Although my travel adventures have only just begun, my plan for doing so is to visit just one country at a time. Stay in a major city with an airport, take day trips out into other cities or the countryside, and really get a feel for that country as a whole. However, for this trip I wanted to do something a bit different. Inspired by the pictures on various bottles of gluhwein portraying old town squares bright with holiday lights, I knew I had to journey to some European Christmas markets for my vacation. (Indeed, gluhwein itself almost became the theme of this trip, as I always had a steaming mug or cup of it everywhere we went.)
There are so many Christmas markets that would have fit the bill, but after much mulling it over, we finally settled on three: Prague, Munich, and Strasbourg.
We had fewer than 24 hours to spend in Munich, and it rained the whole time. But we looked forward to arriving in Marienplatz. (I love when you can look at a word from another language and see how it evolved into the English derivation–you may notice that this resembles the English words “Mary’s place”.) The market there, which has existed since the 1300s, is considered to be the most authentic in Munich. Alas, everything, including the Christmas markets, is closed at 9pm–when we arrived–on a Friday night. Nevertheless, we found the beauty that we sought and enjoyed our brief stay.
We managed to find one restaurant right across from the Glockenspiel that was still open for dinner when we arrived. Menu items were limited at that hour and we both received cold food, but it was an attractive and cozy little spot. The service was decent, the view couldn’t be beat, and I got my gluhwein.
The next morning, I purchased at a candy shop the best gingerbread and fruitcake I had ever eaten. We checked out the Viktualienmarkt (or “victuals market”) in the cold, pouring rain and got a hand-carved wooden Christmas ornament to commemorate our trip. Then we hit the rails for Strasbourg.
As you can see, Munich is absolutely gorgeous. I will note that we had one somewhat uncomfortable experience while brunching on our second day. We went into a restaurant, got seated and offered English menus before we’d even had a chance to say guten morgen, and then got forgotten about. We watched other people come in, order, eat, and leave while we sat and waited to place our orders and for our check for over 20 minutes, trying to catch the eye of an unfriendly waitress so she could remind our inattentive waiter that we were still there. Maybe it was just an off day for that establishment, but it felt very similar to the anti-American prejudice I experienced in Paris in 1997, since we hadn’t done anything impolite.
Still, we didn’t have too many interactions in our brief time in Munich, and no others like that, so I can’t say whether that attitude is pervasive. And it certainly won’t stop me from seeing more of Germany in the future.
Have you visited Munich? What was your experience there?
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