Munich, Germany - July 26

Hitler's former office - now a music university

28 degrees, clear, hot

A tour describing the rise of the Third Reich was on our to-do list for today. All the tours we have done here in Munich have met and started in Munich’s main square which is about a 10 minute walk from our hotel – super convenient! Today’s guide is the first

Third Reich rallies were held here, now it's meeting place

German to guide a tour – the other 2 being from the UK. This guy was very interesting and as were the other guides, didn’t just stick to information about the specific tour topic.

Although this 2.5 hour tour had us we walking all over the old part of Munich, there really wasn’t much to actually see – not too many photos today. Hitler and the Third Reich certainly aren’t commemorated or memorialized. What we did see

Lowenbrau brewers and beer gardgn

were locations such as streets, parks, buildings today used for other things and heard stories of what took place in these locations during the rise of the Third Reich. There were a few memorials to victims of the Third Reich, so those are there to look at.

One thing our guide told us that we’ve heard again and again is how clean and drinkable the Munich water is – I guess it seemed clean, it tasted fine to me. People fill water bottles straight from decorative fountains, not drinking fountains, but the kind of fountain designed to be looked at - interesting.

obatzda

Our tour ended very near to the Lowenbrau brewery and beer garden, so ‘when in Germany’… This place was a lot smaller than the other brewery beer gardens we visited, and more ‘local’ filled with what looked to us to be workers on their lunch break. We decided to make this our lunch stop also. We had Obatzda a German cheese spread made from Camembert, butter and spices. We ate this with a couple small loaves of bread.

refill

Next, we realized that the Augustiner brewery was just around the corner, so we stopped to check that out. This place was by far the biggest beer garden we’ve seen. They even had little flat-bed trucks driving around to pick up used glasses! This was a lovely place to spend the afternoon under the shade of huge trees, enjoying a beer and people watching. Many people bring pic

Augustiner beer garden

nics here and set up their feasts on the tables. Apparently, as long as you are buying their beer, you can bring in your own food. There is still food for purchase of course. I did have my eye on another giant pretzel but didn’t bother. One thing I wish I took a picture of was the guy filling beer glasses. He was filling 1 litre glasses with a hose! An actual hose! Everything to do with beer here is serious business. My first instinct when we get

Augustiner beer garden

these giant beers is to think I got cheated out of a bunch of beer because the foam is about 1/3 of the glass, but in the end,  it settles and most of the glass is full – plus…if I don’t get the full litre of beer I don’t think I’ll suffer!

Before we headed back to the hotel we stopped for a bit of Bayern Muchen soccer shop shopping – of course we did. It never ceases being hilarious that Chris is an XXL in European sizes…they didn’t have shirts bigger!

A bit of napping, packing as today is our last day in Munich and we headed out for dinner. By this point we think we’ve had our fill of German food and go for good ol’ Italian, followed by a pint at an

Irish pub – another thing that is always funny is how no matter where in the world we go, we seem to be able to find an English/Irish pub.

post shopping and hotel in the distance

It seems like so long ago we were unpacking to start our time in Munich, but it’s only been 6 days. I guess this is pretty long to be on one place. I think we’re able to check most of the things on our Munich to do list…there are a few left for next time.

Lori – yup, the surfing was super cool

Munich, Germany - July 25

Chinesischer Turm

28 degrees, clear, hot

Not much was planned for today, so we had a lazy morning. Jet lag coming to Europe has me sleeping very well. I’m not sure if I’m still jet lagged or not, but I think I could sleep for hours. Yesterday my Fitbit said I slept for over 10 hours! This feels like a major success.

Steckerlfisch

Today turned out to be the day of the English Garden. The English Garden is a public park in the middle of Munich as one of the world’s largest parks. It is named ‘English’ because of its informalness…this is my style of park. A stream runs throughout the park with rapids in parts – these are my absolute favourite parts, in fact one section of rapids and a ‘wave’

my weinshcorle, Chris' dunkle 

are designed for surfers!

This park is about 3k from our hotel. By the time we arrive we are parched and hungry…we find a couple of ‘biggish’ beers and a fish and make a lunch of it. This fish called Steckerlfisch is what I came for…In fact this Steckerlfisch was the number 1 thing on my Munich to-do list. We can get giant beers anyplace, but fish on a stick…it was a pilgrimage. Today’s catch is mackerel, and it was quite delicious – I hoped it actually came on a stick, but it didn’t, it was

random European scene

cooked on a stick, but served without the stick. I don’t love picking though fish bones, but it was part of the experience. This fish was €10.00…not exactly a bargain, but what here is?

Once we ploughed through the enormous beer and picked the Steckerlfisch carcass clean, it was time for another beverage. We were pretty sure another liter of beer wasn’t the smart choice so we decided on 2 half liters. This time Chris had a dark beer (dunkle) and I had a weinshcorle (wine and sparkling water)

surfers

– this is delicious! Accompanying our after lunch beverage was an oompa band…fun.

