From markets to museums, Germany’s Bavarian capital has much to offer
Rising, rising, rising. Halfway through my 30-minute sunset ride on the Umadum Munich, the view from 78 metres up is truly majestic. The world’s tallest mobile Ferris wheel debuted in 2019 in the revitalized Werksviertel-Mitte quarter of east Munich. I’m giving it a big “Ja!”
Next door, sheep graze on the grassy roof of Werk3, a sleek orange building that formerly produced mashed potatoes and dumplings. Today, it thrives with 22,000 square metres of shops, restaurants and creative outposts. In my spacious gondola, I turn and gaze beyond the München Ost railway station and the Isar River. Church spires adorn the heart of Germany’s third-largest city.
From this vantage point, it’s hard to believe that less than 80 years ago, Munich lay in ruins. In the last days of Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich, the city was reduced to rubble by Allied bombing. While I grew up on classic WWII fiction—like The Eagle Has Landed by Jack Higgins—I came here for a taste of how modern-day Munich both acknowledges and transcends its historical legacy.