Home of the original Oktoberfest, a legendary Hofbrauhaus and a culture unmatched by the rest of Germany, Munich is a place you have to see to believe. München is what the Germans call the incredible city; its center is checkered with the white and blue flag, draped in the lion mascot of the state and drenched in unparalleled history. Munich is a city of many hidden treasures. It’s more than just the obviously breathtaking Glockenspiel overseeing the city center in Marienplatz, Dirndl and Lederhosen clad natives, Allianz Arena with arguably the best soccer team in the world, Deutsches Museum or English Gardens — though I would heartily recommend all of these things.

The city of Munich is called Germany’s most livable city for a reason, with a large English-speaking expat population and a remarkable number of tour companies offering a variety of interesting exploratory tours of the city and its history. The public transportation is also simple to traverse in Munich, with stops around all of the major landmarks.

A long-loved highlight in Munich is the gem that is the English Gardens. There are local nudist sunbathers, beautiful walking and biking paths, and most remarkably — intercity surfing. A physics professor from Ludwig Maximilian University, which has a gorgeous open campus you can visit, created an infinity wave in the middle of the gardens in the 1970s that surfers from around the world line up to shred. Around the same area you can visit the still intact medieval city walls, eat Bavarian classics at the famous Hofbrauhaus, and visit world-class museums that easily match the Smithsonian institution in Washington D.C.

Munich is more than simply the capital of Bavaria and a bastion of culture. Munich is a city everyone should visit.

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