Once we were on the go again, we wandered along the river, and finally found Munich’s surfers. The wave created by some of the rapids on the stream through the English gardens is very cool – a major attraction.

my feet never felt so good

After watching the surfers for a while we moved to poke our own toes into the cool waters. Besides the fish on a stick, I think this was the most glorious part of the day…sitting in shade, feet in cool water, resting for a bit.

After all this resting and feet cooling we were ready for another beer…where or where??? We settled on the Hofbrauhaus, being here in the day was much more

Hofbauhaus

accessible compared to when we were here near closing time a couple of days ago. 2 more beers and a pretzel later and we were ready for a nap.

random European scene

We decided on dinner at the pizza place we ate at last night and a couple of bed-time beers in the room.

giant hofbrauhaus pretzel

Munich, Germany - July 24

reproduction of the entry gate

24 degrees, clear

We figured our trip to Germany would not be complete without a trip to a concentration camp memorial site. Today we visited Dachau. The was the second former concentration camp site I have visited, the first being Stutthof in Poland and Chris’s third (he visited Dachau when he backpacked a million years ago). The Dachau memorial site was infinitely more developed and

Chris with the guide...watch tower in the distance

preserved than Stutthof. Some of the ways it’s more developed are that there is a museum here to showcase maps, photographs, prisoner biographies and artefacts. A small number of barracks were rebuilt to show an example of where the prisoners lived, but

crematorium

most were not rebuilt after time had broken them. The spaces where the barracks weren’t rebuilt were left as empty spaces of land with outlines of the buildings in the ground. Dachu I learned was the first Nazi concentration camp - ultimately there were approximately 1500 camps.

bigger crematorium

for clothing

Today’s tour was a long one-about 6 hours, a 4-hour tour with an hour for travel each way – the travel consisted of both subway and bus. The guide was great, the trip overall was very worthwhile. I learned a lot about the 1500 concentration camps that existed at one point.

After the tour we were beat and hungry. A pretzel was all I was up for before heading back for a rest. We had some snacks remaining from yesterday, so it was back to the room to recharge.

monument to the unknown dead

For dinner we resorted to comfortable old Italian. Compared to German fare, not exactly diet food either, but we split the pizza and the bottle of wine, so we didn’t have to be to be rolled back to the hotel.

We haven’t noticed much smoking so far in Europe. We do find a bit of it when we are eating outside, but I guess this is where it’s allowed, and that’s where we like to eat, so we live with it.

Dachu memorial

monument to the dead

Munich, Germany - July 23

lunch with the Marienplatz Glickenspiel

23 degrees, mostly clear – lovely touring weather!

It was an alarm morning today. We had a walking tour scheduled for 10 this morning. This was a free walking tour that proved to be great. Certainly one of the best tours we’ve been on, and we’ve been on a lot! The guides work on tips and future booked tours and that is just fine.

We started by meeting in the Marienplatz, the main square in Munich. Today the square is

not exactly light fare

crawling with school kids. Apparently, school in Munich is still in until the end of July, so they are on end of the year field trips today. Our guide is an English woman who now lives in Munich and is really good. We are a group of about 25. The tour lasted about 2.5 hours and takes us all over the old part of Munich. We see beer gardens, churches, squares, the opera house, the high shopping street and a market. We also are sure to return to the square to watch the Rathaus-Glockenspiel. This

that's a lot of beer

glockenspiel chimes 3 times each day and re-enacts 2 stories from the 16^th century. This is a major attraction…now the Marienplatz is even more packed than it was an hour before when we started the tour – the glockenspiel show lasted about 10 minutes. By the end we are tired, thirsty and hungry.

Lunch is in the heart of Marienplatz right in front of the glockenspiel. My tour of German food continues with a lunch of bratwurst which came with fries…should have had the sauerkraut, and of course beer. I have to say, this food is very heavy and rich…good thing there is oatmeal and fruit fo

everything less than 5.00

r breakfast…my digestive system is thankful for the fibre!

Hofbrauhaus - tried last night...BUSY!

We end our afternoon with some provision shopping…German chips (stadionwurst), gummy bears, Milka chocolate, water, a little bottle of sparkling German wine (for €1.00!!) and some veg. There were some very good buys in the wine isle BTW! In

Opera house

one section nothing was more than

German snacks

€5.00!! We almost bought a 2 litre bottle of beer, but decided against it.

I’m not sure if it’s in all of Germany, but this store had no bags…

glockenspeil

no problem…we schlepped the stuff in our pockets.

The evening’s events were a long walk to dinner of more schnitzel (for Chris) and roulade (for me). I didn’t really want roulade (not a big fan of pickles in things), but when what I wanted was out and the waiter suggested roulade I thought it was another thing to check off my German food list. It was good, but super rich and heavy. What German food isn’t rich and heavy? Not exactly diet food – I guess neither is washing it down with beer.

