“I might have been born in Liverpool, but I grew up in Hamburg.” (John Lennon)
I had for a number of years been exploring the cities of Britain travelling by train for day trips (or in the case of Scottish cities having one overnight stay). My personal circumstances precluded being away for longer. In 2018, I decided to extend this by starting to visit cities in Continental Europe, with the intention of having an intense explore while being away for about only 36 hours.
The first city I chose was Hamburg, where I went in April 2018, utilising the very cheap flights available from Stansted Airport. A standard train fare from London to Stansted is often more expensive than the flight, but booking ahead you can usually find an advance fare to the airport for under £10.
Day one – Tuesday 17th April 2018
As my flight from Stansted to Hamburg was at 0750, an early start was required. My plan was to catch the first tube of the day at 0525, to connect with the Stansted Express to get me to the airport about an hour before departure, which given I had minimal luggage, I hoped would be sufficient. I left my house shortly after 5am for the short walk to my local tube station. However, when I arrived there I discovered that no trains were running because of a signal failure. With a bit of quick thinking, I worked out that I could catch a couple of buses which would get me to Tottenham Hale to catch the Stansted Express that I had been planning to catch (or even the one before). This worked perfectly, and is now my preferred method of getting to Stansted for early morning flights.
I had assumed that Stansted would be less busy at that time of the morning, but in fact it is peak departure time and there were long queues to go through security, but they moved quickly. I had time to buy some breakfast before proceeding to the departure gate, where boarding had already started at 0720 when I reached it. My plane left the stand early and actually took off at the advertised departure time of 0750.
With the one hour time difference, the plane arrived in Hamburg at around 10am. Getting off the plane and through immigration was quick and easy. The first thing I did at the airport was purchase a Hamburg Card which provides free public transport in the City (including from the airport) and discounts of up to 50% on admission to museums and similar attractions.
I caught the S-Bahn from the airport, where after one stop at Ohlsdorf the train waits to be coupled with another from the Poppenbüttel branch of the S1 line. At this point, two plain clothes ticket inspectors got on and checked that my newly acquired Hamburg Card was valid. I was heading to the International Maritime Museum, so changed on to the U-Bahn at Berliner Tor. Less than an hour after my plane touched down on the runway at Hamburg airport, I was walking through the doors of the museum.
International Maritime Museum This enormous museum is located in a former warehouse in the Speicherstadt area of the city. The exhibition is spread over nine floors, and tells the history of Hamburg as a port, as well as more general exhibits on ships and the sea. The are literally thousands of model ships on display. I could have spent all day in this one museum, but after three hours I decided I had better move on to see some more of Hamburg.
I walked to the city centre, where a bought a tasty filled roll from a bakery for lunch, which I ate sitting by the Alster lake. I contemplated taking a boat ride along the Alster, but concluded I probably did not have time if I was to visit everywhere else I wanted. So instead I walked up the side of the lake to the Hamburger Kunsthalle
Hamburger Kunsthalle is an enormous museum of art spread over three connected buildings. Its collections range from medieval to modern art. I had been particularly been looking forward to seeing the paintings by Caspar David Friedrich – including his Wanderer above the Sea of Fog.
Included in the admission price was the special exhibition of Thomas Gainsborough’s landscapes they were showing at the time, with its own audioguide. Perhaps the most famous of these was Mr and Mrs Andrews, normally on display in London’s National Gallery. It seemed a bit ironic that I was viewing in Hamburg an exhibition comprised of paintings largely on loan from galleries around Britain.
After finishing at the Kunsthalle, I made my way to my hotel, which was a few minutes walk from the Hauptbahnhof. After freshening up, I went to dinner in a very pleasant pub/restaurant near the station. After a couple of courses washed down with lots of beer, I contemplated having a dessert, being tempted by the apple strudel. I had by this stage run out of beer, but did not want another half litre. However, I noticed chalked up on a blackboard just the word “Salvator” and a price of €3.50. I assumed this would be a small 25cl bottle of the strong (8% alcohol) Paulaner Salvator Doppel Bock, which I thought would go nicely with the strudel. I was right about which beer it was, but wrong about the quantity, as it came in a 0.5l bottle. I drank this very slowly, and was feeling rather merry by the time I came to ask for the bill. I had intended to do a little more sightseeing of the centre of Hamburg after dinner, but in the end thought it safest just to wobble back to my hotel.
Day two – Wednesday 18th April 2018
After having breakfast, I travelled into the Altstadt. The main square is dominated by the rather ornate Rathaus (Town Hall). I had read that tours of the town hall were sometimes available, so I went inside to enquire if there were any that day – unfortunately, there weren’t, but I did manage a little look around inside.
I caught a U-Bahn to visit the Hamburg City Museum (SHMH) located in a park in the St Pauli area of the city. As I got there a little before opening time, I took the opportunity to look at the top end of the notorious Reeperbahn, but at 0930 in the morning it seemed rather tame.
Museum for Hamburg History This splendid museum, as the name suggests, presents a history of the city from ancient times to the present day. There are re-creations of the interiors of historic houses from various periods. There was also an exhibition on the Jews in Hamburg. The extensive 20th century gallery brought home to me how comprehensively the city was destroyed by allied bombing during the Second World War. On the top floor there was a working model railway based on an area of the Hamburg docks – I got there in good time to see one of the hourly displays of it working.
After the City Museum I walked to St Michaels Church, carefully timing my visit to avoid the lunchtime daily service. I climbed the tower for some great views of the city and its docks.
After lunch I went to the Speicherstadtmuseum (Warehouse district museum). I think that it had changed location since my guidebook had been published, and it turned out to be nowhere near as big as I was expecting. It was still interesting, mainly telling the history of the coffee trade in the surroundings of a renovated 19th century warehouse.
As I managed to see all I wanted in the Speicherstadtmuseum in about 40 minutes rather than the two hours I had allowed, it gave me time to visit one more location.
MK&G (Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe) is a museum of applied arts, in some respects similar to London’s V&A museum. Although I had It not originally planned to visit, it turned out to be more interesting than I expected. At the weekends they sold tickets to view a Japanese tea ceremony in a mock-up building in the Japanese section of the galleries. I was fortunate to look in there when they were having a practice session, so got to see it for free.
From the MK&G museum it is just a short walk to Hamburg Hauptbahnhof, so when I had finished I made my way there to catch the S-Bahn to the airport. I calculated that I just had time for a final beer in one of the several reasonably priced bars at the station. As the S1 train would divide before it reaches the airport, I had to ensure that I got on the right portion of the train.
Although busy, I got through the airport fairly quickly. The flight back to Stansted was on time and I was back home by the early evening, little more than 36 hours after I departed.
Europe Explored 