And finally, the winter travels blog begins!
MUNICH, GERMANY
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| Karlsthor city gate |
The train ride from Verona to Munich was looong, especially when you are sardined into a tiny cab with 5 other people: three italian guys and two chatty-cathy's who kept the curtains open the whole time. When it was time for them to get off, the rest of us remaining did a celebratory grunt and finally went to sleep. I arrived in Munich by train at 6:30am, and couldn't check into the hostel until 3pm so I went to the hostel to drop off my bag and wandered around the city with sleep-deprived bloodshot eyes.
There was snow on the ground, and it was preeeetty chilly, but none the less, I walked to Karlsplaz, where there is the Karlsthor, a city gate from the 14th century!
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| Rathaus-Glockenspiel |
I somehow made my way to Marienplatz next and saw the Rathaus Glockenspiel, which is like a giant coo-coo clock on the town hall building. It was made in 1908 and everyday at 11am it chimes and reenacts two stories from the 16th century. It consists of 43 bells and 32 life-sized figures! I didn't see it go off the first day, but the next day when Paul and I were walking around, the whole plaza was filled with people staring and waiting. So, we followed the herd and did the same. Pretty sweet!
Paul finally arrived to the Hostel after some flight delays in London, and we went to our first German dinner at Zum Augustiner. Patiently waiting for us at our table was a basket full of pretzels, and we just about died. I mean really!! Of course Germany would have free pretzels in their bread baskets. (Little did we know but the pretzels were NOT free, and they actually ask you how many you ate and charge you for each one! Tricky tricky.) We had beer, dumpling soup, a sausage platter with sauerkraut and some apple strudel!
We spent five days in Munich, which allowed us plenty of time to explore and get a feel for the city. Our first day together we visited the Residenz Museum, got some brautwursts and beer for lunch, and then went on a beer tour that night! We went to three different places: Augustiner Brauhaus and tried some Augustiner beer, the Hofbrauhaus to try Dunkl beer, and the third place I don't recall the name but their pretzels were to die for (I apparently came out of the Pretzel-lover closet on this trip and consumed an indecent amount of pretzels in 5 days). On our beer tour we met two really cool guys named Chris and Palmer from the East Coast in the U.S. and ended up going on two different tours with them the next two days!
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| Marienplaz |
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| Paul inside the Residenz Museum |
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| At the Hofbrauhaus! |
The next day we went on a tour to the Newschwanstein Castle with our new friends Palmer and Chris. Fun fact: the castle at Disneyland was actually modeled after this one! The castle belonged to Ludwig II of Bavaria and apparently was kind of a nut-job, but really good at building awesome castles.
On the walk down from the castle, we indulged in Bavarian Snow Balls= fresh doughnut covered in powdered sugar=best thing ever.  |
| the part that Disney modeled their castle after! |
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| the definition of winter wonderland |
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| Chris and Palmer, our new buddies |
We went to the Hofbrauhaus for dinner that night, and enjoyed some more delicious food and legit German entertainment!
The next day we went to the Dachau Concentration Camp memorial tour which was absolutely something I will remember for the rest of my life. It was eerie to be there in the winter time with all of the snow and coldness. If you ever go to Germany, I strongly reccommend visiting one of the Concentration camps.NEW YEARS EVE in MUNICH!
Note to self: everything closes at 2pm on New Years Eve. So we kept walking around and found a restarurant still open behind the Viktualienmarkt. We walk in and the place is packed, but some man sitting at a table points at us, then waves us over to join his table.
Turns out he is a pretty big deal at this restaurant and has been frequenting it for 30 years! He had his own reserved table, and got to choose who sat with him. There was an older German couple sitting there as well, and were able to speak enough English to chat with us. They ended up inviting us to dinner at their house and we accepted!
Ecstatic (and trusting that they weren't going to steal our organs or something sketchy) we went to their cute little apartment in the Schwabing district where they served us a FEAST! Fresh pumpkin soup, salad, shank of veal with steamed veggies...LEGIT.
After dinner, they showed us the only dance club they knew of, called Skyline. It was a club on the top floor of a building with glass ceilings where we were able to see the fireworks and dance the night away.
In conclusion:
Pretzels, beer, delicious food, new friends, beautiful sights, wonderful time.
