My Europe Excursions!: München

Our train ride to Munich was a little rough. We decided to not pay for a sleeper car since last time it was 72 euro, and we figured we've been able to sleep in our seats to other cities, we'll be fine. Well, this train was by far the most uncomfortable we've been on - how convenient, right? It was set up with six seats in one little cabin and it was about the size of a closet. The seats were equivalent to a bench in my book. So as you can guess the night was a bit rough; I ended up sleeping on the floor and I'd like to never know how dirty that floor actually was.

On a brighter note though - we didn't get lost on the way to our hostel!!! Perhaps it was because it was literally less than a block from the train station. We got in really early and so we did laundry!! Never have we been so excited! The hostel was really nice, so we had a little room to do laundry in. Well, we needed to wash the clothes we were wearing - so, what to do? I was dressed in my jacket and wrapped my scarf around my waist and Stephanie had a long shirt on..and we did laundry. It was great. And we showered in probably the best shower we've had yet - our day definitely started off well!

After laundry, we headed out to the Dachau concentration camp. We got an audio tour and explored the site. (We got lost on the site, I don't know how that's possible, but we managed to do it). We listened to our audio tour and learned a lot about Dachou. We went through the museum and read a lot about the holocaust. It was a lot of reading so we spent quite a bit of time in the museum. We tried to watch a 15 minute film about the camp, but due to our train ride the night before, as soon as the lights were dimmed, it was a struggle to keep my eyes open, despite the fact that I really wanted to see the film! After the film we headed to the Bunker. We saw where prisoners were held and rooms that they tortured people in. Then we walked over to the dorms. All of them had been destroyed, so they had recreated what it was like on one of the dorms, the rest were all just cement foundations. After that, we went over to the crematorium and gas chamber - creepy, I know. It was quite disturbing to see this part. I don't understand how people used to subject others to that.

At night we went to the University area and walked around. I forgot my camera at night though, so I didn't get any pictures of that area. It was pretty though.

The next day we decided to go to the Deutsches museum. It is the biggest museum about science and it was way cool! Apparently the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago is modeled after Deutsches. We saw how subways are made which was one of my favorite parts because all the metro systems have fascinated me! I didn't understand how they built these massive tunnels under these huge cities, so it really interested me! We also saw boats, planes, chemistry, math, musical instrument, and lots more. We spent like 4 hours walking around - it was great.

After the museum we decided to take a bike tour of the city! A FREE bike tour, nonetheless! We headed to the famous Marienplatz where our tour was meeting and walked around a bit and then met up with our tour. Steph had a bit of trouble with the bike, but it was really fun! Our first stop was the Hofbrauhaus and learned about how Nazi's used to meet there. Then we saw some opera hall, and Odeonplatz. It was raining on us on and off but it wasn't too bad (yet). I think Germany has a really interesting history so I really enjoyed learning about everything!! After Odeonplatz, we headed to The English Gardens - the largest metropolitan park in the world. We headed to the Chinese Pagoda (beer garden) and had some Hofbrau beer. Afterward we headed to the Ice Bach, which is a river where people can surf! It was cool to watch them! It was at this point that it started to POUR on us!! We saw the rest of the sights so quickly that I don't even remember what they are. We got so soaked but it was a good laugh! I'm sad though that we didn't get the chance to experience Munich in the sun though, because it is such a cool city!!

At night, after getting into some dry clothes, we went to the Hofbrahaus to have a Bavarian dinner! The place is huge!! There were so many people!! And the beer was 2 liters! Stephanie and I both got some Bavarian original beer and lemonade mix - it's called a Radler - it was good!

We considered staying in Munich another day, but the weather was predicted to be bad all week =( I'll definitely try to make it back to Munich some day when it's not raining. But overall - an AWESOME city!