Where's Bertie? He's still unmoved, in a car park at the Englischer Garten on the east side of Munich.
Weather: Gloriously sunny and hot morning, overcast afternoon with thunder rumbling and a bit of rain.
A 15-minute walk took us to the nearest underground station this morning, where we found the sole ticket machine to have crashed. We took the advice of a local: just get on the train and if an inspector came, she would explain. We got on the train and she promptly disappeared. Ten nervous minutes later, we exited the ticket-barrier-free station in the middle of town having had a free ride.
The rest of the morning was spent seeing the main city-centre sights, assisted by a city map which came low down on the scale of usefulness and value for money (it was only 50c from the Tourist Office, but it didn't tell us much and even the zoomed-in map wasn't user friendly).
The new town hall. This was the first building we saw as we exited the underground. The old town hall, a short distance away, was a plain building that, left to my own devices, I would have guessed to be the newer of the two.
I could only fit it into one snap by artificially bending it via the camera's panoramic function.
After an initial look around and a stop for coffee (ouch - city centre prices!) we dutifully joined the masses to listen to/watch the glockenspiel/moving statues do their thrice daily display half way up the tower of the new town hall:
A zoom shot of the bits that move
It was predictably underwhelming (although no doubt quite magical when the town hall was first built in the late 1800s), but still worth a 10-minute investment of our time, as we were in the area anyway. Some people found it worthy of a round of applause; personally, I've never understood the notion of applauding something mechanical (nor sunsets, but that's a different story).
A shot of part of the assembled crowd. Notice all those people staring at the screens of their phones, where they can't possibly have seen the detail, missing the reality of what was going on around them. I wonder how many of them will ever play the recording back more than once? (If not more than once, then surely they may just as well have watched it, rather than recording it?)
Within a couple of hours* we had seen most of the main sights within the very centre of city. Of course, we hadn't taken tours of any of the buildings and whilst there are a couple of museums that would have interested us, we weren't going to visit them today (in common with much of Europe, most museums here don't open on a Monday).
One of the courtyards within the palace (biggest city-centre palace in Europe, apparently). It must be quite a job to maintain the painted detail on all four vast facades.
The only thing left for us to do before we declared our sight-seeing excursion to be complete was to have lunch. Mick, who has been hankering after a Bratwürst meal out since we arrived in Germany was just as delighted with his meal as he looks in this snap:
When the bill came it turned out that he had been given a meal that was over twice the price as the one he ordered. Good job he enjoyed it!
After an incredibly hot and humid morning, the sun disappeared as we dined, the temperature became comfortable, the wind picked up, and the restaurant next door (but curiously not ours) prepared by hooking guttering onto the gaps between canopies covering the outdoor tables. By the time we were ready to leave, thunder was rumbling in the distance.
Our intention had been to walk back as it was only 4.5km, mostly through the Englischer Garten, which starts right in the city, opposite the palace. We waivered a little as to whether public transport would be a better idea, but if it did hammer down then I figured we would get wet in the 15-minute unprotected walk from the station anyway, so we may as well walk through the park.
Looking across a section of the park to some sort of folly on a rise in the ground.
There's lots of water running through this park
It rained most of the way, with the thunder getting progressively nearer with every flash, but it never poured down and with the combination of the trees protecting us and the temperature drying us almost as fast as we were getting wet, the waterproof jackets were able to remain unused.
As I type this it's just started raining properly and the temperature is lovely. I predict an early night tonight. Our general policy is not to go to bed until the temperature inside of Bertie has dropped below 30 degrees (because I'm not closing the door and side-windows until that has happened and I'm not going to bed with the door and side-windows open), which has meant some late nights recently. Today it was down to 25 degrees by 5pm. We may even have to use bedding for the first time in a while! Oooh, and I'll be able to knit, after a week of having palms too sweaty to do so!
Today's bonus photo:
Fountain of the day
(*Yep, 2 hours to see a city where most tourists manage to keep themselves occupied for days. I've long acknowledged that I'm no good at cities, although if you take Munich as a whole, rather than just considering the city centre, we are finding plenty to keep us entertained here. It's a pity that we'll be out of drinking water within 24-hours, as I reckon the Englischer Garten could keep our attention for another day yet.
