Name: Beer and the City: Five Hundred Years of Munich in a Glass
SKU: 200

A walk about beer that you can take sober, at ten in the morning, with children. It starts at the Hofbräuhaus, a beer hall that belongs to the state, and asks three questions on the way across the old town: who was allowed to brew, who set the price, and who got to pour. You will see where a duke’s court brewery began in a henhouse in 1589, hear what the famous purity rule of 1516 says first (a price, not barley), stand where a soldier’s refusal to pay for his beer set off the riots of 1844, learn why Munich beer gardens let you bring your own food, meet the farm boy who married a brewery and the widow who built one, and end at the city gate where a medieval horse race and a royal wedding began the Oktoberfest. Every claim is sourced and every legend labeled. No tastings are included and no stop is a bar.

The stops

The Platzl: A Beer Hall the State Owns
The Alter Hof: A Duke’s Beer Bill
Marienplatz: Price Before Purity
The Tal: A Riot Over a Maß
The Viktualienmarkt: Beer and Bread, Nothing Else
Sendlinger Straße: The Brewer Who Married the Brewery
Neuhauser Straße: The Friars Left, the Beer Stayed
Neuhauser Straße 27: The Widow’s Brewery
The Karlstor: A Race, a Wedding and a Tavern Keeper

Finding the start

Start on the Platzl in front of the Hofbräuhaus (Platzl 9), about 400 meters north-east of Marienplatz (U3, U6 and all S-Bahn lines), a walk of five to ten minutes. Stand on the square facing the front with its arches and corner bay window.

Terrain and access

About 2.2 kilometers, flat and step-free, almost entirely in the pedestrian zone and the Viktualienmarkt. Cobbles in the Alter Hof courtyard and uneven paving between the market stalls; only quiet side streets to cross. Crowded at midday on Marienplatz and Neuhauser Straße. No admissions; every building is seen from outside. The tour ends at Karlsplatz (Stachus), with U-Bahn, S-Bahn and trams. The optional walk on to the Theresienwiese adds about 1.5 kilometers with busy road crossings at traffic lights, or one subway stop.

Tickets

No admissions; every building is seen from outside.

Keep going

Munich After Dark: Witch Trials, Plague and the Christmas of 1705

What you get

An email from [email protected] with a link and an access code.
Use it on your phone or tablet in an up-to-date web browser, no app store needed. There is no account to set up before you start.
Download it on Wi-Fi before you go. After that it works offline: audio, text, map and pictures.
Your booking includes 2 phones, so two of you can follow along, each on your own. Extra phones are $2.95 each, or a group can share one phone on its speaker.
Play, pause and replay every part, skip back and ahead, or change the playback speed. Keep the screen on or tap play at each stop.

How it was made

Every fact in the narration is checked against a cited source, and legends are told as legends. The narration is written from that research. How our tours are made.