We have been in Munich before, back in 2011. On that trip we spent a few days going to the art museums, seeing the sights, and discovering the Bräuhauses. If you click here you can see photos from that trip.
This time we are passing through, a good stop part way from Innsbruck to Düsseldorf. Our big plan for the next day and a half is to eat at our favorite bräuhaus, Der Pschorr. The second big plan is to meet up with Lorent and Petra, with whom I climbed just a few days ago. Third, we are going to walk, try to see a few sights we have not seen before, and give Gail a chance to do some shopping.
I shudder at the thought of the shopping. Later, I spot the shopping witch on the wall, and grab a quick photo.
We got to München just after noon, and by the time we bought our tickets onward for Saturday and walked to the guesthouse, it was after one.
We are staying at the Hotel Uhland, a nice old mansion in a quiet part of town, out of the main tourist center but close to the Octoberfest grounds. We stayed here before; I mentioned that when reserving the room and we ended up in room 14, one of the only rooms with a balcony looking out on the quiet neighborhood.
I think what we like about a balcony is that you can always throw the door open, suddenly it feels more spacious and light, and you add a few square meters to your little world.
Anyway, it is a great place to stay, and most important they have a little lounge with 25 hour coffee.
So we knew just where to go for lunch, and headed to the Altstatt (Old City). Lunch is at the famous Hofbraühaus. We find our way through a combination of fuzzy memories and just plain luck, and walk into a huge room.
The hall is huge, with high ceilings and arched posts holding it up. There are big windows along one side, and the space is filled with long tables and benches. An oompa band is playing, and so we find an empty space at one end of a table (after checking with the people at the table to make sure the seats are open) and order up two little half-litre sized beers, two pretzels, and four sausages. Elbow to elbow with people, we just enjoy the food, the sounds, the spectacle of it all.
We have a few hours to waste, so we walk through the main square, called Marienplatz, past the Rathäus (That is the City Hall. Isn’t it a great name for any kind of a leadership building? I think we should rename the Senate and Congress building “The Rat House.”)…
… anyway we walk past the Rathäus and over by the big, twin towered Frauenkirch Cathedral. It was under restoration back in 2011, and they are still working on it. I guess when a building has been around for centuries, a decade of repairs is no big deal.
We wandered into an outdoor sports shop, that turned out to be like the German version of REI, on steroids. Not only do they have every kind of sport represented, if you look at just climbing gear, for example, they have a little indoor climbing wall to try out climbing shoes on, they suspend you from the ceiling in your climbing harness to be sure it fits correctly, and there is a seven story high, indoor climbing and via ferrata wall! Every kind of pack, clothing, running shoe, bicycle, kayak and whatever is in this store.
And it was here that we ran right into our friends, our ONLY friends in all of Munich, Petra and Lorent. We have a dinner reservation at 20:00 with them, so we were expecting to meet them then, but to just run into them in the middle of the city.
What are the odds?
After smiles and hugs all around, and a little chatting, we agreed to meet up as scheduled.
So dinner was at Der Pschorr. I remembered the great pork meal I had years ago, and sure enough it is still on the menu: pork cooked two ways, with the crackling (pig skin) on it. It came with a big dumpling and sauerkraut and met with everyone’s approval as “It is the most traditional of Bavarian food.”
Gail got vegetables in a puff pastry and salad, which she loved. Petra got the same meal I did, and Lorent got a delicious looking beef thing, where the meat is flattened and then rolled up with vegetables in it. Kind of a meat-vegetable roll, with gravy.
We all had beers, some of us had seconds, and after two hours we wrapped up with coffee and an apfel strudel.
More on Der Pschorr tomorrow.
It was just nice to meet up with them again, to have some time to hang out and talk.
Well, they had come in on the S-Bahn (metro) and had to catch it at the Sendlinger Tor station, which was right on our way home. So we walked through the nice night, down busy streets, until they dropped down the stairs and we continues on down the street, back to our room.
Yesterday, at the Hofbräuhaus, we saw this really funny poster of a mountain rescue dog. Instead of a St. Bernard with the barrel of schnapps, it was a daschund with a backpack. Gail really thought it was a cool poster. I took a photo of it, then did a little work on Google and found out where the art gallery is in Munich.
After breakfast we set out, not knowing anything about it except that we liked the print.
I became really skeptical, really quick, that we could not get the poster, because we soon drifted into the wrong side of town.
You know, where the Porsches are poor-people cars and the Blue Bentley with mirrored windows has plates from Dubai. Where a car I’d never even seen before, a Bentley Bentayga (Jeep type thing) was parked right in front of the five star hotel, and the Mercedes and BMW limousines were hidden away on side streets.