Slightly random aside of the day: we escaped into the four-storey H&M store during the most oppressive heat of the morning, to cool down in the air-con. There Mick finally resolved a packing-omission with the purchase of a belt. I'm now allowed to carry the daypack which has, until now, been holding his trousers up when out and about!)
Weather: Gloriously sunny and hot morning, overcast afternoon with thunder rumbling and a bit of rain.
A 15-minute walk took us to the nearest underground station this morning, where we found the sole ticket machine to have crashed. We took the advice of a local: just get on the train and if an inspector came, she would explain. We got on the train and she promptly disappeared. Ten nervous minutes later, we exited the ticket-barrier-free station in the middle of town having had a free ride.
The rest of the morning was spent seeing the main city-centre sights, assisted by a city map which came low down on the scale of usefulness and value for money (it was only 50c from the Tourist Office, but it didn't tell us much and even the zoomed-in map wasn't user friendly).
After an initial look around and a stop for coffee (ouch - city centre prices!) we dutifully joined the masses to listen to/watch the glockenspiel/moving statues do their thrice daily display half way up the tower of the new town hall:
It was predictably underwhelming (although no doubt quite magical when the town hall was first built in the late 1800s), but still worth a 10-minute investment of our time, as we were in the area anyway. Some people found it worthy of a round of applause; personally, I've never understood the notion of applauding something mechanical (nor sunsets, but that's a different story).
Within a couple of hours* we had seen most of the main sights within the very centre of city. Of course, we hadn't taken tours of any of the buildings and whilst there are a couple of museums that would have interested us, we weren't going to visit them today (in common with much of Europe, most museums here don't open on a Monday).
The only thing left for us to do before we declared our sight-seeing excursion to be complete was to have lunch. Mick, who has been hankering after a Bratwürst meal out since we arrived in Germany was just as delighted with his meal as he looks in this snap:
When the bill came it turned out that he had been given a meal that was over twice the price as the one he ordered. Good job he enjoyed it!
After an incredibly hot and humid morning, the sun disappeared as we dined, the temperature became comfortable, the wind picked up, and the restaurant next door (but curiously not ours) prepared by hooking guttering onto the gaps between canopies covering the outdoor tables. By the time we were ready to leave, thunder was rumbling in the distance.
Our intention had been to walk back as it was only 4.5km, mostly through the Englischer Garten, which starts right in the city, opposite the palace. We waivered a little as to whether public transport would be a better idea, but if it did hammer down then I figured we would get wet in the 15-minute unprotected walk from the station anyway, so we may as well walk through the park.
It rained most of the way, with the thunder getting progressively nearer with every flash, but it never poured down and with the combination of the trees protecting us and the temperature drying us almost as fast as we were getting wet, the waterproof jackets were able to remain unused.
As I type this it's just started raining properly and the temperature is lovely. I predict an early night tonight. Our general policy is not to go to bed until the temperature inside of Bertie has dropped below 30 degrees (because I'm not closing the door and side-windows until that has happened and I'm not going to bed with the door and side-windows open), which has meant some late nights recently. Today it was down to 25 degrees by 5pm. We may even have to use bedding for the first time in a while! Oooh, and I'll be able to knit, after a week of having palms too sweaty to do so!
Today's bonus photo:
(*Yep, 2 hours to see a city where most tourists manage to keep themselves occupied for days. I've long acknowledged that I'm no good at cities, although if you take Munich as a whole, rather than just considering the city centre, we are finding plenty to keep us entertained here. It's a pity that we'll be out of drinking water within 24-hours, as I reckon the Englischer Garten could keep our attention for another day yet.
Slightly random aside of the day: we escaped into the four-storey H&M store during the most oppressive heat of the morning, to cool down in the air-con. There Mick finally resolved a packing-omission with the purchase of a belt. I'm now allowed to carry the daypack which has, until now, been holding his trousers up when out and about!)
I am not great with cities either, but I did like Munich.. must be all the breweries and biergartens.
ReplyDeleteI thought the Englischer Garten was full of naked people.. did I get that wrong? Perhaps the rain scared them away..
We didn't encounter anyone in a notable state of undress over the days we were there, but one of the parkrunner's we met last weekend was saying that it had recently been reported in the local press that a law has been passed clarifying that it is acceptable for a woman to be topless in public, but not for the genitals of either gender to be on display. So, perhaps the days of nudism in the Englischer Garten are over?
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