I realized on my trip to Munich that the only german I know relates to drinking. I'm not sure how this has happened, since I do not know anything about drinking in general. But, I digress.
Munich was AMAZING! I cannot stress that enough. I will begin with the flight on Lufthansa. Crau & I were not seated together..........sucky........and I was seated with a couple who had a 14 month old that was still being fed "the natural way". Yeah, lady, thanks a lot. To top off this 8+ hour flight, the seat I was sitting in was the first in the section, which had access to the wall infront of it that accommodated layets for babies. Well, there was another little one (same age) a few rows back & they decided to move the mother & little tyke next to me. So now I had 2 babies, one mother feeding her child constantly (please don't make me say it---I hate anything to do with the topic), and no Crau to be all excited with. Long flight.
But we landed in Germany & all those issues were left on the plane. We were in Munich--land of the Munchens! (last time I say that...promise.) We had no problem geting our luggage or through customs, but when it came time to get out of the airport & on our way.....we had issues. We could not figure out how to buy the train tickets that would whisk us to our hotel & start our touring day. But, the munchens are so nice & try to help......whether they speak English or not. A gentleman tried to help us, but it was no use. He told us what we needed but we didn't understand. However, Crau figured it out & we finally bought said tickets & hopped on a train that took us directly to the city center.
We get off at our stop--Marienplatz--and take an escalator up (thank goodness for modernized citites......if you care to ask one day I will tell you about the Paris fiascos) and find ourselves right infront of the famous Glockenspiel. Stunning. We look at a map & see that our hotel is literally 2 blocks away from this center. Fantastic! So we struggle with luggage to the hotel & check in. Sort of. The room isn't ready so we...me especially...do a quick switch of things so that we can go off to see the sights & not have to lug all of our crap with us.
Our first stop was the Hard Rock Cafe. We have found that this works nicely for us. It's a famous & popular site in every city & we can guarantee a menu in English for our first real meal in a day. What was even better is that it was around the corner from the hotel. And what was right across the street from that? The infamous Hofbrau Haus! The great beer hall of Germany was across the street from the back of our hotel. This seemed great---until 2 am. I'll get to that in a minute.
After lunch we hopped a train & went to the Kartoffel Museum. That's a potato museum if you didn't know. If you know me at all, you know I'd be the type of person to go to such a place. Very cute, I must say. We even took each other's pictures with the potato people.
We spent time wandering the city & got dinner. We actually ate pizza that night. It seems weird but Crau & I have had nachos & pizza in every city we have travelled to so far. It's tradition now.
It would seem that one would be able to fall asleep with ease for not having slept in over a day & yet sleep avoided me. Maybe I was overtired. Maybe it was being in a strange city. Or maybe it was the singing that came from outside the Hofbrau all night. Oh yes. So, we were up every night because these Germans know how to party!
I will sum up the rest of the trip in brief comments. We went to the Hofbrau at 11:30 the next morning. We drank HUGE radlers (beer + lemonade...sounds weird but was actually good) and then went on to Dachau. We had a ball until Saturday night. It is also tradition to wander around the city at night & see it all light up. While walking around, I mentioned that I had a sore throat. I thought it was from being in all of these smoke-filled areas. As much as the Germans drink, they smoke even more. It's nuts. Well, Crau said the same thing at almost the same moment. By Sunday morning, it was not from the smoke. We were sick. Congested, achy, stuffy, sore throat sick. Horrible. We went--in the rain--to a museum Sunday morning. We wandered through it....sick as we were...and ended up in a room that was completely enpty. Just as I get to the center of this small room, a voice (quite booming) comes over the PA system. Crau & I froze in motion. We didn't know what it was saying because it was in German. But it soudned like "I am the great and powerful Oz...." I giggled the whole time because that is what I do. We scurried out of the room & finally found our way out of the museum. In was still raining & we stopped at a coffee shop to wallow in our hot tea about being sick. We went back to the hotel & Crau napped. I decided to go to the BMW museum. It was great. I saw so many awesome cars.
We went to a potato restaurant that night & then on to Starbucks. It seemed like our colds might pass us by & this was cause for excitement because the next day we were on our way to rent a car & drive on the Autobahn.
No such luck. The rain continued & my cold worsened. We went to pick up the rental car & I was beyond disappointed. Here we are in the auto-making capitol of the world & what do they give us? A chevy. We drove about an hour & a half out of the city to some remote area to see Neuschwanstein Castle. So worth it. We wanted to go on to a few other attractions, but didn't have it in us. I felt lousy. And it was still raining. So we drove back to the city & collapsed. Tuesday we were to drive to the Steiff Museum & Legoland, but I just couldn't do it. So we hung around and went to random sights ..............IN THE SNOW. Uh-huh. It snowed. I wanted to go home so badly, but had no choice in the matter. We were in this until Wednesday.
Thank goodness when Wednesday arrived. We packed our bags, went shopping, and then hopped a train back to the airport. In the rain. If I didn't know any better, I would have thought I was in London.
I will say this: Munich is great. The people are very nice. So many of them speak English. The city is so pretty. And they know how to eat (& drink). I can't wait to go back & actually do all of the things I didn't get to & re-do some of the things I did because I did not appreciate them as much as I would have liked.
