A recent family trip to Hamburg to visit friends and wrap ourselves warm in the spirit of gemütlichkeit (a more sociable version of hygge) was all the more special for being our last cold winter holiday before we move to New Zealand. Snow fever had been rising for several weeks and our daughters were delighted to see snow symbols and freezing temperatures on my weather app. Alas, though it was certainly very cold, the snow was a no-show and there was only freezing fog. Still, our five-year-old seemed to find saying, “Ich bin ein Hamburger” endlessly hilarious, so who needed snow to keep them entertained?

My first impression was that Hamburg is a city of smoke at all scales – from the harbourside oil refineries to the clouds of cigarette smoke. It was all a bit grungier than I was expecting, but extremely friendly and welcoming. Situated in north Germany on the river Elbe, Hamburg, the country’s second largest city and the third largest port city in Europe, has had several major disasters to contend with over the centuries – from the great fire of 1842 and catastrophic flooding in 1962 to the devastating Allied firebombing in the second world war. This, along with the fact that before German reunification it used to be a city state, has all contributed to its resilient character.

I’d long wanted to watch the local cult football team St Pauli with their fervent left-wing fans, and my friend had arranged tickets. Even though they are in the German second division, the Boys in Brown get crowds of 30,000 and an early kick-off did nothing to spoil the party atmosphere, with Che Guevara and marijuana leaf flags furiously waving at the Ultras end. It was like being back in the early 80s – standing terraces, alcohol and smoking (not to mention mullets and moustaches). Sadly, what was happening on the pitch wasn’t nearly as entertaining, St Pauli meekly losing 1-0 to Hannover 96.

After the game we met our families next door at the Hamburg Dom, a sort of funfair crossed with a Christmas market stuffed with chocolate-covered bananas, waffles on sticks, roasted nuts, lebkuchen hearts, franzbrötchen (little cinnamon rolls) and the Hamburg speciality fischbrötchen (fish sandwich) – and sausages as far as the eye could see. Our youngest loved the old-fashioned painted carousels and rides and earned her dodgems racing stripes with her first jolting head-on crash. What’s more, our elder daughter snagged one of those giant cuddly bears that I had never once managed to win for her before. Result.

Ice skating at the huge outdoor Eisarena in Planten un Blomen park in the city centre was a little agoraphobic for our tastes, used as we are to tiny versions in tents back home, and the skill levels were pretty high, too. But our youngest loved baking and decorating Christmas biscuits on one of the Märchenschiffe (fairytale) boats on the south bank of the Inner Alster lake, in among a whole class full of excited German schoolchildren.

The highlight was the mighty Miniatur Wunderland in the Speicherstadt area to the south of the city, the world’s largest complex of warehouses and a Unesco world heritage site. It was constructed between the late 19th and early 20th centuries on thousands of oak beams as a free economic zone. The whole area is crisscrossed by canals and steel-arch truss bridges (Hamburg has more bridges than any other city in the world). It’s here in one of the huge redbrick neo-gothic warehouses you can find the biggest model railway in the world, which opened in 2001. Our 11-year-old was sceptical, but soon changed her mind when she saw the sheer scale and attention to detail of the various world cities, cameraphone clicking. There are trains running under the floor, under steps and all the way around its 15.7km of track. Our favourite was the Swiss Lindt factory, which dispensed tiny chocolates to take away.

The lighting is set up to simulate day and night every 15 minutes and there was a mad scramble to see the erupting Mount Vesuvius. The mini version of Hamburg was one of the most popular sections, including Herzog & de Meuron’s new landmark concert hall, the Elbphilharmonie – far more comprehensible than seeing it in the flesh. The museum has delayed plans to build England, perhaps to see just what kind of post-apocalyptic wasteland it will look like.

There was more miniature fun to be had at the recently opened Pierdrei Hotel in the neighbouring HafenCity district to the south, our daughters hunkering down in their own little cozy room within our room, with bunk beds and wooden shutters. They were also very taken with the fantastic tiny surrealist dioramas set into the walls along the corridors, all very Alice in Wonderland and designed, in fact, by a Miniatur Wunderland employee, Sandra Havemeister.

A similarly bizarre corridor was to be found in St Pauli on the Reeperbahn, the infamous red light district where I went with my friend one night (minus our children, of course). Street drinking is legal here and Jeff had told me about the local practice of cornern (cornering) – buying a drink from a kiosk and drinking it outside the bars on the street. We bought some Wildbräu Helles from a shop on Schulterblatt and walked through Neue Pferdemarkt and down Wohlwillstrasse to get to the Reeperbahn.

Originally, brothels here catered to sailors at the nearby docks, but since the early 1960s its reputation has been enhanced by being the crucible of where the Beatles honed their songs in the many dive bars there. Reeperbahn street itself is still pretty sleazy – especially Herbertstrasse – and the area is popular with stag parties, but ongoing gentrification has brought galleries, hipster bars and markets. It’s a curious mix.

Nearing the end of our walk south of the Reeperbahn, we had a beer at the Golden Pudel Club, where clubbers often head for a bite to eat at the nearby Fischmarkt. Then it was on to Reeperbahn institution Zum Silbersack with its gaudy facade but cheerful customers, for one last beer. As if encapsulating the slightly surreal but earthy charms of the city, we passed Boris Becker walking along the Reeperbahn on a crutch with a cigar on the go. My kind of town.

Way to go

Accommodation was provided by Pierdrei hotel (doubles from £100, family rooms for four from £143). Rail options include London to Hamburg via Eurostar to Brussels, a high-speed Thalys or ICE train to Cologne, and a German InterCity train to Hamburg, from €70 each way at bahn.de

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