Erstaunliche Abenteuer: Easter Vacation Part 2

Allianz Soccer Arena

The second part of my Easter vacation we spent in München (Munich) and surrounding area. On Monday we left at about 6am and drove to München. We arrived late morning and and tried to check in. The person at the desk said that we couldn't check in yet because the guest in that room hadn't left yet. So we spent most of the afternoon walking around and seeing some sights.

München is huge compared to Saarbrücken or even Boise so we did a lot of walking that day. We walked around downtown and tried to go look inside some of the churches. Being Easter Monday all the churches were having mass and all of the stores were closed. We did go into one church and a lady got mad at us because Ben didn't take off his hat and we had cameras. For being a lady that goes to church she wasn't very nice.

We made our way to the English gardens which is a huge park. There is a river that flows through it and there is a place for people to surf. It was really chilly and there were still people out there surfing. Then we walked to the other side of the park where there is this Chinese Tower. We stopped and ate lunch and then made our way back to the train station. From there we went back to the hotel and checked in. We were exhausted so we took a short nap and then went out for supper. For supper we went to a place called the Hofbräuhaus. It is a really old brewery that has been making beer since 1592.

Chinese tower

Hofbräuhaus

The Hofbräuhaus has live music which is traditional Bavarian music and the musicians were even wearing lederhosen. It was a huge tourist attraction and there were a ton of people that were there and it was very loud. It took us a while to get our food, I think because it was so hecktic, but it was good! I had a German style type macaroni and cheese dish.

Hohenschwangau

The next day we saw the weather was supposed to be nice so we went to Neuschwanstein. This is a castle I have been wanting to go to since before I graduated high school. We started out by going to the "summer residence" which is a castle called Hohenschwangau. It is the yellow castle in the pictures. The tour was about 35 minutes and we got to see a good portion of the castle. We didn't get to see every part of the castle but we got to see a good chunk of it. There is one picture from the guest bedroom that I secretly took. The view looks fake. Even standing there with the window open it looked fake just how perfect the mountains look and how blue the sky was.

Neuschwanstein

Hohenschwangau and lake from Neuschwanstein

After we finished that tour we had about an hour until our next tour at Neuschwanstein. It is about a mile walk from Hohenschwangau to Neuschwanstein. It was perfect time to walk up and take some pictures...some may be an understatement. We then took a tour of Neuschwanstein which only took about 35 minutes as well. It was kind of disappointing because Neuschwanstein is probably three times bigger than Hohenschwangau but they tour is the same length. I still loved it though. They said that the castle was never completed and so that might be why you don't get to see as much since it isn't even finished. They did turn some of the unfinished parts into a cafe and a visitors shop. I am still unsure if I was okay with that. But they stuff that was finished was amazing. The king sure knew how to pick the places for his castles because each one had amazing views.

Lake by Hohenschwangau/Neuschwanstein

After we took our tours we took a path that lets you go to a bridge. From this bridge you get a perfect postcard view of Neuschwanstein. The path that goes on past the bridge was still closed from winter so we couldn't keep going.

View from guest room in Hohenschwangau

After we spent about five hours there we headed back to München. We had a little break, not long enough to take a nap this time, and then we went to supper. Then we went back downtown to eat at a Mexican restaurant that Ben and Iris had eaten at before.

Neuschwanstein

On our last day there we went to a water park called Therme Erding. I don't have any pictures of this because I didn't want my camera to get damaged. The place was amazing it was almost all inside. There is a spa part and then a pool part and then a ride part. In the places we went the water was really warm. The water wasn't quite hot tub warm but it was definitely close.

Surfers at the English Gardens

One thing I noticed when we were there was that there wasn't hardly any life guards. There was no one to tell you when to go. Either a ride was just a free for all and you just went whenever and you got out of the way or you had to wait for a green light. I never saw one person get hurt. This concept amazed me because there is no way anyone would do that in the states. The slides were fun and they seemed really long! The only bad thing was that there was only one stair case that when to every right so the stairs were always crowded.

After the water park we went back to München to shop a little. It was raining when we got back so that sucked but we have been collecting yellow post cards of the city signs wherever we go and we hadn't found München yet so that was our goal. We found it finally after we gave up looking for it! After that we checked out a burger place and it was really good! That I think pretty much sums up my trip to München.

P.S. The pictures would cooperate so they aren't in a very nice pattern sorry.