Munich, Germany 8,2014

 

We spent three nights in Munich and it was so much fun. We took the free three-hour walking tour with Sandemans New Europe from Marienplatz around the city. Our guide was great and very informative and yes, her name is Virginia. There are several options for this company including paid tours but I think this free tour is good enough for the first day to learn a bit about the old part of Munich and it's culture.

After the tour, we walked down to the English garden, a huge park in central Munich, which has a beer garden near the Chinese Tower which can host about 7000 people at the same time. It was fantastic, full of people and with loads of food available. The most common dishes that people ordered were roasted pork or chicken with lots of chips and each person had one serve with at least one beer. We ordered a grilled mackerel, half a roasted chicken, a roasted pork knuckle and a pretzel and two huge steins of beer. It was a fabulous meal and it took us about an hour to finish before we took the underground back to the hotel.

The next day, we came back to Marienplatz to walk up the Alter Peter (Old Peter) Tower for a fantastic 360 degrees city view. It took us a little while to go up but it was totally worth it for only €2. After all that effort, we needed some beer refreshments. Of course there is no shortage, even in the mornings, in Munich. We made it to Hofbrauhaus, one of the oldest beer houses in the world, established in 1589. This is a great place with lots of old regular characters who come with their own jugs and dressed in traditional costumes, the lederhosen. The ceiling of the restaurant has some great murals painted on it, too. The beer (served in one litre steins!) and food was great, not to mention the band playing traditional music which provided a great atmosphere. Even though I was a bit tipsy, I did manage to finish my beer.

We went back to the hotel and took a nap then headed out for dinner. We went to a kebab shop close by the hotel as we needed to take a train to Salzburg the next day. Stir fried freshly handmade noodles with potatoes and chilli was surprisingly great even though it was way too spicy for me. That's my fault because the lady warned me when I ordered but I thought probably spicy by European standards. It turned our even hotter than Thai green papaya salad or Korean noodles. But I did enjoy it.