Biking in Munich - Englische Garten

I think the Englischer Garden would be easy to cycle without a guide. (I saw someone cycling through the Chinesischer Turm beer garden with four huge steins of beer, two in each hand!)

We stayed on the edge of the Englischer Garden and walked through much of it. Very nice!

I can't comment on cycling to the BMW factory, as we didn't go there.

In my opinion, guided tours are just a way to separate tourist from their money. If you can figure out how to do it on your own, you'll be better off.

Jess, we took the Mikes Bike Tour in Munich last year, and it was the highlight of our 2 days in Munich! Fun facts and atmosphere. We're in our 50's, and several in the group were in their 20's and 30's. Everyone in our group was having fun. We remember the facts and history from that afternoon and of course, it was fun to return to Munich and the Englishe Beer garden.

If you want to meet up with other travelers, Mike's Tours might be a good option. But as a method to explore Munich, I was disappointed. I had covered about 80% of the territory of the tour on foot the day before, and I saw little new. The cultural and historical details brought up on the tour, although amusing, can be found in any basic guidebook. And as the others noted, you can easily explore the Englischer Garten on your own, especially via bicycle. By this method, it won't take too long.

I've ridden to Olympiapark, or at least, the hills in the immediate vicinity. It's a much more peaceful area of the city, if rather modern. If you decide to cycle out here, do it on a day with clear, sunny skies. From the hills, you'll be able to see all the way to the Alps.

If you decide against Mike's Tours, you can easily rent bicycles at the Hauptbahnhof. Munich is one of the more bicycle-friendly cities in Germany (and not by coincidence, also one of the least car-friendly!). You'll have a great time riding around. Also consider riding along the river to the zoo or out to Nymphenburg.

I've rented bikes from Mike's on two different trips to Munich, as well as taking their introductory bike tour of the city. I agree the previous poster that the tour is a fun and friendly introduction to some of the highlights of Munich, but there's not a lot of biking involved- short rides between sites, then longer stops for "historic" talks. It also includes a lunch stop in the English Gardens.

On both of our trips, we enjoyed much more renting bikes (at Mike's) for the day, and exploring this very bike-friendly city. The staff at Mike's provided a map, and marked out a route for us. We visited the BMW Weld, English Gardens and the Olympic park, as well as the Nymphenburg Palace (on two different trips). All very doable (for four 60-somethings), and all very enjoyable; the best way to spend a day in Munich. A bonus with Mike's is that they are right next to the Hofbrauhaus, to replenish your fluids when finished!

Thank you for all the helpful responses. It looks like we may need to rent the bikes a bit earlier in the morning in order to get to BMW-Welt on time for our tour...Mike's Bike Tours doesn't open until 10:00 so we are now looking into Radius Bike Rental. Has anyone used Radius? Are they equally good?

We always rented bikes from Mike (not the tour, just the hourly bike rental) for our Oktoberfest group trips. You might want to ask Mike about an early bike pick up, I'm sure he can be flexible.

For the English Gardens we always ride up to mini-Hofbraü. Great way to see a lot of the park.

DJ