007 Travelogue: Munich (GERMANY) 2024

Sunday 14 July

Our first destination of 2024 was Germany. The Finnair flight landed in Munich in the morning and we picked up our rental car from the AVIS office at the airport. We got a “Seat Arona 1.0 Suv”. Munich Airport is a “Bond destination”, where 007 first lands in Ian Fleming‘s book “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” (1963), but at that time the airport was still located in an old location in the Riem district. Munich-Riem Airport was in use from 1939 to 1992, and today all that remains is the old air traffic control tower!

No Bond films have been filmed in Munich, but 007 has visited the city a couple of times in the Bond books.

“Tracy gazed at him wide-eyed when she met him outside Passport Control at Munich Airport, but she waited until they were inside the little Lancia before she burst into tears. ‘What have they been doing to you?’ she said through her sobs. ‘What have they been doing to you now?’

Bond took her in his arms, ‘It’s all right, Tracy. I promise you. These are only cuts and bruises, like a bad ski-fall. Now don’t be a goose. They could happen to anyone.’ He smoothed back her hair and took out his handkerchief and dabbed at her eyes.”

Ian Fleming: “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service“

When Bond next visited Munich in John Gardner’s book “Seafire” (1994), a Franz Josef Strauss Airport was already in use. It was opened in 1992.

“The flight to Munich was, as usual, boring, and the German efficiency at passport control and the car-rental desk left nothing to be desired. He collected a cream-colored VW Corrado, driving straight to the Splendid, where the car was parked for him by the staff of the hotel, the facade of which managed to draw anyone’s attention away from the place. It was one of the delights of the Splendid that it looked like nothing and yet, for comfort, security, and service, was everything that an incognito traveler would wish.”

—

“Wolfie appeared to be under the impression that he was a Formula One driver, but he still took well over an hour and a half to get to Munich Airport. There were only four really frightening incidents during the drive, and Bond paid up, hurrying into the almost deserted airport to find that he had a very long wait, as there were no flights to London until a British Airways departure at seven-thirty in the morning. There were seats on the flight, so he managed to exchange his Lufthansa ticket, to the delight of the young woman at the BA desk.”

John Gardner: “Seafire“

Since we could only check into our Munich hotel at 3 p.m., we first drove to see The Nymphenburg Palace (Schloss Nymphenburg). It is a Baroque palace situated in Munich’s western district Neuhausen-Nymphenburg, in Bavaria, southern Germany. The Nymphenburg served as the main summer residence for the former rulers of Bavaria of the House of Wittelsbach. Combined with the adjacent Nymphenburg Palace Park it constitutes one of the premier royal palaces of Europe. Its frontal width of 632 m (2,073 ft) (north–south axis) even surpasses Versailles.

It was commissioned by the Elector of Bavaria Ferdinand Maria and his wife, Princess Henriette Adelaide of Savoy (1636-1676), in honor of the birth of their long-awaited son, Maximilian II Emanuel.

The weather in Munich was quite hot. After lunch at the castle restaurant, we visited outside of the nearby antique shop. Antiquitäten Seitz Werner is located at Notburgastrasse 19. We don’t know if it was an antique shop in 1961 when Bond went to buy a wedding ring for his future wife Tracy 🙂

“The next day was occupied with hilarious meals with Marc-Ange, whose giant trailer had come during the night to take up most of the parking space behind the hotel, and with searching the antique shops for an engagement and a wedding ring. The latter was easy, the traditional plain gold band, but Tracy couldn’t make up her mind about the engagement ring and finally dispatched Bond to find something he liked himself while she had her last fitting for her ‘going-away’ dress. Bond hired a taxi, and he and the taxi-man, who had been a Luftwaffe pilot during the war and was proud of it, tore round the town together until, at an antique shop near the Nymphenburg Palace, Bond found what he wanted–a baroque ring in white gold with two diamond hands clasped. It was graceful and simple and the taxi-man was also in favour, so the deal was done and the two men went off to celebrate at the Franziskaner Keller, where they ate mounds of Weisswurst and drank four steins of beer each and swore they wouldn’t ever fight each other again. Then, happy with his last bachelor party, Bond returned tipsily to the hotel, avoided being embraced by the taxi-man, and went straight up to Tracy’s room and put the ring on her finger.”

