Patti World

Day 2: Walking with the Brugmans, a tour of Munich

This was a good one. Recommended by Rick Steves in his Best of Germany tour book, we took the free guided tour in Munich; Charlie was standing outside the Carl Thomas Jeweler in Marienplatz ready to go at 10:35. Surprising to us, he was British, so no struggling for words at all. History must be his hobby because he obviously loves it. Of course, we had to start off with the Glockenspiel because we were standing in the plaza at exactly the right time. While the animation of the figures didn’t change, the music did; John got the tune right, but another guy knew that Elvis had turned it into a hit song—  “Muss i denn” (1827 Frederick Silcher) became “Wooden Heart” for the movie “G.I. Blues”— pretty cool. That was one of the more than 20 folk tunes in the mix played from the tower.


The figures circle around inside the top balcony.

Munich was 80% destroyed by the war (it was the heart of Hitler’s movement), and fabulously restored to look old. Inside and around the clock tower, which shows the Bavarian king and queen watching a jousting match. The blue/white knight represents Bavaria, and in the last rotation defeats the red and yellow knight.

Inside is a public building that houses real working Ministries.

With lovely modern stained glass. 80% if everything we saw was new, except the very foundations, which were only 100-200 years old. Munich was settled by monks, which is why the name is Munich — John asked about Munchkins, but the joke did not register. The Wizard of Oz is too American, even for our British guide, it turns out! Anyway, the monks liked making beer, and Munich had great water. They also found that the salt here was a commodity. With Salzburg close by (Saltz= salt), salt mining was a profitable business. There was another story about a wooden bridge that became very popular. In response, a competitor for public access built a stone bridge, then burned down the wooden bridge so he could charge passage (a la Billy Goat’s Gruff?) That was around 1100. All of this (with huge gaps in the history) explains why there is a monk central to the Munich flag.

Jump forward and turn the corner. Inside the cathedral, this is the devil’s footprint. Legend has it that the builder made a deal with the devil so that he could finish building the church on time. The builder fooled the devil but still ended on time.
This building, under construction, marks where Herman Goring was shot, and Hitler was arrested. Charlie told us how close Goring was to being killed and how Hitler was jailed for high treason, but then got a reduced sentence— if only he’d been admitted to art school instead. The world would have been so much better and maybe even prettier. The ironies run deep.
This fun brass map shows us the old city with the shiny cathedral in the foreground. We walked all of it. The whole town is neo-Gothic, which means the cathedral should have candle-dripped spires disappearing toward God, but that design was too expensive, so they went with the round domes instead.
Lunch at Zum Alten Markt was particularly lovely, especially with the mix of gravies. Yum!
Inside, the restaurant looked like a scene from Beauty and the Beast—“I use antlers in all of my decorating!”

In the afternoon, we hit another planned destination. It turns out that Munich has a terrific Egyptian museum. The collection is mostly broken potsherds, but the building is stupendous. We start by descending underground by this path, with the same slope and feel as if entering an Egyptian tomb.

Smiling crocodile with eyelashes. Actually a mummy mask for a crocodile with traces of mummy wrappings inside.
The collection devolves into Roman influence, but this lion has fabulous colors. Behind it, you can just see the shallow steps that take us out of the tomb and back to surface level. Quite amazing in all of its displays, even if most weren’t spectacular.

We did not return to the raucous beer hall for dinner, but decided to follow Elliot’s recommendation and have schnitzel! My half order was terrific. Just right to end the day. Good night.