Flammie’s Hamburg
Hamburg is a large city in Germany, I used to live in circa 2015–2020. It is not the biggest or most touristic city in Germany but well worth a visit and overall a nice place to live in. The party happens mostly on Reeperbahn, which has most of the nightlife and also restaurants, city centre and area around the central station is actually more quiet even. Towards west from central station is a shopping street and east are the gay neighbourhood and the Turkish neighbourhood. There’s also an area for bars and night life near Sternschanze station, traditionally more leftwing, locals and Uni students than Reeperbahn, which is just more tourists and stag parties. There is second railway station in Hamburg Altona which was incidentally close to my office, so there are some places mentioned near there, you usually wouldn’t visit there unless taking a train. (Notably, I lived in area that’s near to being halfway between Reeperbahn and Sternschanze, so some of the places are randomly organised because of that).
Restaurants
Reeperbahn
Actually best food in Germany in night life is street kebap, most are good in the neighbourhood, especially after beers. Reeperbahn also has food trucks and cocktail stalls throughout the year on main street (or Spielbudenplatz as it is on Google maps etc.)
- Man Wah good Chinese foods
- Holy Taco, good tacos but high prices
- Baby Goat Barn, decent pizza, atmosphere a bit hit and miss
- Big Bull, mediocre steaks
- Dos Amigos, locals’ favourite, I did not like it
- Kentucky Fried Chicken, worse than average KFC, and bit too rowdy, avoid
- Maredo another local chain restaurant for steaks, prefer Block House over this
Altona
- Köz Urfa one of the best Turkish restaurants in Hamburg
- 380 Grad Pizza Bar, nice pizza slice shop, probably gone already
- Green Papaya decent Thai food
Centre
- Fanny Thai, really good Thai food but bit expensive
- Curry Lounge, nice cheap generic Asian
- Block House, is a nice local chain for steaks, decent prices but sometimes full of families and kids
- Domino’s in Germany bought over and rebranded another chain, it’s not exactly like Domino’s elsewhere in Europe for better or worse
Shops
- Yuan Ye (aka the foreigner market near central station), biggest(?) Asian food market in Central Hamburg, so best place for good and cheap
- Rewe has both smaller shops (e.g. in the docks) with few necessities and foods as well as larger markets (e.g. in Altona)
- Lidl and Aldi are cheaper but good
- Netto also used to be discount shop but maybe just another chain store as of now
Bars
Reeperbahn
- Night Light, legendary metal bar
- Lunacy, metal, punk and hardcore, sometimes other things but usually decent
- Brewdog, trustworthy craft beer and pub foodles
- Astra St Pauli Brauerei, overpriced and bad service, tourist trap
- Irish Rover, decent Irish bar, bit off Reeperbahn (used to be my local-ish)
- Shamrock, sports bar with Guinnes, mid
- Indra Club, venue, sometimes metal
- Knust, venue, sometimes metal
- Headcrash, venue, rarely metal, usually avoid
Grotte, great metal bar, unfortunately gone
Sternschanze
- Altes Mädchen, a brewery restaurant, good food and beers
Others
- Marias Ballroom, a venue in Hamburg Harburg for some metal gigs
- Bambi Galore, a venue in Bilsted for a lot of metal gigs
- Markthalle, venue, sometimes metal, near central station
Hotels
As I lived in Hamburg I do not have huge range of experience with hotels but I have visited it since so I know of a few.
- A & O Hostels is a trustworthy chain, one in Reeperbahn is actually worth the money even for single rooms (definitely for dorms). Ones near central station (e.g. A & O Hbf Hamburg) are more meh but cheap
- Big chains on Reeperbahn are decent but expensive, e.g. Ibis, Premier Inn
Festivals
- Hörnerfest, folk metal etc, local train trip away around Summer Solstice
- Metal Bash, classic metal, nearly in S-bahn reachable,
- Headbangers, true metal etc.