As of yesterday, the German state of Bavaria has finally dropped the mask mandate on local public transport, after two and a half years.
Along with Spain, Germany has been the most mask manic country in the western world and has continued to enforce the slavish dogma with an iron fist while every one of its neighbours has tacitly admitted the futility and failure of the measure.
Bavaria now joins Saxony-Anhalt in once again allowing freeface travel on buses and local trains.
It must be noted, however, that long distance trains fall under the remit of the federal government, which is still stubbornly dragging its heels and insisting on FFP2 beaks being religiously worn.
Fortunately for libertarian travellers, there is a very simple workaround to this.
All buses, trams and city U-Bahn and S-Bahn services are now freeface.
Trains are split into regional services (coded RB or RE), on which gag rags are no longer required.
Forced muzzling still applies on InterCity, EuroCity and InterCity Express services (coded IC, EC, and ICE).
Just like travelling on a cheap LänderTicket, avoid anything with a “C” in the train number.
With all this in mind, a simple city break in Munich and a trip to the Christmas markets should once again be back on the menu for non-adherents of the mask cult.
It is good to see this positive move in Bavaria. Germany is a country I have been very fond of for many years and I have been dismayed to witness first hand some of the disgraceful behaviour that has taken place there in the last few years.
Hopefully this belated outbreak of sanity will quickly spread to other states and sufficient pressure can be put on the federal regime to finally put an end to the misery.