It's amazing how 12 hours of sleep can make you feel like a brand new person. After not getting any sleep the night before we arrived in Munich, 12 hours was much needed. No more cranky Linda (much to the delight of Steve, I'm sure).
Because we slept in, we were too late to make a trip to Salzburg or Neuschwanstein, so we decided to visit Nuremberg. It was only a 90 minute drive from Munich. A word of advice, Nuremberg can show up on the GPS in many ways: Nuremberg, Nürnberg, Nueremberg, and Nüremberg).
We had zero expectations about what Nuremberg would be like. I think because of that we found the city much more enjoyable than Munich (the 12 hours of sleep probably helped too).
Before visiting, I only knew of Nuremberg from learning about the Nuremberg trials that took place there between 1945 and 1946. Nuremberg itself is a beautiful, quaint city that really displays the best of Bavarian culture, something I didn't see too much of in Munich. The vibe was super chill, a nice change from the crowds and commercial stores in bigger cities.
The city center was fun to explore. It was bustling with tourists. There was a little market and a music stage. Hovering over all this was St. Lorenz Church, which was originally built in 1477. Fun fact: constructing the church first began in 1270 and took over 200 years to complete. We just don't have history like this in the US!
restauration kopernikus
We loved this Polish restaurant so much that we ate there for lunch and dinner. We ordered the bigos (cabbage stew with sausage), the piroggen (pierogi), the fränkischer schweinebraten (baked pork and a side of dumpling), and the pfannenschnitzel (schnitzel). The portion sizes were on point.