Munich... when you tire of chugging back bucket-sized steins, there are the art museums to take in.
Munich's best art and history museums.
Six famous museums in Munich, Germany, including three art galleries spanning the great European masters through to the here and now (Alte Pinakothek, Neue Pinakothek and Pinakothek der Moderne); collections of Greek and Roman art and antiquities at the Glyptothek and Antikensammlungen and all things Bavarian at the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum.
€1 ($1.75) entry on Sundays, a saving of up to €8 at some museums.
Mention Munich and the first thing most people think of is Oktoberfest and the Hofbrauhaus but when (or if) you tire of the delights of chugging back bucket-sized steins of beer or feel as if you really can't stand the sight of one more pair of badly fitting lederhosen, it's time to get out of the beer hall and do what the locals do in Munich of a Sunday go on a cultural binge.
You can get your fix of all things ancient and old at the Glyptothek and Antikensammlungen, both brimming with Roman and Greek antiquities, big Roman busts, gold, silver and bronze jewellery and more sculptures and pots than you can poke a stick at.
It's a Bavarian rhapsody at the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, where you'll find three massive floors dedicated to cultural artefacts from all over southern Germany and Bavaria in particular. There's sculpture and pottery, musical instruments, craftwork and furniture. The highlight is the famous collection of cots, apparently the "most valuable and extensive crib collection in the world" according to the museum's leaflet.
The Alte Pinakothek is home to one of the most important art collections in the world, a whopping great collection of more than 800 European masterpieces from the 14th through to the 18th centuries. The Neue Pinakothek picks up where the Alte leaves off, with 18th- to early 20th-century art, including some great impressionists.
But, for my money (all €1 of it!), the best of the lot is the Pinakothek der Moderne. Four separate museums (art, design, architecture and works on paper) have been combined under the one roof to form Germany's biggest (and most accessible to those that subscribe to the "don't know much about art but know what I like" school of art appreciation) collections of 20th- and 21st-century art.
Like all modern art museums, some of the stuff is just plain weird but most of it is just plain fabulous, including the architecture of the building itself, a massive white space that seems to float beneath a huge dome.
There are plenty of Warhols, Picassos, Dalis, Klees and Kandinskys, and lots of great lesser known German works, but the place where you can really lose yourself is in the basement, which is dedicated to the evolution of industrial design. Eames chairs and Apple Mac computers, just like the one I had at uni, sit side-by-side with VW beetles and 100-year-old electric kettles. A room to the side is devoted to extremely covetable modern jewellery design.
But the great thing about Munich's €1 Sundays is that you can pick and choose your art, without feeling guilty that you've marched past rooms full of the gorgeous works of old Dutch masters just because you want to see the huge Rubens masterpiece, The large Last Judgement, so big the hall was built around the canvas, or ignore the rooms full of Picassos to gaze instead at the quirky collection of sneakers and mobile phones. At just €1 a visit, you can always come back.
Under 18s get in free any time at Bayerisches Nationalmuseum and at the three Pinakotheks. The Pinakotheks also have a regular program of free talks and tours. Check the website below for more details. You can join a free guided one-hour tour of the ancient collections in the Antikensammlungen on Wednesdays at 6pm; Thursdays 6pm in the Glyptothek.
If you just want to see the show, temporary exhibitions at the three pinakotheks are also reduced on Sundays.
See pinakothek.de for details on all museums except the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, which you'll find at bayerisches-nationalmuseum.de
Sign up for the Traveller Deals newsletter
Get exclusive travel deals delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up now.