Munich

It had been cold for the last few days. Not so cold for the locals, but coming from sultry London it was cold for us. This morning we woke up to snow! For the morning there were extremely large flakes of snow falling, enough to dust the fields with a white coat. Driving down to Ulm we borrowed some internet to find out where we are going to stay tonight.

Then we basically just drove to Munich on the autobahn. Steven and Richelle came to Munich with us on their way to catching a train to Nurenburg. We had a little 1.2L car with four of us and luggage stuffed in, but it still managed to sit on 150-160km/h for the main stretch of the road. You know when you drive the M1 from Brisbane to the Gold Coast and you hit the 110km/h section of road and it is just sweet relief from the slowness of 100km/h? Well, reverse that feeling and multiply it by 10 when you hit a 120km/h section after 160km/h. It is just painfully slow!

Coming into Munich, Steve's eyes lit up and nostrils flared as he smelt the Augustiner brewery in town. Before too long we were there in our first Munich beer hall, which is attached to one of the oldest brewerys in Munich. Everyone had a round of 1L beers which went down just a bit too easily for some.

A quick train ride to town brought us to the Marienplatz, the main square of Munich. The square was filled with more Christmas markets. What would have been good is to go up the town hall tower. However it seems that closing time was 30 minutes earlier than stated so we missed out. Tonight we spent our time wandering around the markets and town centre, having some Gluhwein and Bratwurst.

Wednesday

This morning we had a look around Munich before leaving Germany. Our bags are stored at the train station and we head back to the main town square, Marienplatz. First thing is to watch the end of the disappointing glockenspiel performance of the town clock before we get the lift to the town hall tower for the outlook that we couldn't get last night. The view of Munich is good, but we can't see to the Bavarian alps due to the haze.

Today we pass the Hofbrauhaus (a famous beer house) and decide to stop in for a sneaky drop. The Hofbrauhaus is a tourist mecca, much different from the Augustiner beer house yesterday. We can definitely understand how this, and every other drinking establishment, could be jam packed to the rafters with beer swizzlers during Oktoberfest.

We continued wandering around the Munich sights before boarding a train to Salzburg mid afternoon.

Click the photo to see more of Munich.

Munich