Munich Tours

We did the Dachau tour & it was great. They give you information you wouldn't find w/o taking it. It is a very somber tour. Enjoy! Don't know anything about the others. We walked around the Marketplace & visited Ludwig's Castle.

"Dark History Tours" has been getting good reviews, so you might want to get in touch with them. It is run by a native English speaker who is a professional archeologist and absolutely passionate about Munich and its history. I have spoked with a few people who have taken tours with this guide and they were really impressed and liked it a lot. They aren't expensive either. He does 3rd Reich kind of tours as well. Thus the name - Dark History.

http://www.dark-history.eu/

Just a quick word on Mike's tour. Although I enjoyed it at the time, looking back, it wasn't the most efficient use of my valuable vacation hours. You get an overview of a few areas of central Munich, but other than one church where admission is free, you don't actually tour any of the buildings. With only two days in Munich, you might find that you actually want to visit some of the buildings you only briefly rode by. You can do just as well by renting a city bike and following the highlights in Rick Steves' book. That way, if something interests you, you can go in. Of course, you won't meet any fellow travelers this way, if that is one of your goals...

I'd take a Dachau tour, but only the 2½ hr one offered by the Memorial itself for €3,-. My guide sure gave us a lot of information about the Memorial in 2½ hours. An MVV XXL Tageskarte (€7 single, €12,30 2-5 people) will cover all your transportation (S-Bahn and Bus) to the memorial and back. It's very simple to do on your own. Take the S-2, Richtung (direction) Petershausen, to the Dachau Bahnhof. The bus stops are in front of the Bahnhof and very well marked in English.

Ditto Char's response to the Radius Tour to Dachau. Yes, you can do it on you own for less money. Will you get as much out of it? I don't think so. That is just my opinion of course. The tour was very informative, and since I went there to learn something it was money well spent. We considered doing the Third Reich tour too, but decided against it in order to actually see Munich during our very short time there.

Has anyone done both the Radius tour and the Memorial's official tour? Why do you assume you will get more out of the Radius tour? Just because it costs more? Where did they get all of this extra information, and why doesn't the Memorial give it to you, too? I'll bet they hire ex Memorial guides.

If you do the tour on your own, instead of having a guided tour, you can rent an audio-guide for almost the same price (€3,50) and do the tour at your own pace.

Ah, Munich. Since 1987, I've spent 26 full (10) or partial days in that town. There's a ton of stuff to see in and around Marienplatz (Rathaus, Residenz, Frauenkirche, Vikualienmarkt, Hofbräuhaus). You can also climb the church tower at Heilige Peter for a view of Marienplatz, the whole city, and, on a clear day, to the Alps. A few blocks south of Marienplatz is the Stadtmuseum of Munich. It's very interesting, but only in German. Near Marienplatz, on the river, is Deutsches Museum, their version of the Smithsonian. You can easily spend a day there. On a nice day, the Englischer Garten is a good place for girl watching ;o). In the western suburbs, Schloss Nymphenburg was the summer palace of the Wittelsbachers, in a beautiful park setting. Some people like to tour the grounds of the 1970 Olympics. The pedestrian mall from Marienplatz to Karlstor has great shopping and nice restaurants.

Given only one day, the problem would be figuring out what not to see.

and you didnt even mention the great art museums in munich.

Darrell,

We have taken Mike's bike tour, we enjoyed it, but like Tom said it only gives you an overview of Munich, you don't really get to see the inside of many buildings. We thought that we spent to much time at the beer garden, our time could have been spent in a more cultural way, but at the time we needed a break from churches and museums and it did the trick. We also went to Dachau on our own, exactly like Lee describes it, it is easily done, the guided tour at the historical site is very good and cheap, only at 11am and 1pm. Hope you enjoy Munich as much as we did!