Munich is for Drinking (and eating)

May 15-19, 2014

Given our relaxing and music-infused experience in Vienna, we were sad to leave. Again, it poured rain on our travel day so we skipped Salzburg but left it open as a possible day trip from Munich.

Our arrival in Munich was sadly underwhelming. While our hotel (Eurostars Book Hotel) was nice enough inside, the neighborhood was horrific, especially after the leafy green streets of Vienna. All around the central train station (Hauptbahnhof, which Joe and I called Hop-on-Hop-off), there is nothing but hotels, casinos, and sex shops. It feels a little like Las Vegas but without the glitzy glam. If the hotel hadn't already been booked, we may have just turned around and headed back to Austria.

The next day we headed further in Munich to join a city bike tour in Marienplatz. Mike's Bike Tours is the most popular in Munich and it deserves the distinction. (The city tour is the #3 highest rated activity in Munich on TripAdvisor.) Despite the cold and drizzly weather, this tour - and our awesome guide Chris - gets the credit for turning us around on Munich. In the summer, Mike's runs tours in the morning (11:30) and the afternoon (4:00), which was perfect for us.

Our original impression that Munich was dirty and run-down (the same impression I think people who come for Oktoberfest may walk away with) couldn't have been more wrong. The city was beautiful! There were so many green spaces and relaxing, open parks. I can only imagine how nice it would be to spend summer days laying out in the Englischer Garten, drinking and socializing in the biergartens and riding along the Isar river.

Englischer Garten, our favorite part of the tour, reminded us a lot of Hampstead Heath. We made a drinking stop at Chinesischer Turm, a Chinese-style pagoda and biergarten in the park. The tour also included historical sites, of course, but I didn't get many good pictures. (Still, I have since been planning a France-Germany-Austria trip for high schoolers specifically because I want to take them on this bike tour.)

Charlie and our guide's turtle friend, Gustavo

Mike's Bikes operates in Amsterdam as well, and would be worth looking up in either city. They also have run Bus Bavaria, which guides the coolest Neuschwanstein Castle tour I could find (though we couldn't go with them this time, I would definitely want to work with them if I come back with students). Bus Bavaria is also in the Top 10 activities on Tripadvisor - this is a truly great company!

After our 4+ hours of biking around Munich and freezing our fingers it was time for beer. We headed over to Hofbräuhaus at about 8:30 pm and couldn't find a single open spot to sit in the multi-room restaurant. It was a Friday after all, so we left, discovered delicious Latte Macchiatos, and returned about an hour later. We stayed until we were kicked out at closing, enjoying the boisterous atmosphere, beer, and community seating. (We first sat with a group of Brazilian tourists and then ran into some of our fellow bikers from the afternoon tour.)

Our waitress was particularly entertaining as she wasted no time dealing with tourists. If you weren't ready to order when she arrived, she'd leave before you could finish saying "Uhhh" and instead of politely setting each different brew in front of the appropriate customer, she just plunked all of the drinks for the table in the middle and expected us to figure it out. We loved her no-nonsense, German efficiency. 

This was taken on Monday afternoon when the restaurant was effectively empty. 

Even though rain was predicted for our entire visit, we got lucky (again) and actually had some sunny days. 

Neues Rathaus (New Town Hall) in Marienplatz

The famous Glockenspiel on Neues Rathaus.
(No, we did not wait around to see it do its dance.)

We visited many brewhouses and restaurants as the main goal of our visit to Munich was to drink beer (Joe) and eat German food (Sarah). We'd recommend ordering with moderation so that you can pack four or five different food/drink stops into a day. For example, it's worth a stop at Weisses Bräuhaus on Tal (just beyond the Old Town Hall from Marienplatz, across the street from Paulaner im Tal) for a pint of Augustiner Helles and a bowl of pretzel soup. From there you're just steps away from Hofbräuhaus, Augustiner am Platzl, Paulaner (of course), the Viktualienmarkt (with its biergarten), and Cafe Rischart (which is all over the place but the one that looks down on Viktualienmarkt has the deliciously tempting ice cream sundaes).

Charlie & Bert with the Munich lion (near Mike's Bike Tour office)

a statue of Juliet with an apparently lucky right breast (under the clock at Old Town House in Marienplatz)

In all three countries on our trip we saw an abundance of asparagus of both the white and green varieties. In Vienna and Munich, many of the restaurants we visited had seasonal asparagus menus! Since Joe and I both love asparagus, we found these special offerings very welcoming.

fresh asparagus!

In the afternoon on our second day we wandered through Viktualienmarkt, the outdoor farmer's market just beyond Marienplatz.

some of the largest leeks, beets, spring onions, and radishes I've ever seen (and then mini artichokes)

Viktualienmarkt biergarten (on a cold day!)

