Munich

After getting all moved out and saying goodbye to Chambéry (with only a few difficulties), we headed off to Munich, Germany.  We had a stop in Paris on the way.  This train ride was not much longer than many others we'd taken but it felt longer for me, probably because it was just one too many 8-hour train rides.  We did get there eventually.  Thankfully, our hostel was right by the train station.  I would have to say it was the best hostel I stayed in the entire time I was in Europe.  It was well-organized with good security and had social events that could be attended.
Unfortunately, it was rainy and cold the whole time we were there.  Reed's umbrella was broken so he had to share mine.  It was funny to see him walking around with a pink umbrella.

The first thing we did the first full day that we were there was go to the Munich Museum.  We basically went through ten centuries of Munich history.  It was really interesting to see it, but a lot to take in all at once.  After that, we got lunch.  Lunch places in Munich were kind of cool.  The combined homestyle type cooking with a bakery and a salad bar, kind of like the ready-to-eat food section of the grocery store.  Then, we went to Marianplatz, the central plaza of Munich.

Despite appearances, it is not a church as far as I know.  It seemed like an office building and had a central courtyard with a lot of restaurants.  The tower had a little robotic marionette show that played three times a day.

We went up in the tower to get a good view of the city.  Unlike many other attractions that we had seen, we got to take the elevator up.

The most recognizable building in Munich, the Frauenkirche:

After coming down from the Marianplatz, we went and looked for the Beer Museum which Reed really wanted to see.  It was poorly labeled on the map so we mostly just ended up wandering around.  By the time we found it, it was closing within a half hour, so we didn't go in.  From there we went through a market that sold a lot of different food, flowers, and crafts.

Then we wandered over to the Frauenkirche and went inside.

I found out that this was the church of Pope Benedict XVI before he became pope.

After that, we wandered over to the Hofbrauhaus.  It's a very well known brewhouse in Munich and it's huge, completely full of tourists.  Reed was very enthusiastic about German food, but I definitely wasn't. The restaurant was very loud and crazy.  There was stuff going on everywhere; I couldn't imagine working there.  When we asked for an English menu, the waitress gave an exasperated sigh and went off  to find one of the rare menus.  Reed of course got a sausage and sauerkraut dish with some beer.  I got a salad, that was too cucumber-y, and a bread basket. (He doesn't look too happy in this picture, but he really did enjoy it; he said it lived up to the hype)

The next day, although the weather was very cold and rainy, we set out for the Dachau concentration camp.  As I mentioned before, Reed and I had taken a Holocaust class together the semester before I went to France and we'd learned a lot about Dachau, but it was interesting, and horrifying, to see it in person.  Here are some pictures that I took there:

For those of you that don't know, this gate to the entrance of Dachau is famous.  It says "Arbeit macht frei."  This translates to "work makes free", the slogan of these concentration camps.

These are the barracks where the prisoners stayed.  The gravel plots are the foundations of barracks that used to be there.  The last picture, is a photo of the bunks that the prisoners stayed in, sometimes two to a bunk.

This is the biggest memorial there, although there are many many memorials at the concentration camp sight.  It has three main parts:

Later in its history, Dachau became an extermination camp.  This is the building that houses both the gas chambers and incinerator.

The gas chamber with false shower heads:

The incinerator:

When we got back from the concentration camp, mid-afternoon, we decided to check out the Englischer Garten, a gigantic park in the city of Munich.

We fed the baby geese.

There is a small river/ large stream that flows through the park.  The ground underneath it is shaped in such a way that it forms a wave, thus there is surfing in the city of Munich.  We saw a guy go out on it right after we got there.  The wave was bigger while we were there because of all the rain.

We walked through the park until we got to the Chinesischer Turm (the Chinese Tower), another very recognizable building of Munich, and a famous bier garten.  Unfortunately, due to the weather, it was completely abandoned.

After that, it started pouring.  So we followed the map as well as we could and came out completely opposite of where we thought we would.  After getting some directions from a friendly German woman, we found our way over to the Olympic Park.  The Olympics were held in Munich in 1972 and were best known for the Palestinian killings of 11 Israeli athletes. The park was very cool though, and I would have loved to have seen it on a sunny day.  There was a lot of stadiums and a nice little lake.

Then, we went up into the Olympic Tower..

From there, we had a good view of the BMW corporate building.

But, because of the weather, not much else...

That night, we went to a different brauhaus, one that was recommended by our hostel.  Reed had more weiners and beer.  I had a beefsteak with a pepper sauce.  It was halfway decent.  I enjoyed it more than my meal the night before.

The next day, our last full day in Munich, we decided to take a day trip out to see Neuschwanstein.  I don't think it would have been Reed's choice if all of the other sights hadn't been closed due to a Bavarian holiday, but I was very excited to see it.  To get there, we had to take two trains and two buses.  Here are some pictures of the Bavarian countryside that I took on the way there.

The last bus dropped us off in the valley below the castle.

We slowly worked our way up on a path that wound around before taking you there.

The whole way up, we were walking through beautiful forests.

The higher we got, the more glimpses of the castle we had.

We finally reached the top.  A fun fact about this castle is that it was the original inspiration for the Disney Cinderella Castle.  

The castle was located high above some very beautiful country.

Once at the top, we had to wait an hour for the next English tour (you're only allowed to go in with a tour).  The inside of the castle was beautiful.  Ludwig II had eccentric, but pretty good, taste.  We weren't allowed to take any pictures in there so I don't have any to show.  My favorite room was the throne room.  It had a beautiful golden sun painted on the ceiling with an ornate chandelier hanging down from it.

After the tour (which was only half an hour long), we sought out the Marianbrucke, a bridge that has beautiful views of the castle.

On the way there, we had a view of the castle where Ludwig II grew up, Hohenschwangau.

 

We found the bridge and it's beautiful views:

That night for dinner, we went back to the Hofbrauhaus because Reed wanted to enjoy it one last time before we left.  After Neuschwanstein castle, he had gotten a Bavarian hat as a souvenir and tried it on while we were at the Hofbrauhaus.

Here it is all decked out:

I really enjoyed Munich, but I wish we could have had weather that did not require me to wear my winter coat and carry an umbrella everywhere.