Monday, 4 June 2007

A Week in Bavaria – Munich

MONDAY A Travelling Day

We left Berlin and caught the fast train (Inter City Express) direct to Munich (5hours 45 mins). It definitely is the way to travel around Europe.





We booked a small hotel near the train station. We’ve found these are the same price as a night in a double room in the youth hostel and we get a full buffet breakfast and free internet! However they all seem to be in the red light district so you just have to be careful when you go out at night.

It had been raining but it had stopped – it was just cold. We found our hotel easily (Hotel Italia).

For all you history fans (from Mike’s tour guide)… Munich was founded in 1158 by Henry the Lion (remember him from previous posts?) who got involved in the trading of a valuable commodity known in its day as white gold. This was salt, which was coming from a nearby town called Salzburg. The trading centre was near a monastery hence the name ‘Munchen’ or ‘near the monks’….”

TUESDAY A Rest Day

It rained all day today, and was a high of just 10 degrees, so we just took it easy, caught up on emails and prepared some blog pages. We looked through some tour brochures and decided to stay in Munich the week and forget about Stuttgart. We also walked over to the EurAid Office and booked our trains to Zurich and Rome. We also booked a tour to Neuschwanstein Castle for Thursday.

WEDNESDAY Walking around the City

We visited the hairdresser just down the road a bit in the morning and Rex had a haircut and Liane had some colour and a trim (rather brave of us but we were starting to look a bit dishevelled after 7 weeks from home). We were rather pleased with the results and gave a generous tip.

We explored the city centre after that.

A German selling a fancy do everything knife.

We found the Viktuallen Market where there were hundreds of gourmet food stalls. YUMMY!!


No, this is not a beer. It is a drink called Apfel Schorle (Apple juice with mineral water)

Saw this funny newspaper headline "Five police chase plastic crocodile"

We climbed the 300 + stairs to the top of St. Peter’s church and admired the spectacular view over the city all the way to the Alps WITH snow.

Liane found the Birkenstock sandal shop (they are made in Germany) and managed to buy a pair! Had to have some retail therapy!!

We found the world famous Hofbrauhaus – one of the last authentic beer halls in the world. We tried the Dark Brew (a local brew) which you can only order in .5L or 1.0L jugs! Liane has never drunk so much beer in her life as she has in Germany! And of course we had to have a bretzel with it or did we have to buy a bretzel from the lovely girl who was selling them??

Trying the local dark brew. Wasn't too bad. Can only order 0.5L or 1.0L jugs!

At 5pm we stood in the city centre Marienplatz and watched The Glockenspeil (one of the largest in Germany and all of Europe with 43 bells), which according to Mike’s tour guide… “is by far one of the most overrated shows on earth.” There were a lot of renovations going on around it and the workers even continued to hammer away while it played so I’m afraid we had to agree.

Saw this lovely denim jacket for you Angela. The price wasn't 8.99E BUT 899E. Sorry!!


THURSDAY Neuschwanstein Castle

We met our tour guide, Virginia (an Aussie whose Mum lives in Geelong), just outside the train station for our trip to the famous Neuschwanstein Castle. We took public transport – 2hr train to Fussen and then 10 min bus to Hohenschwangau on the Austrian border. I suppose we could have done this part ourselves but our guide was excellent and gave us the tragic background story to Ludwig II who built this wonderful castle (Germany’s most famous tourist icon and a candidate for the New 7 Wonders of the World and used in Disney films).

It was begun in 1869 but never finished only 18 out of 100 rooms were ever completed. It has links to some famous musos apparently Tchaikovsky was inspired here to write Swan Lake after staying at the parental home Schloss Hohenschwangau. Schwan =swan of which there are supposed to be many of them here on the lakes in Summer but we didn’t see any. Richard Wagner was a close friend of Ludwig11 and also wrote a lot of music here. The castle has many paintings of the scenes from his operas.

We walked the steep 40min path to the castle, with some stops along the way to catch our breath and to hear the next instalment of the story.

Virginia, our Aussie tour guide, speaking passionately about King Ludwig

You can also take a horse drawn cart if you want.

You have to pay 9 Euro to actually go into the castle for about 20 mins tour. You only get to see the completed rooms – which were quite spectacular but our castle guide was dreadful. She was hard to understand and sounded very uninterested. Still a rather magnificent castle in a wondrous location built high on the rocks in the snow capped Alps.

A reminder of home, an Aussie tour bus!

FRIDAY The English Garden

Today we went to the Waschsalon (laundrette) where a very helpful English speaking owner helped us work out how to use all the machines. We’ve been lucky so far and been able to wash our clothes at friends and family’s homes so this was a new adventure.

