Weekending in Hamburg

Friday, August 15th was a holiday here in Bavaria, so we took the opportunity to do a weekend trip to Hamburg, Germany. Hamburg us located in northern Germany. With 1.8 million people, it is the second largest city in the country. As it is located on the Elbe River, it is the second largest port in Europe. The city is covered with bodies of water: rivers, canals, artificial lakes, etc. I don’t think we were expecting that. The weather for the entire weekend was really mixed. The temperature was in the high 60s and pretty pleasant for sight-seeing. But the precipitation was so unpredictable! One minute the sun would be shining and literally seconds later, it would be pouring. I do believe that Hamburg gets more rain that the average city, but I’m not sure if every day is like this, or if we just were unlucky. Anyways, it didn’t affect our trip too much.

We had an early flight on Friday morning, so we were able to eat lunch in Hamburg. We enjoyed an al fresco lunch at a café that sits along the main harbor. This is the most touristy part of the city and boy, was it crowded! After lunch, we walked through some different areas of the city. Hamburg is very spread out. We walked a ton and really only saw two main districts of the city on that first afternoon. In the evening, we did some more walking and checked out the Außenalster, the large, artificial lake that is located in the city. It was very pretty to see at sunset. For dinner, we chose a cozy wine bar with delicious Flammkuchen (flatbreads). Our waiter was super friendly, which is unusual for German restaurants! In fact, we both noted that all of our waiters/waitresses for the entire weekend were much friendlier than the waiters in Munich. Point, Hamburg!

On Saturday, we woke up earlier to go for a run, as we wanted to experience a morning run along the Außenalster. Our hotel provided us with a tiny map of a running route that would take us right around the lake – perfect! The only problem was that the map wasn’t very detailed and the route up to the lake was much more complicated than we anticipated. We had planned to do 5 ½ or 6 miles, but we actually ended up doing 7 miles, plus some walking when we got a bit lost and had to stop at a random hotel for directions. Matt was not too pleased with me! But the run was beautiful (despite getting lost) and it was a great way to start our morning and see more of the city.

After we showered and changed, we headed to a different area of the city for an American-style brunch. The place was so cute and their pancakes and French toast were delicious! Plus, they had great filter coffee (just regular black coffee), which is often difficult to find at cafes in Munich. It was such a treat to have a little taste of home. Munich doesn’t have anything quite like this.

After a long and relaxing brunch, we continued our tour of Hamburg. We ended up using public transportation a lot because of how spread out all of the different areas are. The “old city” area did remind me a lot of Munich – the town hall has a similar architectural style, as do many of the surrounding buildings. However, the abundance of water within the old city was really unique. It reminded me a bit of Venice in a way, but not overwhelmingly so, as the architecture is much, much different.

In the evening, we decided to check out a craft beer bar and restaurant, as Matt is always looking to try different craft beers in Germany. Recently in Munich, we’ve seen quite a few beverage stores that carry craft beers popping up around the city. The imported craft beers from the USA are usually pretty expensive (think €7 for a Sierra Nevada – and remember, this is at a store, not a bar!), but there are several German breweries that have gotten into the craft beer game. Anyways, we weren’t sure what to expect but wow, this place was so cool! It reminded me a lot of the trendy restaurants that we enjoy in Philly. This place was called “Altes Mädchen” (“the old young girl”??) and it was located in a warehouse with really fun and hip décor. It was absolutely packed at 6:30 on a Saturday night (very early in the evening for Hamburgers), so that’s a great sign. We managed to snag two seats at the bar though because Germans absolutely detest eating and drinking at the actual bar of a bar/restaurant. Again, the bartender here was so friendly! Although admittedly, it was difficult to understand her because of her thick accent and the volume in the place. Nevertheless, Matt enjoyed a really great tasting flight of different brews, while I tried a cider that comes from Hamburg. We were planning on staying for only one drink, but we enjoyed it so much, we stayed for dinner. Matt tried the burger (with manchengo cheese and avocado, yum!) while I tried the pulled pork sandwich – different than I had expected, but still really delicious. We had such a fun time at this place! Again, it almost felt like we were back in the USA (minus everyone around us speaking German, of course!).

After dinner, we strolled through another interesting part of Hamburg: the red light district. Similar to Amsterdam, prostitution is legal in Hamburg. We walked down a few of the streets just to see all of the bars and clubs, but we quickly headed back to the hotel. It wasn’t anything too crazy, but it’s not really our scene. In fact, all of the girls are fully clothed and you wouldn’t even know what they are doing, except that they all carry fanny packs to identify themselves. Interesting to see though, for sure.

We had to be up early again on Sunday to catch our flight back to Munich. It was a pretty quick trip, but we really enjoyed seeing another German city, especially one that is so vastly different from Munich. I think all too often we stereotype the entire country of Germany based on our experiences in Munich, and the reality is that other parts of the country are very different. Below is a small summary of some of the differences:

-Munich is much cleaner
-Hamburg has MUCH more diversity, both in good ways and bad (so many creepy people using public transportation!)
-Hamburgers (yes, that is what they are called) seem to be much friendlier to strangers
-Hamburg seems to be more open to international influences (food, music, fashion, etc.)
-Munich is much more conservative
-Hamburgers appear to stay out later and party a bit more aggressively
-Munich traditions and culture are more in line with what Americans think of when they think of Germany

Overall, we had a really great weekend and we were glad we got to see another very different German city. At the end of the day though, there's no place like home, and we're happy to call Munich ours!

Cheers,
Matt and Kristin