Saturday night we headed to Kilian's to watch the Bayern Munich v Dortmund game. Ironically, we ended up in an Irish bar surrounded by Aussies and Brits, many of whom were there for the Arsenal v Hull City game that came on before. There we had a great time hanging out with some people we met (a Brit who is from the exact area in London where we live now and an Aussie couple we hope to visit with again on their travels later). Then we grabbed a quick dinner at Guido al Duomo next door before trying to get to bed "early" for a big tour day on Sunday.

Whenever we have four nights in one place I like to get out of the city at least once to see something more rural. Living in London, even our green area of Highgate, means we don't see a lot of rolling hills or snow-capped mountains. We took the tour to Neuschwanstein Castle because my Uncle Bob recommended it, but the day would have been worth it even if we hadn't gone inside the castle because the drive through the countryside was so beautiful.

First we stopped at Linderhof, a sort of miniature palace in the mountains. This was King Ludwig II's tribute to French design and was modeled after Versailles. Ludwig II is often referred to as the fairy-tale king because he spent so much of his time and money building castles and funding the arts, particularly the operas of Richard Wagner.

 short walk from the bus to the palace

I liked the sculptures on the right side especially. They seemed more sassy.

After Linderhof we drove on to Hohenschwangau, a small village at the base of one of the lower Bavarian Alps where Ludwig II built his personal refuge, Neuschwanstein Castle. From the village there are several options for getting up to the castle (bus, horse-drawn carriage), but we would recommend walking/hiking without hesitation because that is the only way to take in the gorgeous scenery.

A view of Alpsee and the Bavarian Alps about a third of the way up to the castle

For some reason our photographer thought we wanted Hohenschwangau castle in the background, not the infinitely more beautiful lake and mountains that ended up directly behind our bodies. 

Walking is also the only way to reach the Marien bridge above the castle and get the views looking down on it with the valley behind. There are also several other trails around the castle that we would have loved to explore if we'd had more time. (For this reason I would recommend Bus Bavaria's tour; they spend the whole day at Neuschwanstein, biking, picnicking, and - if you are up for it - paragliding.)

Neuschwanstein, one of the many European castles that claims to be the inspiration for 

the Disney castle, and the alternate view from the castle back to the bridge.

enjoying every moment of the forest climb down from the castle

An iphone pic through the tinted bus windows and it's still gorgeous

Our last day was 70 degrees and gorgeous. We had one major stop left on our list: the Deutsches Museum of Science and Technology. We had crossed the Isar River during our bike tour but it was so much prettier in the sunlight. This picture doesn't do it justice - the river shimmered emerald green.

Joe and I always love a good science museum, but the astronomy exhibits in this one are particularly good. One was a 3D model of the Orion constellation that helped put in perspective that even though we may see the three stars of Orion's belt as even and in a straight line, they are actually at different distances away from us and seem unrelated if viewed from a different perspective. We followed a sign to an "observatory" area and expected a viewing platform like the ones we reach when climbing church towers but we were shocked to find ourselves in the museum's solar observation center where scientists use this telescope to monitor sun spots. The staff member on duty even opened the dome for us so we could take a look. So cool! (They also do night-time visits for people who want to use the telescope.)

Munich totally won us over. Joe drank lots of good beer and we enjoyed eating German food at every turn. (Soft pretzels, mustard, sausages? Saurkraut and red cabbage? Yeah, I'm sold.) Despite our original impressions of the city, we were sad to leave. Munich was a success!

5/8 of these are in Munich and there were more

Berlin

(September 10 - 14, 2013)

Copenhagen, the departure and arrival port of our cruise, was an easy enough city to decide to spend some extra time in, but from there Joe and I could have gone anywhere in Europe. From the time Alicia and Manuel left until I had to be in London for my orientation we had over a week and a half; we knew we didn't want to go straight to London since we'll have to whole year to explore there. First we thought we'd head to Amsterdam, but then decided that we'd like to do the Netherlands in spring. Then we thought about Paris, but since it's only a short train ride away we decided that we could use some of our weekend getaways for the closer destinations. That meant choosing cities that were further east and may be more difficult to accomplish during my school term. We each chose one and decided to spend our 10 extra nights split between them (including 2 extra nights in Copenhagen to top that one up to 4 total). The capital of Germany was Joe's choice, the capital of the Czech Republic was mine.

The flight between Copenhagen and Berlin was short, cheap, and uneventful. We had chosen a hotel in Alexanderplatz in what used to be East Berlin (and is now just east Berlin). This location was fine overall, but if I had to do it again I'd pick somewhere else. We had a good 15 minute walk to Alexanderplatz (the actual plaza), which was basically just a mall and hangout for teenagers. There was a group of restaurants on the Spree River that reminded me of Restaurant Row in San Marcos (except more deserted and most serving the same food), but beyond that we had to travel to the other side of town to do much. Plus our hotel, the Leonardo Royal Hotel, felt very strange. It had a beautiful lobby and the room was nice, but we had to walk down a crazy long hallway to get to any rooms from the elevator. This wouldn't have bothered us much, but the lights in the hallways were motion-sensored and were almost always off, which made sense because in the 5 days we were in the hotel I think we saw one other person.  For days it felt like we were the only people in a deserted hotel, although we knew that couldn't be true. Plus the in-room wifi cost €15 PER HOUR, so we had to use the computers in the lobby (like it was 2004).

