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Munich was by far the most disappointing city yet, and we had a very average stay.
This of course is tge statement I prepared if we hated Munich. Needless to stay I don't need it as it was one of the cooler cities in Europe.
Suprisingly Munich and Berlin are two of the most contrasting cities in Europe, despite being the two biggest cities in Germany. Munich represents every German stereotype known to mankind. The huge beer halls, beer gardens, leather shorts with pulled up socks and a shirt with a green vest are all in Munich. It is also the home of beer in many people's view, and Oktoberfest is of course in Munich. On average one person in Munich drinks 1.5 litres of beer a day (530 litres a year). The university students who stay on campus are given a litre of Munich's finest free from the government every day. In Munich when you go to the bar and ask for a beer you get a litre. The stein's that these litres are served in weigh 1kg empty.
Our hostel, Wombats Munich, was in a good location next to hauptbanhoff, the main train station in Munich. The six bed dorm we were in for the five nights certainly ensured we met some, umm interesting people. There were a Dutch couple who were in the room for the first four nights. Their day went something like this-
7am. Get up and argue for an hour. Or two. Slam the bathroom door at ten minutely intervals.
3pm. Sleep for hours after possibly having a love making session.
11pm. Argue about the arguement about who started the arguement about starting the arguement.
2am. Finish that arguement.
Our first day in Munich was filled with a "Free" walking tour with our guide, Ozzie. Of course free means a large compulsary tip at the conclusion, god as if you didn't know that. However it was a good way to see this city and included a bratwurst and beer.
Another cool part of Munich is the surf wave. They have a man made wave in the river where the surfers strut their stuff. It is worth a look on YouTube as it is pretty different.
On Tuesday we went our separate ways for the day. This was the first time we have spent more than an hour away from each other for three months, no word of a lie. Mat went on a tour of Dachau, the first concentration camp. Meanwhile I went to the Olympic stadium from the 1972 olympics. This was a compromise from the original suggestion of both going to the museum of paperclips. I still think the free paper clip offered with that tour is too good to refuse, but I guess it wasn't meant to be. We both had a good day, and learned a lot.
Munich also provided us with the best meal so far, at the famous Hofbraeuhaus. This is a three story beerhall that holds 2500 people and is reknowned worldwide. The main festival hall alone holds 1500 people. For dinner we had a Pork Knuckle, which is huge and comes with gravy and potato dumplings. Basically this is a huge leg of pork with a lot of meat.
Allianz Arena is a state of the art stadium that is only 5 years old. It is the home of Bayern Munich, the European football giants. It was a major stadium at the 2006 world cup. The best part about the stadium is that it has been designed so that tge whole stadium can change colour for different matches. It is either white, red or blue. Our tour took us through the whole stadium, including the change rooms, players tunnel and the press conference room. The Bayern Munich megastore covers 800m2 and has an astronomical amount of merchandise.
"The Crawl Beer Tour" sounded too good to refuse, so Tuesday night we embarked on this pub crawl. The guide took us to three beerhalls/beergardens. The biggest beergarden (Augustiner Kellar) held 5000 people and is the biggest inner city beergarden in the world. At the conclusion of the tour the guides challenged someone to strip off and go for a bit of a fountain run through the major fountain of Munich. After a few beers this seemed like a great idea and I had no hesitation in taking up the offer. I did keep my (white) underwear on to keep legal. (Happy mum?)
After the beer tour we all went back to the Euro Hostel bar for a few beers (or coctails for the real men). This was obviously a great chance to meet some other travellers. At one stage I saw a very pretty girl across the bar, so I did what any man would do, use a classic pick up line. "could I take a photo of you so I can show Santa what I want for Christmas?" This line has 100% strike rate so far (1/1). Elsa turned out to be a really great girl who in my opinion is one of the better girls in Europe.
Today we head back into Austria to Innsbruck.
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