Last month, James, my parents, and I visited Europe for about two weeks. We packed A LOT into our time, so I'll split my posts up by day. I had originally intended to split up by country, but there was so much to write about my first day alone that I've decided to do it this way. :)
We took a flight from Little Rock to Charlotte (with P. Allen Smith and his crew!!!) and barely caught our flight (literally, the whole family running through the airport with our two-weeks of stuff crammed into a carry-on each) to Philadelphia before barely catching our flight to Munich.
When we got to Munich (about 9 am), we didn't want to waste a second since it was our only day in the city. We got a taxi ride to our hotel and after a little bit of confusion actually getting there (the hotel was on a pedestrian-only street) we were lucky that one of our rooms was already ready. (Our hotel, Hotel am Markt, was cute, comfortable, affordable, and in a great location. I highly recommend it!) We dropped off our bags, freshened up, and hit the road!
James and Dad split off to explore the market near our hotel and Mom and I went directly to the Marienplatz to see the Rathaus-Glockenspiel do its thing at noon. (I didn't get a great photo of it, but it's a huge cuckoo clock!)
Immediately after that, Mom and I took the subway out of town and then grabbed a bus to get to Dachau Concentration Camp. The weather was appropriately gloomy.
My family had been when I was a baby, so I of course didn't remember it, but Mom did. In fact, Mom remembers seeing a lot of different camps, but this was the first one I had seen as an adult. I've always been fascinated by the Holocaust and it was a strange feeling actually being there. It is difficult to describe, really. I expected it to affect me, but it was even more moving than I had prepared for. There were so many empty foundations from where barracks had been and one even had reconstructed bunk beds--it is amazing just how many people were crammed in (it was at more than quadruple its intended capacity at its most crowded). There was a photo from 1933 showing the newly-constructed camp and I was surprised at how the trees weren't all that large now. The holocaust seems like such a long time ago, but visiting the camp made it seem so real to me and like such a recent part of history.
We had made plans to meet the guys at the hotel after that, but when we got there we discovered that they had both fallen asleep and locked us out of our rooms! (Each room only had one key that was kept at the front desk while we were away). We gave them a break since they both had aisle seats right by the restrooms on the 8-hour flight...and headed to the market near our hotel for a pretzel. I also got a MezzoMix, a fantastic cola-orange soda. :) We tried to get the guys up at this point, but didn't have any luck.
So, Mom and I decided we'd wander around the Marien Platz until the guys' second "wake-up call." We did some souvenir shopping (a dirndl-clad stuffed bear for Natalie and a Bavarian table topper for me to use at Oktoberfest!) and spent quite a bit of time in the local department store--the cosmetics and perfume section was heaven!
We went back to the market for dinner (we'd basically given up on the guys at this point!) and shared brats, cabbage, potato salad, and beer at the bier garten. It was perfect!! (I had been dying to eat here from the second we stepped out of our taxi--how is it possible for a city to smell soooo good?) We sat at picnic tables watching the locals while blooms were falling from all of the surrounding trees. Gorgeous. I could have stayed there forever.
By this time, Mom and I were tired and went back to the hotel to take showers and get to bed early...just in time for the guys to get up, of course! We all got dressed and headed to the Hofbrauhaus about 9 pm. It really was as much fun as my Dad had been telling us! I got (yes, another--it was Germany!) pretzel as well as apple strudel and a whole liter of the Hofbrau dunkel. The beer was fabulous, but it definitely took a conscious effort to finish the entire stein. The good thing about going that late (and on a week night) was that it was mostly locals. We sang some of the songs and clinked mugs and were lucky enough that the band played an up-close-and-personal "happy birthday" set for a girl at the table next to us! I'm so glad we got to go--and I can't wait to visit again! (Just look at that strudel!--Sorry for the blurry photo, but it was dark in there.)
I really, really loved Germany. The mix of old and new was so interesting and foreign to me. There were modern town houses with little lace curtains in the windows and old homes with roofs covered in solar panels. It is hard to explain a lot of it, but the look was right up my alley and really made me envy the lifestyle. Americans want everything new and perfect, but the combination of that with the old is just perfect to me. I think the OCD part of me loves the idea of embracing the imperfect.
Also, did you know that German subway trains have a button you press to open the doors at your stop? And that big "2" painted on the side of the trains...that doesn't necessarily mean it's line 2, but more likely second class. We learned that the hard way! Ha! :)
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