On Sunday, we took a train from Interlaken to Mannheim, Germany. After a few stops, a man sitting across from us heard us talking about Germany and he started telling us about Germany and where he was from. The young woman next to me joined in, telling us about Geneva, Switzerland, where she lived. We discussed differences in politics in each of our countries. She told us that they charged us for water in Switzerland just to get more money out of us and that we have to specifically ask for tap water in a pitcher. We thought we tried, but we must not have been asking clearly enough.
We got off the train in Mannheim and stepped outside to soak in the sun and get some fresh air before traveling more. We then took the train from Mannheim to Munich, but we both tried to rest on the train so we were half asleep when we heard them say something about a Munich station. They didn’t give announcements English like they did on most other trains, though, but it was only a couple minutes after when we were supposed to get off, so we got off the train. We stepped outside and I checked my location on Google Maps only to find that we were still way outside of the city (probably at least an hour and a half walk). We frantically searched for a bus that could take us closer and eventually found a train. We figured it was too short of a ride for them to check for tickets, so we just hopped on the train. We got off at the correct station and walked to the hostel. We went to dinner and I got a turkey schnitzel with potato salad.
On Monday morning, we walked over to the famous Viktualienmarkt, a large outdoor market with fresh produce, mini delis and cafes, and souvenir shops.
We decided it was too cold to be outside, so we wandered away until we found a breakfast restaurant. After, we visited a few different churches: Asamkirsche, which was my favorite because of all the ornate details everywhere you turn, and St. Michael’s Church. We walked around to some more town squares, wandered through a garden, and then walked to a mall to take shelter.
For an early dinner, we went to Hofbrauhaus, an old, well-known beer garden, for an early dinner. I got a potato and vegetable soup with a pretzel and we shared apple strudel for dessert. In the evening, we visited the Residenz Museum, an old palace where the Bavarian monarchs lived. The architecture in Germany is definitely different: the churches and palaces have a lot more gold decorations than other countries.
We walked back toward the hostel and stopped at a cafe to dry off and warm up. I got a chai latte and we split bread with butter, chives, and tomatoes. When we got back to the hostel, we went to the lobby and ate the last few chocolates from Switzerland.
We let ourselves sleep in the next day and went back to the market where we got paninis. Our next stop was St. Peter’s Church.
We spent a few hours at the modern art museum, looking at exhibits of art from all different movements. We thought about going to the Englischer Garten but almost immediately changed our minds once we stepped outside into the rain and wind. We walked back to the mall instead and did some more shopping and then went to another authentic German bar/restaurant where we split a pork roast, potato dumpling, potato salad, and apple-flavored red cabbage. We went to another cafe to warm up where we split a white chocolate almond coconut crepe.
On our last day in Germany, we went to Aldi to pick up food for later. We spent the day on a tour visiting palaces in the Bavarian region. We first took the tour bus to Linderhof Palace. The palace looked smaller from the outside, but we took a tour of the inside and it was gorgeous. Similar to the Residenz Museum, it was covered in gold decorations. Some of the wall paintings were partly made with sculptures where a few legs seemed to be climbing out of the painting. It was amazing how seamlessly the people in the painting transitioned into the sculpture. There seemed to be a heavy French influence on the architecture and paintings in the palace.
Our next stop was in Oberammergau, a cute touristy Bavarian town. We walked around the town and stopped at a souvenir shop with a bunch of Christmas decorations and cuckoo clocks.
We took the tour bus to the Neuschwanstein Castle. We walked uphill to the castle and walked around it to see the view of the town and lakes from the mountain. We had a guided tour through the castle. A lot of the doors, walls, and furniture were made with dark wood, which made it feel like we had jumped into a fairytale, like “Hansel and Gretel” or “Little Red Riding Hood.”
We took the bus back to Munich, ate dinner at the train station, and went back to Aldi to buy breakfast foods. We went to a restaurant and split another apple strudel. We realized we forgot to ask if they accepted credit cards and we were out of euros, so I had to go to an ATM to get cash to pay for it. I was surprised by how many places in Germany didn’t accept credit card or had a payment minimum for cards. We went back to the hostel and talked to a guy in our room from Canada. We exchanged travel stories and transportation mishap stories.
The Voyage Journal 