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Late Sunday morning we went out to a restaurant called The Big Easy, which is known for live jazz music & an epic Sunday brunch. Epic it was! With a smorgasbord including everything from scrambled eggs to chicken curry to 15 types of cheese it was difficult to know where to start! Luckily we could take our time & relax, sitting back in our big cushy chairs listening to an awesome duo on sax & piano crooning away to all my favourite kind of tunes from the likes of Billie Holiday & Frank Sinatra.
After brunch, we strolled out into the sunshine & headed for the Englischergarten - a huge (2 times bigger than NYC's Central Park), beautiful park in Munich that is known for its' "nude beaches" & beer gardens! We strolled along the river where nude sunbathers of all ages were stretched out along the bank enjoy the early afternoon sunshine. Kinda strange coming from a country where it's unusual to see a nude beach on an actual beach, let alone on a riverbank in a park! We also stopped by the surf wave, where a wave for surfing has been artificially created in the river so people can surf, one at a time, for a minute or so in the middle of a river in a park.
We then made our way to the Chinese Tower, under which sits one of the most famous beer gardens in Munich. Being a Sunday, & just about lunch time, it was packed with locals & tourists alike, settling in for a lazy, sunny afternoon with beers in hand. We had planned to meet my old English teacher, Tom Rowley, there, along with his wife Barbara, their son Ben, & another of their old friends, but unfortunately we had no such luck. They didn't have a phone, & our phone is temperamental at the best of times (what did people do before mobile phones?? :P), & despite wandering round & round the Chinese Tower for about an hour after the time we agreed to meet we couldn't find them! We later discovered that they too had been wandering around the Chinese Tower looking for us, so how we managed to miss each other I can't quite fathom…In any case we eventually decided to call it a day, & after spending some time lying in the sun (fully clothed) we headed back to our hostel for another cat nap.
In the evening we went to one of the Augustiner breweries & had a less than pleasant dining experience, although it didn't quite beat the Chamonix-grey-pork incident. This time we ordered a sort of Bavarian meat specialty tasting plate, which was described as having ravioli, meatballs, roast pork etc. on it. Sounds pretty nice right? Wrong! It was Bavarian food gone bad! And I couldn't help but keep remembering what Ozzie had told us about Bavarians' tendency to use every single part of the animal wherever possible (for a place with such strict laws about what you can & can't put into beer they sure don't seem to mind which bits of pig you eat!). I ate a lot of pretzels that night! :S
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Mutti Your experience at Augustinier reminds me of our Christmas at Garmish-Partenkirken where the menu was in german--of course-- and the waitress didn't speak any English. Greg finished up with pigs kidneys!! Ugh