Thankfully we had a long walk back to the hotel to settle some of this food.

roulade and schnitzel

random cool building ornamentation

Hofbrauhaus - tried last night...too busy!

The weather tomorrow is supposed to be much warmer…I need to get ready for that

Munich, Germany - July 22

17 degrees, torrential rain

I don’t think the beds or pillows are particularly wunder-bar, but we sure did sleep soundly last night – could have been the 18 hour travel day.

honey comb

Normally, waking up at 9:30 would be unheard of, but I could easily have turned over and passed out for a few more hours this morning. However, if I wanted to hit the included hotel breakfast I knew I had to get moving. This was a good decision…the breakfast was great. It was a typical hotel buffet (scrambled and boiled eggs, bacon, juice, toast, cheese, yogurt) with regional additions. I learned about Weißwurst – white, small, pork/veal herby morning sausages. I didn’t love it but

mini bar

am glad I tried. Another thing I’m glad I tried was the honey comb. I’ve been wanting to try this forever, and today was the day. I think it will be my first and last try…you eat the hone

random cool fountain

y and chew the honey comb, apparently you can ‘consume’ the wax or spit it out.  Eating the wax was a bit weird for me, so out it went when the honey was gone.

–

no idea what this is, but coo

The weather was not the best for our first day of German sightseeing – actually it was torrentially pouring. That was OK, really as we were happy to relax and get over this jet-lag. For the rest of the afternoon we hung out in the room

schnitzel and beer

napping, blogging, reading and watching the British Open - in German. We are thankful for the included mini bar!!

The rain stopped in the early evening and we decided to hit the town and walked for a bit. We needed food and a drink, but by the time we settled on a place, it was a bit late and things were winding down. As is usually our style, we sat at one place, weren’t served,

more beer

left, tried another place with the same results. Finally, we found a place that was interested in us…beer and schnitzel…yum…worth the wait. A couple more beers to top off the night and we were back at our hotel.

Munich glockenspiel

see how easy it is to get to the WC?

Robert...it's getting sunnier

Munich, Germany - July 21

20 degrees, overcast, some rain

good start

Our travel day continued relatively uneventfully. We arrived in Munich at long last at about 8:00 local time, noon Calgary time. Our business class seats were pretty good and we both got a few hours of sleep. I don’t tend to sleep much even with the ‘lie flat’ seats, so the fact that I slept at all was a bonus.  My Fitbit says I got ab

willkommen!

out 4 hours. I had pretty low expectations of Condor Air considering that they are described as a ‘low-cost’ carrier, but my expectations were exceeded.

The flight from Frankfurt to Munich was 35 minutes – wow…that’s my kind of flight – and they even did a drink service. The plane wasn’t even half full – I have no idea when I was on a plane that wasn’t bursting. There is quite a distance from the airport to the centre of Munich, so instead of a 100.00 plus taxi ride, we opted for a 30.00 (total for both of us) train ride – very simple. Chris investigated transportation before we left home, so that made it particularly simple - for me. After the train it was a couple blocks’ walk to the hotel. Just after we got to our room on the 6^th floor the skies opened, and it poured. We unpacked, waited for the rain to stop and headed out. This hotel has an included mini bar (2 beers, a coke, a sparkling and still water) which we indulged in as we unpack – and of course gummy bears which were apparently invented in this part of Germany.

Once we were unpacked and cleaned up a bit we realized we

needed some food. By this time it was about 10:00, so we found one of the only places still open. Our first meal in Germany was Italian! Pizza, bruschetta and a bottle of wine hit the spot.This place was quite hopping – probably because it was the only game in town at this point. The one odd bit was finding the ‘facilities’.

Of course I didn’t ask as I’m a bit of a baby in foreign countries, but I usually have no problem finding a sign or watching people. This time…NEIN. After hunting high and low, I found the toilets after an unmarked elevator ride to the basement.

We are staying at the Mercure Munchen Altstadt. The hotel is pretty basic, but cozy and the location can’t be beat.

July 20 - Calgary to Munich, Germany

The start of this vacation is an overnight to Europe…10 hours to Frankfurt, a 2 hour layover and another hour to Munich. We have business seats, so that will make the flight soooo much more tolerable – it won’t be glorious, but it’ll be fine. It seemed like we were the only flight leaving when ours did…the airport was dead…this was a good way to start a trip. We got our Nexus cards a while back and I can’t say we’ve ever used them leaving Calgary. Again tonight…no need – deadsville.

For this trip we decided to go with a new airline to us – Condor. This is an economy airline out of Germany. This is good because we can fly directly to Frankfurt…I hope that won’t be the end of the goodness…business can’t be bad.