Melissa and her husband Marcus visited Hamburg and they spent three days in this exciting city. This is a copy of their blogpost on The Diary of a Jewellery Lover:
Day three
Today after breakfast we decided to visit the International Maritime Museum and then the Chocoversum, Hamburg’s own chocolate museum.
Onto the U-Bahn again we took the nearest stop to the Warehouse District or Speicherstadt the largest warehouse area in the world. After the obligatory photo of Mr W with an anchor, we entered the International Maritime Museum.
The museum houses Peter Tamm’s collection of model ships, construction plans, uniforms, and maritime art, amounting to over 40,000 items and more than one million photographs. It really is a comprehensive collection and one that will delight lovers of ships and maritime memorabilia.
I must admit Mr W did enjoy it more than me but they did have some incredibly cool items such as old submarines, a small pirate exhibition and a bunch of harpoons. We were unlucky that we didn’t manage to book a guided tour but to get the most of it this is probably the way to go. Allow an hour or two to explore but if you are a real maritime junky you could probably spend all day here.
We stopped in the lovely coffee shop attached for coffee and dessert, the peach pie was outstanding, then decided to walk over to the Chocoversum.
If I could describe the Chocoversum in one word it would be choctastic! The Chocoverseum is a 90 minute guided tour through the history of chocolate. You follow the journey from the raw cocoa beans from the pods to the finished bar of chocolate ready for the shops.
We both really enjoyed this museum, seeing the cocoa bean and trying it raw then being shown how it is made into chocolate and tasting the samples as you go around really made it memorable. My favourite part was making your own bar of chocolate and of course eating it later!
So with tums full of chocolate, we stumbled back to the U-Bahn and our hotel. We could have gone to a traditional German restaurant that night but I must admit, we did the touristy thing and went to the Hard Rock Cafe, in the harbour area.
What did we think of Hamburg? In our short time here we only scratched the surface of this fabulous city but can conclude, it’s a city full of history, amazing museums and stunning architecture. If it wasn’t on your radar before, I hope it is now.
Let me know, would you consider Hamburg as a city tourist destination?