Ian Fleming” On Her Majesty’s Secret Service“

The Franziskaner Keller mentioned in the quote was once located at Hochstrasse 7, now the office of “Selected Events” was at that address.

Accommodation: Hotel Adria München

Address: Liebigstrasse 8a

Room type: Junior Suite Price: 205.29 EUR / 1 night / 3 people (breakfast included)

Booking: via hotels.com

After arriving at the “Hotel Adria München”, it was time for a little evening walk. In the book “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service“, Bond visits, among other places, Odeon’s Platz. In John Gardner’s novel “Seafire” (1994), Bond’s hotel is “Hotel Splendid”, located on Maximilianstrasse. Today the closest hotel to that name and location is the Splendid-Dollmann Hotel, but it is not exactly on Maximilianstrasse.

“Back in the flat, Bond spent half an hour hunched over the telephone calling Lufthansa and booking a return flight to Munich leaving late that afternoon, then reserving a single room at Munich’s Splendid, where he would be well out of the way, particularly hidden from the Tarn party staying at Vier Jahreszeiten. The Splendid had long been the Munich resting place for those who wished to keep a low profile.”

John Gardner: “Seafire”

“His suitcase had been unpacked and there was a bowl of crocuses beside his bed. Bond smiled, picked up the bowl, and placed it firmly on the window-sill. Then he had a quick shower, complicated by having to keep his dressings dry, changed out of his stinking ski clothes into the warmer of the two dark-blue suits he had brought with him, sat down at the writing-desk, and jotted down the headings of what he would have to put on the teleprinter to M. Then he put on his dark-blue raincoat and went down into the street and along to the Odeons Platz.

(If he had not been thinking of other things, he might have noticed the woman on the other side of the street, a squat, toad-like figure in a frowsty dark-green Loden cloak, who gave a start of surprise when she saw him sauntering along, hustled across the street through the traffic, and got on his tail. She was expert at what she was doing, and, when he went into the newish apartment house on the Odeons Platz, she didn’t go near the door to verify the address, but waited on the far side of the square until he came out. Then she tailed him back to the Vier Jahreszeiten, took a taxi back to her flat, and put in a long-distance call to the Metropole Hotel on Lake Como.)”

Ian Fleming: “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”

We had a table reservation for the evening at the Hotel Vier Jahreszeiten, which is Bond’s hotel in “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” book. Dinner at the hotel’s restaurant Schwarzreiter Tagesbar was absolutely amazing and it was a great end to our first day in Germany. More pics about the hotel here

We also have to mention film “Munich“, produced and directed by Steven Spielberg and nominated for five Academy Awards, starring Daniel Craig as South African driver “Steve”, one of the main characters.

Munich is a 2005 historical drama film produced and directed by Steven Spielberg, co-written by Tony Kushner and Eric Roth. It is based on the 1984 book Vengeance by George Jonas, an account of Mossad assassinations following the Munich massacre. Spielberg has called his film “historical fiction”, which deals with real events through fictional characters. The cast also includes Bond villains Michael Lonsdale (Hugo Drax, from “Moonraker“, 1979) and Mathieu Amalric (Dominic Greene, from “Quantum of Solace“, 2008).

The next day, morning walk before leaving Munich. There are many interesting things to see near Odeons Platz. When Roger Moore has visited the city, he has stayed, e.g. in the “Bayerischer Hof” hotel.

The next day we head towards Wasserburg am Inn, where Bond visits in the book “Seafire” (1994)

See more 007 TRAVELOGUES here