Germany's highest peak, 1936 Winter Olympics, and Zugspitze at your doorstep
Garmisch-Partenkirchen is Germany's premier Alpine resort — a twin town at the foot of the Zugspitze (2,962m), Germany's highest mountain, with a rack railway and cable car taking you to the summit above the clouds. It hosted the 1936 Winter Olympics, has some of the best ski terrain in the country, and sits in the Werdenfels valley with painted Lüftlmalerei facades and traditional Bavarian architecture that hasn't been theme-parked.
The two towns of Garmisch and Partenkirchen were merged in 1935 specifically to host the 1936 Winter Olympics — the last Winter Games before the war, and notable for being a Nazi showcase event. The region has been a resort destination since the Romantic era, when artists and writers came for the mountain scenery; Richard Strauss lived here for the last decades of his life and composed much of his late work at his villa in Garmisch.