Germany….The Promised Land

After the miserable, miserable, miserable, miserable, miserable train ride from Florence to Munich, Blake and I arrived in the Munich train station, which was comparable to a space station after the complete disorganization that was the Florence train station.  One step in, and we knew we had arrived in heaven.  It was about 15 degrees cooler than the sweltering heat of Italy and there were giant pretzels everywhere.  Being 6 in the morning, the station was relatively empty, so Blake and I (following my brother’s advice) waited in the slowest ticket line known to man to purchase our reservations for Berlin.  Our line was so slow, that after about 15 minutes of standing there, we separated, and I was able to actually get through my line in the time the slow ticket lady was still talking with one couple.  As soon as we made it through, we were advised that we didn’t need reservations to Berlin and our love for Germany increased (despite having purchased a Eurorail pass, it turns out you must also purchase reservations for destinations in France and Italy…This is an annoying expense.  Why can’t they just add that to the ticket cost?  Argh.  I guess its actually lucky though.  There were people who didn’t purchase reservations in advance on the sleeper train chilling in the hallway, sitting on their luggage the whole time.)

Exhausted, we quickly found our hostel – Euro Youth Hostel, where we were informed that we could not check in until 2:00 in the afternoon.  Considering that we had gotten a combined maybe 4 hours of sleep on the train, we stumbled around the main section of Munich and found the best market known to man.

Yum!

Note – if you find yourself waking up before 8:00 (or being forced to be awake before 8:00) in foreign countries, it is actually the best time to be awake in all these cities.  Being the summer, there are massive HERDS of people everywhere during the afternoon, but you can count on it being virtually empty at 7:00 AM.  The market was just opening, so we found someone crushing up fruit for juices and bought two tiny cups (I am making us have at least one fruit serving a day.  I don’t want us to get scurvy!) and something called a “Philadelphiaring” which awesomely turned out to be a bagel and cream cheese.  We debated joining a walking tour of the city or a walking tour of “Hitler’s Germany” at 10:00, but decided we were way to tired, and instead walked to the English Gardens, which was the best decision we have made on this entire trip.  I can’t even describe to you how intensely happy we were walking up to a shaded area of green grass we had decided to nap on.

Our approach to the glorious napping spot

We laid down, and thus began my favorite activity of the entire trip – the best 3 hour co-nap anyone has ever had.

We were asleep approximately 10 seconds after this picture was taken.

The view

After three great hours, we woke up and headed over the nearby beer garden, where Blake decided that Germany was the greatest country in the world (apparently he is moved by sites of giant beers, sausages, and pretzels).

The biggest smile Blake has had all week.

We ate and drank and headed back to the hostel to finally check in, shower, and figure out our next few days.  We wondered around the city using my buddy, Rick Steves, as a personal reference guide for the city’s sites.  Eventually, we found our way to the Hofbrauhaus, which while extremely touristy, was just one of those things we thought we had to do in Munich.  After 2 liters of beer a piece, ridiculing the table of teenage American tourists next to us acting like complete drunken idiots, a giant plate of gravy soaked pork and sausages, and about 4 pretzels, we stumbled back to the hostel for the night.

All in all – a great day.  We are now Germany fans for life.  Future plans include traveling to see some castles, Dachau, the glochenspeil (I have no idea if I spelled that right), and the Germany/Spain World Cup game.

Now, I must wake up Blake.  It’s 8:30!

BYE!

Museums, Street Performers and Awfulness

So currently I  am on an overnight train from Florence to Munich. Unfortunately, due to a stupid error in our Eurail time table schedule, we had to take the overnight train which we did not take into consideration in our budget, so we are in coach and not a sleeper car. But fortunately, our car is pretty happening, with an Italian/German 18-year old going into flight school, an Indian Monk who is going to study German, an English college grad who is going into graduate school for Librarian-ism, and a mom from Winter Park, Colorado who is joining her daughter and her boyfriend on a leg of their trip through Europe. And, not to mention, Kristi and I just finished a full bottle of wine by ourselves (we offered, but apparently the monk and the 18-year-old flight student don’t drink), so we are feeling good to sleep on the way to Germany. UPDATE: NIGHT TRAINS ARE HORRIBLE. Contrary to my feelings written above, this was one of the worst experiences I’ve had. Nothing to do with the company, but the seats were like old solitary confinement spaces where it is just too short to stand up, and too short to lay down. It was just too small to be comfortable.  (KRISTI INTERJECTION:  Also, the air conditioning wasn’t working, there was a baby stranded in a stroller in the hallway near our car – crying its little eyes out, and at some point, I decided that I would be more comfortable laying on the dirty, dirty floor.  This lasted until I remembered trying to find a bathroom to use earlier, only to find the closest one filled to the brim with pee and poop.  While laying on the floor attempting to sleep, all I could imagine was that toilet overflowing and pee and poop making its way over to me, laying there on the nasty floor.  Needless to say, I quickly stood back up and rearranged myself uncomfortably in my tiny chair.) So our advice would be to avoid the night train at all costs, or at least spring for a sleeper car.

But we need to get back to our last days in Florence…

Our last two days have been comparitively relaxing, being our Florence museum days. However Kristi is still waking up at 6:30 am and rearing to go, so they are starting out early. Yesterday, we woke up and found a little local cafe for breakfast, which turned out to be a lot like the Italian Cheers where everybody yelled the guys’ name who walked in, only subsitute cappucino for barley pops, and insert two American tourists who have no idea what the hell is going on. The highlight of the day was going to the Galleria Accademia to view the David, by Michealangelo. It was 100% worth the hype. Then we walked around Florence, which turns out to be much more beautiful and amazing than the area around our hotel would make it out to be. We found ourselves at a wine bar and then a great pizza joint across the river for dinner, partaking in many a vino and bierre before treaking back to the hotel – only to be sidetracked by what I can call the greatest street performance known to man. We caught a few words of English and figured they had to be from the U.S., so I went and talked to the camera man (who was documenting their travels) and it turns out they are a 19-piece brass band from Providence, Rhode Island, some go to Brown and others just used their vacation from work to do a 2-week mini-tour through Italy. Check out the greatess of the What Cheer? Brigade:

The next day began with a MacGyver-like adventure involving a camera charger. I accidentally brought a charger from Kristi’s old cameara and the battery wouldn’t fit; running through my options of buying a new camera, using disposables/iPhone for the rest of the trip, or smashing apart the old charger with a chair in hopes I could piece it together to fit the new battery, I went for the latter and here’s the result:

Yes, those are band aids holding it together.

We then packed up and headed for the Uffizi gallery, which, along with rows and rows of baby Jesus and Mary paintings, main acts include Botticelli’s Birth of Venus and Spring.

And later that night, we packed up for our overnight trip to Munich and leads us to now. We will see what Germany has in store, but I can tell you it will include many pretzels, beer and sausage. I can’t wait.