This past weekend, Steph and I took a trip to Deutschland! Our flight was at 6:40 AM with Lufthansa (I’m pretty sure it was the same one that I had taken as a layover for Amsterdam). So, we woke up at 3:45 AM and left for the airport at 4:30. When we arrived at Fiumicino, I tried to check-in on a Lufthansa kiosk, but it said that our flight wasn’t available for check-in. Another American girl who was trying to fly to Munich too said that the Lufthansa people told her that they were “operating” on the plane (sounds safe, right?). A few minutes later, however, they told us that our flight was CANCELED. I just can’t get a break with traveling – first the Venice bus nightmare, then the canceled flight from Frankfurt, and now this! We had to wait in line to figure out our next move. Luckily, we were the second ones in line, because we waited there for at least an hour and a half for the seriously incompetent Lufthansa workers to help us (I couldn’t even imagine how long we would have waited there if we were farther back in line). They put us on the next flight to Munich which was scheduled for 11 AM (we were pretty upset about this because we scheduled the earliest flight so we could have the entire day in Munich—we could have also slept for another four hours). We slept for a few hours in the airport (which is becoming a weekly thing for me), but it was hard to relax because they changed our gate about three times. Of course our flight didn’t get off on time; it was delayed another 20 minutes or so but we were just so anxious to get to Munich. We finally landed in Germany at about 1:15 PM.
Dachau Concentration Camp
Our plan from the beginning to go to the Dachau Concentration Camp located just outside of the city of Munich. Because of our canceled flight, however, our plans were a little skewed. We took the train from the Franz Josef Strauss Flughafen airport to the main train station in Munich, the Hauptbanhof. We were going to walk to our hostel to drop off our bags and then get back on the train to Dachau. However, our hostel was a 15 minute walk from the Hauptbanhof so we would have lost 30-45 minutes by doing that and the concentration camp closed at 5 o’clock, so we would be on a race against the clock. We decided to just bring our bags.
At the concentration camp (which was about 30 minutes away via train and bus), we learned that Dachau was one of the first camps (established in 1933) and lasted twelve years until the end of World War II. Over 200,000 people were incarcerated at Dachau and more than 43,000 died. We saw where the prisoners had roll call everyday, where they got stripped of their clothes when they first arrived, and the barracks that they slept in. The camp was not led by a tour guide, but instead, had a lot of material to read on Hitler and his regime, his rise to power, World War II in general, and, of course, Dachau specifically. We were there for about an hour and a half and wanted to see the crematory but weren’t allowed in because it was already a little past five o’clock. We were a little disappointed that we couldn’t see it because I’m sure it would have been interesting, but our roommates had visited the weekend before and said it was very emotional. It was freezing and windy so we were relieved to get back on the bus and away from the tundra of Germany.
The entrance to Dachau Concentration Camp
Friday Night in Munich
After having to leave Dachau due to it closing for the night, we walked to the hostel to check-in, shower, and get ready to get some dinner. We were put in a six-person (all-woman) room with three bunk beds and saw that three other people were already in the room. We met one – a girl from Finland. The other two we saw later in the night but didn’t talk to them – we’re not sure where they were from but they didn’t speak English. We actually think one might have been a mother and the other her daughter.
For dinner we went to the restaurant next to our hostel. It was pretty interesting trying to read the menu that was completely in German, and I felt bad getting Italian food but I could not read ANYTHING else so I ordered four cheese gnocchi along with an original Bavarian beer. We wanted to go to the famous beer garden, the Hofbräuhaus, but we were pretty exhausted so we decided to just go to a nearby bar. However, after we finished dinner at 10 PM, we nixed the whole idea of going out and just went back to the hostel to sleep so we could get an early start on the day.
Train to Castle Debacle
Saturday, we took a day trip to the nearby Neuschwanstein Castle which was a two hour train ride away. We bought a ticket at the train station for 28 euro round trip for the both of us. Steph handed me the ticket and since we were in a hurry for the 9:51 train, I just threw it loose in my bag. When we got on the train, I looked through EVERYTHING in my purse (multiple times) and could not find it anywhere. I think that it must have fallen out when we grabbed a coffee and a cheese pretzel (SO GOOD).
On the train, when the conductor came to check our ticket, we frantically explained to him that we really bought one but just can’t find it. I asked him if we would get off at the next stop and buy another ticket. He tells us that that’s not possible and that we owe 40 euro EACH for purchasing another ticket on the train. Steph started crying and I felt awful because I was responsible for holding onto the ticket. I guess the conductor felt bad because then he said that he would only charge us 40 euro for both. It was a seriously unfortunately incident but you leave and you learn.