"Believe, Live, Give" A good slogan by International Catholic Mission Work.

We wandered back through the train station which is like a mini city with many different kinds of shops and restaurants on many different levels. We worked out how to catch the train to Garmisch for tomorrow to go up to the Alps and then found a rather elegant Italian restaurant (with the menu in German) and had lunch there (with a nice drop of red).

After getting some munchies at the supermarket (at the station!) we very cleverly worked out (all by ourselves and changing stations) how to catch the trains in the subway to The Englischer Garten. This is the largest metropolitan park in Europe where people often come to sunbake or swim in the nude in their lunchtime break from the office. We didn’t see anyone but we heard a woodpecker and did see a white swan and a squirrel!!

It was wonderful to walk through.

Frolicking in the garden.

We walked about 3km and found out that you could hire bikes. It would have been great to cycle around as many other people were doing. Another great day in Munich!

SATURDAY The Zugspitze

We caught the train to Garmisch (about 1 ½ hours) and then the Zugspitzbahn to a forest lake called the Eibsee. From here we caught the cable car and travelled up up 2000m (as they say in Uganda) to the highest mountain in Germany (2966m). At first Liane wasn’t to sure about the cable car but it was quite big and it was quite a smooth ride through the clouds.

We sort of had checked the weather and thought it might be ok as cloudy weather with a bit of sun was forecast. When we got to the top we couldn’t see a thing! It was 0 degrees and a visibility of 20 – 100m!! It is Germany’s highest beer garden.

You can also catch the cable car to Erwhald in Austria from here (where I have some more cousins) but we didn’t.

Oh well, we had a lovely lunch in the restaurant and took the next cable car to the skiing area. Here the weather was slightly warmer (9 degrees) and we trudged through the snow to check out the highest church in Germany – it was closed!!

We then travelled back down the mountain to the Eibsee through a 4km long tunnel and caught the regular train home. Even though we didn’t get to see the Alps from the top I guess we can say we have been there. It was still a good day and we were very pleased at our train catching skills. We will have to put this journey on the list for our next visit.

Hint for travellers – check the website for weather conditions at the mountain top before heading off!

SUNDAY A Cultural Day

What to do on a sunny Sunday morning in Munich?.... “A visit to the Alte Pinakothek (Art Gallery) is a must. It is one of the largest galleries in Europe and houses an outstanding collection of paintings spanning from the 14th to the 18th century…” (from The Rough Guide to Germany). The Sunday special only charges 1 Euro per person! The art works were all collected by the local royal family.

No photos were allowed in the gallery so we can only offer this sculpture on the lawn outside.

We saw many beautiful paintings glorifying God. Some of the artists whose works were on display were Leonardo Da Vinci, Rubens, Raphael, Rembrandt, Botticelli, and Lorrain.

This was a real little treasure. The one by Rubens was 8m by 3m depicting Father, Son and Holy Spirit and was one of our favourites as was Christ Crowned with Thorns by Da Vinci. A series of 6 paintings by Rembrandt showing the Passion cycle was also remarkable.

After a pleasant lunch in the gallery café we wandered back through the town

3D city map with Braille street names

and listened to the many buskers that were entertaining the tourists.

Click play button to listen to these young violinists.


Click play button to listen to these musos.


Click play button to listen to some classical buskers.

Click play button to listen to some funky buskers


Of course we finished the afternoon with Kaffee und kuchen und viel sahne (cream)

In the evening we went out for a final drink in Munich. We heard an amazing classical quintet playing under the verandah of the shops (the acoustics were quite good). This was the first time we had gone out without the camera so we couldn’t take a snap or recording – so we bought their CD instead (we always support the struggling musos).

We enjoyed our time in Munich as it was well set up for tourists with many people speaking English and a large variety of sights to see. Well worth another visit.

In our wanderings of Munich we came across all these different lion statues. Remember we mentioned Henry the Lion on Monday?

Germans believe that rubbing the nose of this lion near the palace brings good luck.

2 comments:

Simon said...

Rex I'm getting more and more jealous/envious after every installment of your blog! Looks like you are enjoying many delicious foods. The food looks awesome, makes my mouth salivate looking at the pictures! LOL! The scenery is magnificent, keep up the good work ;-)

Anonymous said...

Hi Liane & Rex, It has been wonderful to read about your travels, and to see our relatives. Showed Mum & Dad the photos last Sunday. Lovely haircut Liane. What is the hairdresses address?!!!
Karen and Rod