Wednesday, September 11, 2013

The last of our Bavarian fun, Munich


The morning we left Salzburg seemingly everything went wrong and yet it worked out great.  We enjoyed a lovely breakfast that morning, then caught a bus to town so we could get to the train station in time for an early train.  Snafu 1 - our bus took a different route than the one posted for it, so we missed our train.

Fortunately, this was a problem we could overcome by catching a later train.  Of course that meant that we arrived in Munich an hour later than planned.  Now instead of having 1:30 to get to our hostel, check in, eat lunch and catch a train to Neuschwanstein, we had 30 minutes.  Snafu 2 - we caught the train but didn't have time for lunch. Oh, just an FYI, we were able to do all this train travel for the low price of 13 euros each thanks to something called the Bayern Ticket.  It allows you unlimited travel in Bavaria for one day.  For us it meant we could get from Salzburg to Munich to Neuschwanstein to Munich for almost nothing.  Gotta love it.

Traveling on a growling stomach isn't much fun no matter how pretty it is outside the train.  And it most certainly was pretty outside, as you can see.


So we arrived in Fussen starving and headed straight for a restaurant.  We found one with some good food for shockingly reasonable prices and had a nice relaxed meal.  Then we headed back to catch a bus up to the castle only to discover Snafu 3.  The buses to the castle only run just after the trains had arrived.  Which meant we were waiting another half hour to catch a bus up there which was important when you realize that the daylight would be running low soon.  We considered a taxi but dismissed them as a ludacris ripoff.


So we caught the next bus up, then double timed it up the hill to the castle.  Literally.  The estimate said it would take 45 minutes to climb up.  We did it in 20. When we reached the bridge overlooking the castle we found the final snafu.  Snafu 4 - the sun was in a lousy position for taking pictures of the castle.  We did our best anyway.


The reason this all worked out great is because we did some more climbing to a spot very few visit.  There we got to sit all alone and enjoy the beauty of the castle and countryside together.  And that time made the whole day worthwhile.


Later we caught the train back to Munich, slept as best we could in a loud dorm (Vicky picked has sworn off dorms for all future trips) and hoped for good weather the next day.  Fortunately, we got it.  It was clear, warm and lovely, so we decided to visit Schloss Nymphenburg.  The palace itself wasn't that impressive but the gardens around it were and walking around in them was a wonderful way to relax and enjoy a nice day.



That afternoon, we went back to the hostel and I took a nap due to sleep deprivation .  That evening we decided to visit the historic center of Munich for a little evening sightseeing.  The Neo-Gothic New Town Hall was definitely the most interesting site (though hard to photograph).


That night we had better luck sleeping, which is surprising since we were extremely excited about going to Switzerland the next day.  But sleep well we did, before walking the 3 minutes to the train station to ride in 1st class for the first time.  The most beautiful country on earth awaited us!

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