Schloss Neuschwanstein Castle
We arrived at the Fussen train station just before noon and had to catch a bus a little further to get to the base of the mountain that the castle is on. There are normally three options to get up the mountain to the caste – walk, bus, or horse-drawn carriage. However, the bus doesn’t run when it’s snowing or raining. We decided to take the 45 minute walk up to the mountain; however, we were just too enticed by the carriages when we passed them. It was only six euro per person for the ride up so we hopped on one, and we were so glad that we did. It was incredible; I’m sorry that the most romantic thing I’ve done so far in my 21 years of life had to be with Steph – haha. Although I hate the cold, the snow gracefully falling was beautiful. I’ve never done anything quite like it, and I’m sure it will be hard to top.
When we got dropped off, we had a bit more to walk to get to the entrance of the castle. The road was pretty slushy which cause my feet to get SOAKED. Wet feet in the freezing cold snow is NOT FUN. I’m pretty I got some degree of hypothermia. My feet have never, ever, ever been as cold as they were then – and I had two pairs of socks on under my boots (including thick, furry ones that Steph let me borrow). The rest of my body was cold but definitely bearable. I wore leggings under my jeans, plus a turtle neck, sweatshirt, scarf, and heavy jacket. It would have been nice to have earmuffs or a hat but I would have much rather had warm feet. At one point I was literally on the verge of tears. I can’t even fully describe it – that’s how bad it was. We got to the courtyard where we had to meet for our guided tour about 25-30 minutes in advance (and, of course with my luck, we had to wait outside so there was no hope of my feet warming up anytime soon). Steph and I took the time to enjoy the amazing (and snowy) views before our tour was called.
The guided tour lasted about 35 minutes – we learned that Schloss Neuschwanstein was built for King Ludwig II of Bavaria late in the 18th century and stopped construction after Ludwig died. At the time of his death, only about 1/3 of the planned rooms were completed. Ludwig loved the opera so all of the artwork in the castle depicted a scene in an opera. His favorite, Tristan and Isolde, is the theme to his bedroom (which I was surprised to see was not that large). My favorite room was the throne room which, ironically, does not have a throne because Ludwig died before it was built. The room is Byzantine inspired and the chandelier resembles a crown. The floor is covered by a mosaic which is comprised of 2.5 million pieces (if you are impressed with how many details I am recalling, it is because I wrote this entry on the train from Fussen back to Munich). The castle also has a small hallway room that looks like a cave – it is so weird and seemed kind of random (apparently it has something to do with an opera – no surprise there) but very cool at the same time.
The tour ended and we dreadfully had to go back out in the German tundra. By the way, Schloss Neuschwanstein was the inspiration for Disneyland’s Sleeping Beauty Castle and reminded me exactly of that – some kind of fairytale. The castle is so picturesque that I couldn’t believe that it was actually real. The entire time I was there, I felt like I was in a Disney Movie and I was Disney princess haha. Anyway, when we left the castle, it was snowing SO much harder – literally blizzarding. I can’t recall a time that I’ve ever experienced that hard of a snowfall. When we reached the bottom of the mountain, we were completely covered in snow. The one thing I did notice was that the snow was very powdery and the snowflakes were huge. I spit my gum out and it went straight through the snow effortlessly.
At the bottom of the mountain, Steph and I desperately needed a place to thaw out. We found a very quintessential German restaurant to heat us up for an hour or so. I could tell that my makeup was running but I didn’t realize how bad it was until I went to the bathroom. My entire face was basically black. A woman in the bathroom laughed at me when I walked in and said something in German that I took to mean something along the lines of “oh my gosh, your face”, “wow, that is ridiculous”, or “do you realize how absurd you look right now?”. Luckily, I quickly got the situation under control. Steph and I both order potato soup (delicious); she got a German beer, and I got a cappuccino.
I wasn’t sure that I wanted to make the trip to the castle, especially after we were robbed of 4-5 hours of our weekend by our flight being canceled, and the train takes two hours each way so it’s a full day excursion. This would leave little time in the actual city of Munich; however, I am SO glad that we did it. It was so “typical” German, if that makes sense, and I would mark it as a must-see for tourists in Munich. I bet it is amazing in the spring/summer when it is warm and the flowers are in bloom, but the snow added to the beauty just as much so I have nothing to complain about (except maybe the extreme frost bite that my toes has to endure). There is also Schloss Hohenschwangau, another castle previously occupied by King Ludwig, nearby. That castle was gorgeous as well (although not as much as Neuschwanstein), and I wish we had the time and tolerance for cold to make the trek up the other hill to check out that one, although we did see it from afar.
Saturday night at the Hofbräuhaus!
We got back to our hostel in the city at around 7:30 (grabbed a cheese pretzel for dinner I also had one for breakfast). We took a shower, blew our socks dry, and got ready. At about 9:15, we asked the hostel worker at the front desk how to get to the Hofbräuhaus, and he directed us to the metro. He said we couldn’t miss it if we just “follow the drunk Americans”. We took the metro two stops into the city center – this was our first time actually in the heart of Munich. We had a map but absolutely could not figure out where we were. We wandered around for 10-15 minutes trying to find a street name that we could find on the map. I was standing against a store with map in hand when Steph called me over to turn the corner because she saw a lot of people and a place that looked like a main street and thought we could either ask someone where it was or locate the street on the map. I turn the corner and whatdayaknow – it’s the Hofbräuhaus (Steph had no clue). We had no idea how we accidently stumbled upon it but it was very lucky!
