Munich is looking wonderful. And prosperous. And a city of high cultural values, no news there, but you feel it immediately.
The weather is stormy.
Young people are a strong (and handsome) presence wherever you go. Bicycles, bicycles, bicycles. Easy riding in the flat open city, there's no need for (or question of) helmets here - the chance of contact with a hard surface looks very remote. A mother with her child in a rear drawn bike carriage is a common sight. Dedicated lanes are respected and where they aren't, traffic sharing is civil and generous. Public transport is multilayered (bus, tram, U-bahn, S-bahn) and well integrated. Tickets to the opera include travel all all public transport.
The grand 'strassen' in the Zentrum, lined with the saved, preserved and restored, are magnificent.
Everyone is friendly and gracious. The service ethic is faultless.
We are in Schwabing, staying close by friends.
The hotel is functional clean and slick modern. A delight really, tucked in a suburban street in this northern Munich district between Hohenzollernplatz and Kurfürsenplatz. There's not many prewar buildings (art noveaux-ish on the left next to postwar)
The main roads are wide and busy and the tram / bus services enviable.
A few blocks away is the park built on the mounded rubble of the ruined city with the telecommunication tower in the Olympiapark peeking in from the west. The morning are often cool and showery and this is the loveliest calm space to start the day, with the occasional jogger, dog walkers, and herded school children ...
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