Our first full day in Berlin we jumped in by joining Fat Tire Bike Tours' All-in-One City panorama, a 4.5 hour wandering through the major sites of the city including a beer garden lunch between Tiergarten and the Berlin Zoo. This helped us get a sense of the layout of the city and ticked a bunch of the must-see spots off our list right at the beginning.

Ready to Ride!

bikes and St. Hedwig's Cathedral (seriously)

a stop in front of Humbolt University's main libarary in Bebelplatz, the site of the Nazi book burning in 1933 during which 20,000 volumes were burned.

From Wikipedia: Among the thousands of books burned on Berlin's Opernplatz in 1933, following the Nazi raid on the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, were works by Heinrich Heine. To commemorate the terrible event, one of the most famous lines of Heine's 1821 play Almansor was engraved in the ground at the site: "Das war ein Vorspiel nur, dort wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man auch am Ende Menschen." ("That was but a prelude; where they burn books, they will ultimately burn people also.")

Joe and a remaining section of the Berlin Wall (you can see where the metal is
exposed because pieces of the wall have been taken as souvenirs).

Watchtower that looked over the No Man's Land between East and West Berlin

The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. The large cement blocks are of varying heights and on an undulating foundation, some tipped one way or another, giving people who walk inside the feeling of being isolated and disoriented even within this organized grid. 

Riding into Tiergarten (probably shouldn't be taking pictures while riding a bike...)

Berlin is almost entirely flat, so cycling is rather easy.

The Reichstag

Day Two we took Alicia's recommendation and headed to the DDR museum, an interactive experience of life in East Berlin. I really enjoyed it and probably could've stayed for about twice as long as we did, but we had evening plans and had to get ready.

The Trabi, the only car available to East Berliners, was a symbol of status and freedom. It took years to save enough for one and even once your order was in, it could take years to get your new car.

A side-by-side comparison of East Berlin-made jeans the contraband Levi's.

This exhibit was meant to give the visitor the sense of being interrogated. When you placed your elbows on sensors on the desk, the voice of the interrogator asking you question and of your own terrified responses resonated within your own head. It was intense and bizarre but effective.

a prison cell

We enjoyed making ourselves at home in this Brady-style East Berliner model home.

In the evening we travelled across town to visit the Museum of Musical Instruments (Musikinstrumenten-Museum), where guests use a headset to listen to the various sounds of over 3,000 different instruments. Some were familiar friends, but others were total strangers.

"Serpentine"

early horns

Joe totally fan-girling over a synthesizer used by Pink Floyd

EMS-VCS3 (one of only a hundred) like the one used by Pink Floyd.
(Seriously - look at his smile. Totally excited by this.)

This museum visit was just a prelude to our real event for the evening, though: a performance by the Berlin Philharmonic at their concert hall, Philharmonie. The performance included pieces by Polish, Czech, and Hungarian composers; Joe knew one of the names and neither of us felt swept off our feet by any of the compositions, though the performance itself was beautiful.

Bert & Charlie attended, too. It was their first orchestral concert!

For our last day our goals were further afield, so we headed back to Fat Tire to rent bikes for the day (sans tour). With these we rode out to the Museum für Naturkunde (Natural History Museum) to see their exhibits on dinosaurs, DNA, and the solar system.

The Guinness World-Record holder for the tallest dinosaur skeleton, a 43 foot Brachiosaurus.

The sun, totally not to scale. The German
word for Earth is "Erde," just fyi.

Crazy packed exhibit of living creatures. This was only one section of several rooms.

They provided this key with a magnifying glass attached to
help visitors figure out what they were looking at.

 Plus there was a bust of Charles Dickens, Charlie's namesake.

Charlie was excited to make new friends...

...until he almost became their meal.
(The other ones look like they're laughing at him!)

I also found a place called Princess Cheesecake and had to go there! (It was very good and had a lot of flavors I would like to try. The cheesecake was light and fluffy, not the New York variety.)

And we added a German edition to the International Harry Potter collection: German Order of the Phoenix!

Berlin, on the whole, had a different feel than any of the other cities we visited. It was colder, but still lively. Not as oppressive as St. Petersburg, or as industrial-but-beautiful as Gothenburg. In some ways it feels as though the city is still recovering from its history, and the reminders of the atrocities that happened here are still in the air. It was the first place where people weren't quite as ready to accommodate our English-only tendencies. The food was good but not sensational. The city lacked people in a weird way, but not like the rural back country of Norway where the charm made up for the silence. I would recommend that people see it, but I wouldn't necessarily put it on my list of top 5 cities. And so Berlin gets checked off our European To See list and off we go to Prague!