The Hofbräuhaus was exactly as I imagined it to be – lines of picnic tables and waitress and waiters in their beer girl/boy outfits. The Hofbräuhaus is Hitler’s old hang out and apparently where the Nazi Party was founded (crazy). We didn’t know what to do once we got there – if we had to get a beer and then sit down or sit and wait for someone to take our orders. We wandered around the hall for a while and found an empty table (which we thought was weird because we heard that you had to be aggressive to get a table and sit with strangers). A waitress came over and we ordered the standard 1 L beer of Hofbräuhaus original. There were also girls walking around selling GIANT pretzels like at a baseball game. Steph and I bought one pretzel to share and it was DELICIOUS! We were hoping that people would come and sit at our table with us so we could mingle and make friends with some Germans but no one was biting. A group of about eight people came and sat at the next table, and one guy in the group came up to us and said something in German (obviously we had no idea what he was saying so we just gave him some blank stares). Luckily, he spoke some English, and we learned that he was a Munich native showing his friends from Spain around. We were talking to him for a little bit and he told us the area of Hofbräuhaus that we were sitting in was for locals. Oops. We had been the ultimate tourists too by taking tons of pictures. Embarrassing. The Munich local was very nice to us though and mapped out a few places we could go after. He left us and we order one more beer to drink before the midnight close.
A few minutes later, two guys came over to us and asked to sit with us. Apparently they and their two other friends that they were with spent the entire time they were there trying to guess where we were from – I guess it’s kind of creepy but they were really funny about it. Their other friends guessed that we were Eastern European ha ha. They said that they both knew we were American though because we had our fingernails painted. We asked them where they were from and they said Philadelphia – Steph was pretty excited when she heard that. BUT – it turns out that they were from outside of Philly – in Salem County, NJ. Go figure – we go to Germany and meet guys from Philadelphia/New Jersey. They called their friends over from the other table, and Steph and I decided to joke around with them and pretend to be Eastern European. Steph introduced herself with a phony accent, and one of the guys complimented her on her “perfect English” and bragged to his friends that he was right about where we were from. Of course, I couldn’t control my giggles and gave up the joke. They asked us if we wanted to go out with them after the Hofbräuhaus closed and we agreed. They took us to this club and seriously wined and dined us by paying for literally everything – cover charge, taxi, coat check, and drinks the entire night. They must have spent about 100 euro on us. We went home at 2/2:30ish and set our alarms to wake up to explore Munich!
Last Day in Germany
The next morning, we checked out of our hostel and got on the metro to head towards the center of the city. We walked around for a bit but the wind was BRUTAL and so unbearable. I don’t know how the Germans do it. After braving the cold for as long as we physically could, we went to the train station to grab some grub before we got on the train for the airport. Steph wanted McDonald’s so we hung out there for a while, got one last authentic German pretzel (unsurprisingly, I got a cheesy one), and hopped on the train.
Too bad our cancelled flight wasn’t from Munich to Rome instead from Rome to Munich because the Munich airport is AWESOME. I felt like I was more in a mall than an airport. Lufthansa also has free coffee machines which were amazing so we were double fisting cappuccinos and mocha lattes while waiting to board. Everything ran smoothly with our flight (which I’m not used to) and we got back to Fiumicino at 6ish – just in time to meet Steph’s friend Shawna who is here for the week from home!
One big difference between the U.S. and Europe is when they give you your check at restaurants. In America, as soon as you finish eating, you’re provided with the bill. On the other hand, restaurants in Europe allow you to hang out and socialize for a long time after you eat your meal. Multiple times this semester I’ve found myself impatiently asking where the waitress/waiter is with the check
Another thing I noticed on my trip to Munich is one big difference between Germany and the other countries I’ve visited so far – much more of a language barrier. In Rome and Barcelona, it is not hard to communicate especially because most people have at least a general basic understanding of English. In Amsterdam, literally every Dutch person we came across spoke perfect English. In Germany, however, most of the signs were solely written in German, whereas I’m used to seeing signs written in both English and Italian (or some other language, depending on where I am). Not as many people speak English, and they have an identity and culture much more distinct from those of America, Great Britain, or any other English speaking country.
There is one last note I want to make to end this entry – if you ever get the opportunity, travel to Germany! I wish I had seen more of the actual city of Munich, plus I would like to get to Berlin, so I know that I definitely need to get back to Deustchland in the future. I fell in love with it during the short time that I was there! Auf wiedersehen!
