Last year, as I have mentioned, I rewarded myself with a trip to Europe after passing my exams for work. I never really got around to posting anything, as that time in my life was quite busy! The trip was very last minute, but all I knew was that I wanted to do something active. I narrowed it down to Argentina, Peru and the Alps, but didn't make my final decision until about three weeks before I left, which is totally not like me. I finally decided on an Alpine vacation, since September was the perfect time of year for hiking in the Alps.
I started off my trip with a pit stop in
New York for Labor Day to visit with my parents. After having a great time wandering, running and eating with them, I headed East once again, this time to Frankfurt, Germany. Why Frankfurt, you ask? Well, it's a long story, but basically it was much cheaper to fly to Frankfurt and take the train to wherever I wanted than to fly to where I wanted. So, Frankfurt it was! I took the red eye, which put me into Frankfurt in the morning. I immediately found a train to Munich, and had a very enjoyable train ride southward. I arrived in Munich in the late morning and although I was quite tired, I had a quick coffee, grabbed my camera, and headed out to see what I could find.
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| Glockenspiel |
The best part about Munich was all of the fresh fruit stands, beer stands/halls, the bikes and the bakeries. Don't get me wrong, there were a ton of awesome buildings and of course there was the Glockenspiel, but I really enjoyed the laid back biking atmosphere and the smell of fresh bread. I got my fill of it all, literally and figuratively, and then headed to the Lidl, which is the European grocery store, for some supplies for the next day. Perhaps my kilo to pound conversion is off a bit, but it seemed like the fruit there was really cheap!
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| Hofbrauhaus |
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| Fruit Stand |
I went to bed around 8 pm and woke up the next day around 7 am very refreshed. Take that, jet lag! The first thing I did was to take a nice run around town. The funny thing was that it seemed like there were no other runners out. I saw two other people the entire time I was running, which was about 6 miles. I ran up to the English Gardens (Englischer Garten) which is a huge park. The coolest part of that was that there were surfers in the waterways! I guess that is one way to get your surf on when you don't have an ocean nearby!
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| Picnic Lunch |
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| English Garden Surfers |
After my run, I had a nice breakfast of bread, cheese, cold cuts and fruit and I boarded a train headed south towards Austria.
Have you ever been to Germany? What is the price of an apple per pound where you live? Do you eat out when traveling or do you picnic?
I haven't been, but... it's on my (long) list. And may I heartily plug Peru for your next venture? I had a wonderful time and learned so much.
ReplyDeleteLooks like fun!! I miss traveling but I hope we will be able to start again when my son gets a little older. We are taking are first family vacation to FL. this summer so it's a small start. I do tend to picnic a lot as it is cheaper and that way I get what I want especially when there's nice farmers markets. For our summer trip we found a place that is affordable with a kitchenette so we will be cooking a lot of our meals which is very nice when you have a family.
ReplyDeleteI am glad you are recapping your trip as I've been wanting to hear more about it and see more pictures! I have been to Munich but it was such a long time ago and it was December when we were there so the weather was kind of cold. We thought it was a neat German town, though!
ReplyDeleteWhen I travel I try to mix up eating out with eating in. I usually try to make breakfast and then eat out for dinner and have snacks in between. I definitely get sick of eating out very quickly!
And depending on the kind of apple, apples are about $2.99/lb here right now. They are probably less expensive during the peak growing season but I tend to like the more expensive brands like Honeycrisp and Sweet Tango.
I really want to spend some time in Germany. I flew into Frankfurt once on a trip to France, and got to see some of the countryside from the train window, but it's not the same.
ReplyDeleteI flew in and out of Munich years ago on a ski trip to Austria - Innsbruck - and a few days in Amsterdam. Love the scenery and the food!
ReplyDeleteI have never been to Germany but would love to go! I wish I was more adventurous like you to travel alone
ReplyDeleteWell, as you know, I grew up in Germany :) I am glad you had a good time... I've been to the spot where the surfers are in the water :)
ReplyDeleteI haven't ever been to Germany, but would definitely like to go someday. Sweets' mom is fluent in German, so part of me would love to travel there with his parents, so I could watch her in action (rather than just speaking it to humor us from time to time).
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorite meals when I was in London was going to one of the local markets - we got fresh cheese and fruit and meats. We then took a boat on the Thames to Greenwich, where we picnicked and got to see the Greenwich Mean Time line, where we were able to have one foot in the Eastern hemisphere and one foot in the Western hemisphere at the same time!