25.10.10
We arrived in Munich (The beer capital of the world) yesterday after a 3.5 hour train ride from Innsbruck. The train ride was pretty uneventful but got quite frightening as we climbed up steep hills with tracks supported only by stilts. I did however learn that toilets or water closets as they are known in Europe on trains are only holes in the ground! I invented a game to pass the time and it involved counting the evidence of this fact on the tracks! The Wombat's hostel didn't work out entirely according to plans. The whole place was fully booked! The ratings didn't lie!
We managed to find a small hotel close to the train station called Hotel Italia. It happened to be in Munich's Red Light District and we passed five dodgy looking strip clubs as we made our way to the hotel. The one directly next door was called the Candy Shop!! The hotel was very nice with ensuite bathroom and a buffet breakfast served daily. The hotel also offered free WiFi which was attractive as Internet Cafes in Europe can be extremely pricey. The only problem was I wan't quite sure of how to use the safe and ended up locking our passports and 150 euros in the safe! Zoe was not impressed and I had to walk downstairs to ask the German host if he could possibly open the safe! He could, so we decided that there wasn't muck point in using the safe at all! We had a short rest before hitting the streets of Munich! Unfortunately we headed in the complete wrong direction at first! Zoe wanted to go home as soon as we arrived as we passed strip club after strip club down this main street. We even passed a young prostitute sitting at a street corner dressed to the nines. She must have been about 14. It was very sad! I must admit that at this time, I was even frightened and was on constant lookout for people looking to steal something off me or hold me up at knifepoint.
Everyone in this area, appeared to be Turkish or African and we wondered why Munich was so attractive to so many tourists and where we could find a real german like we had seen in postcards. We changed direction and headed to the centre of town. We knew we were in the right place when we found our first beeer garden. It didn;t take us long before we were sharing a local brew! All I wanted was an original Bratwurst! I walked all over the show and could not find one anywhere! I said to Zoe "I thought every second shop would sell them". In the end, it was getting late and we hadn't eaten all day, so we settled for grilled fish. Once I had finished eating, I am not joking when I saw that I walked down a street and every shopfront was offering Bratwurst and Pretzles. I made sure I had one the following day! It was super!
We walked the town and the buildings were pretty amazing, the cathedrals and clock towers had so much detail. We had spoken to the Munich Information Desk and had taken a couple of brochures to glance through as we walked! Best decision ever, because that night we ended up attending the Beer Challenge! The challenge was almost like a pubcrawl in that it offered two free beers and a shot of Jagermeister over a 4 hour period. During this time, we were to visit 3 brewing houses. It was very random in that we knew nobody and everyone met outside the Starbucks at train platform 11. By the end of the night everyone was my friend! There were people from Australia, America, United Kingdom, Canada, Austria etc.. but we got on really well with 3 american girls named Chantelle, Rachel and Jordan. They were from California, Minnesota and Texas and had recently met each other while studying at a culinary school in a small town in Italy. They were very friendly and we had an amazing night! They offered to host us in Italy and wanted to arrange to go with them to the states when they head back. My head hurt a bit the next morning, but I pulled through ok! We had learnt German drinking songs, the history of beer in Bavaria, Beer Trivia and now I can say Cheers in German! Proast! We visited the Hofbrauhaus and ordered a litre of beer to share between us! Adolf Hitler used to hold his meetings at this site years ago! It is nearly impossible to find a seat but it is a great way to befriend people you don't know as you cuddle up next to strangers! We also visited Augistiner Keller where the Pope's favourite beer is brewed. This particular brew is quite fruity and is unfiltered! It was pretty good!
In the morning my memory had failed me as to what the last site was called but once we were finished there, we went back to the Euro Youth Hostel for our shot of Jager and to party on. The tour was supposed to finish at 10 p.m but we only managed to finish at 1.30 a.m! Needless to say I slept very well that night!
The next morning we had arranged to meet the gils at the Starbucks for a less festive tour. It was a very appropriate day to be visiting the Dachau concentration camp where a total of 206,206 prisoners were held captive by the SS during the Third Reich. Of these prisoners 45,000 did not survive the brutal torture that was inflicted on them. The day was very gloomy, overcast with rain. It was windy and the brown and yellow Autumn leaves fell from the trees and swirled in the wind before settling on the ground. Even more significant, was that it was freezing cold and it was only autumn. My heart sank as I thought of all those prisoners who suffered doing manual labour in six inches of snow in the original uniforms that were shown to us! The shoes consisted of a block of wood with some material over the top almost like a slipper.
We walked into the area and we could see the remains of the railway line used to transport masses of prisoners into the camp for crimes such as being a communist, a jew, political extremist or homosexual. It gave me shivers to think that the ground I was walking on played such a significant part in history and so many people had suffered there. I actually felt quite bad for showing interest in the history and paying to be part of the tour to visit the site. The gate welcomed us there with SS propaganda with the words Hard work will set you free in German! The guards knew all too well that this would not be the case! Dachau was the longest standing Nazi concenrtration camp. It was opened in 1933 and ran until 1945. We were shown where the prisoners slept. At first, overcrowding was no an issue with each prisoner having their own bed. For the first four years, the average ncrease to the number of prisoners each year was approximately 2,500. The intake spiked in year 4 when 18,000 were taken in. In some years, the annual intake reached as high as 78,000 and there were up to 6 prisoners sharing any given bed. The camp consisted of 30 dorm rooms that looked like army barracks. Each bed had a shelf to remind the prisoners that they had no wordly possessions to rest on them.
We saw the 12 toilets that were shared between 2 to 3 thousand prisoners at any one time. This experience was a massive eye opener and the foundations that line the ground will be a constant reminder of Germany's dark history. We were taken through the museum where prisoners were once stripped of all their possesions and registered. We also looked at the showers. Prisoners were tortured all year round with boiling water in summer and freezing water during the winter. Other forms of punishment involved hanging prisoners from their wrists with their hands tied behind their backs. Once in this awkward position, they would be lifted onto hooks, swung and taunted! It made be angry just being there! You could see where the beems that supported the hooks once were. Lashings were also used. 25 lashings were given when orders were disobeyed. The problem was that prisoners needed to count each lash in German! Not all could speak German! In some cases, the lashings continued until the prisoners died! The Nazis also used this site for medical experiments on humans such as pressure testing and hyperthermia. We were then shown the gas chambers and where the dead bodies were cremated. This was a very interesting tour and it hit a very soft spot. It is terrible to think of the amount of evil that was present in such a small area only 70 odd years ago.
We caught a bus and a train back to Munich. We then returned to our hotel to begin planning our next leg. We head to Prague tomorrow for a few days. After that we will be going back to London for a week before going to visit sunny South Arica for two weeks!