The neighborhood where women in full veils jabber and shop, followed by sharp-eyed body guards, and the Japanese woman, powdered and elegant, turns her nose up at Dior as she passes.
Back to that Blue Bentley.
Think about that: did they drive here, to Munich, from Dubai? Look at a map. Or did they come on a boat? Airlift it in? Or is it just the spare, “run around town” car they leave here, for their shopping trips?
Back to the dog poster.
I found it at this website, which led us to the Komische Pinakothek, München Förderverein.
It was sort of a mixed residential building, and we could see in the gallery from the street, but the door was closed. So I looked around and rang the bell. Well, they were surprised to see us, but in my poor German I explained what we were doing and they ushered us in with huge smiles. Sure, they had copies, and they were so pleased we made the effort, and they would be glad to give us one for €10 which just only covered the cost of paper, because we seemed like nice people…
It was their little dog which was the model for the poster, but it died a year ago. They had other prints and things they have done, and a lot of work by artists on commission. We liked one print, but at €300 for just a print, we passed on that one.
So they rolled it for us, we gave them the ten euro, and we were on our way to find a tube to carry it home in.
We stopped for lunch at Schneider Weisse Bräuhaus , the home of several wheat beers. I had Tap 7, the Original (darker colored) and Gail had Tap 1, Meine Blonde Weisse which was lighter. We had pretzels with the beer. Their menu and coasters note that the beer is "Gutes für Leib und seele." Good for body and soul.
And it certainly did fortify us.
After lunch we headed out to walk in the English Gardens, a huge, expansive park right in the city. There is a Japanese Tea Garden, two rivers and a lake, meadows and a beer garden. Following just one, outside trail, the round trip is about eight kilometers. And that is just one half of the park! Right in the middle, along one of the rivers, is the aptly named "Nudist Meadow” where people suntan in the altogether.
I think that is such a funny phrase, I have been waiting to throw it in.
“In the altogether.”
What exactly does that mean?
Anyway, the Nudist meadows is just across the river from the other meadow where families are are picnicking with their kids and people are playing volleyball and frisbee and tanning in bikinis and shorts. Both sides of the meadow share the river for swimming and floating.
And you know what? Nobody gives a damn, or even a second glance.
That is one of the things that is so nice about Germany, and Europe in general: it is relaxing to be around people who don’t have all the body issues and hangups we have in the US.
Besides, if you are still scandalized by it all, I included a “life size” photo below, so you can see that even if you look really hard, all you can see in the huge meadow are little pink blobs.
Well, it took the good part of three hours to walk the trail just around half of the park (We rounded the lake and headed back, rather then go on.) so we were pretty thirsty at the end. We went to a little bar fronting the Marienplatz, where we got a table right in the doorway looking out on the people in the square.
Every day at 17:00, the little glockenspiel clock on the Rathäus tower goes off. The bells play a little tune, and the figures start to move. First the top group marches around, two factions carrying flags past each other, followed by knights on horseback. On the second rotation one knight knocks the other back, off his horse.
It is totally fixed: the knight coming out from the right side (moving left) always loses, so don’t place a bet on the right guy winning.
After that, the bottom set of figures dance, twirling around. As far as interesting clocks in Europe go, it is OK, about the middle.
Dinner was at Der Pschorr again. I had pork with mushroom gravy and spaetzle (cheesy egg noodles, but sometimes they are potato I think) and Gail had the pork dinner I had last night. She generously gave me the cracklings.
Part of what I really like about Der Pschorr is the beer. I mean, watching them serve up the beer (it does taste great as well.)
It goes like this:
They roll out a barrel of fresh beer, just out of the cooler. The guy heaves it up onto the counter (I am guessing it is between 15 to 20 gallons of beer, which would put the weight about 120-160 pounds.).
Then he takes a big wooden mallet and POCK! smacks the tap into the bottom.
Then PLONK! and he opens the air hole on top so the beer will flow.
These are the sounds of heaven. That, and a cork popping on a good bottle of wine. Anyway...
They just pour and pour and serve up that beer as fast as they can. They went through three barrels of beer during our dinner (eating time) alone. One time I got the first glass out of a just opened barrel (which is a treat as it is cold and very flavorful) and before I could finish it they started in on a new barrel!
So, we ate our dinner, watched the show, then walked the streets a little before heading back to our room. After a coffee in the lounge, we watched a little TV for the first time in seven and a half weeks, then turned in, the cool breeze drifting in through the open door to the balcony.