So sorry it has been a while (a long while since I have updated my blog), but after a long absence here is another entry! The semester is coming to an end and my time in France has actually seemed like a lot longer than 5 months, a lot! Needless to say I am very ready to get back home to what is normal and comfortable. I have enjoyed my time in France with all the wonderful people I've met and places I've visited, but one can only do so much before it all becomes a blur and some great memories are forgotten, so I think I'm gonna need to come home soon. I'm writing this blog on Mother's Day so happy Mother's day to mom dear momma! Also my dad celebrated his birthday in the time between this blog and my last blog from Turkey, so a very happy birthday wish to my dad!! Well, classes have ended (finally) and the finals season begins! I have taken 2 finals out of 3 so far and one more to go. The finals period at my university lasts for two weeks, where as in at IU it's only 1 week, and without fail I have a final the Wednesday of the first week and the very last Friday of the second week. Why not, right?! My first two finals have gone fairly well so far, I hope, and I'm beginning to study for my last final and am so ready to be DONE! and start to pack for home. But before I can come home I do have one final trip planned to Corsica. It's a smallish island off the southern coast of France. It is a seperate island, but under French military rule. I will be spending a week on an island on the Mediterranean ocean just laying around on the beach and spending my last moments in France with some good friends. I figure this trip will be fun and relaxing and I owe it to myself for surviving the crazed country of France, but also I am looking forward to this week because my other trips have been jammed packed with touring and exploring and learning lots about the world, but this time I can just relax...
Speaking of trips, I need to tell you all about my time in Colmar, Munich, Salzburg, Vienna, Berlin, and Strasbourg. That's right ladies and gentlemen, 7 cities in 9 days. It can be done, and it has! I went on the trip with my roommate Cathy, just the two of us explorers. We had bought a eurorail pass to travel between the cities. At first sight this pass might seem optimal because you pick the number of days you want to travel and the countries you are traveling between for one set price and take whatever train you want to whenever you want to. Well we had some troubles because we were traveling over the easter weekend and many trains weren't running and a couple train stations were closed for construction, but those turbulent times will come later in this story. We also stayed in hostels rather than hotels. Hostels are more like college dorm rooms where you have the bare essentials and you sleep in a room with a bunch of strangers and share the bathrooms with everyone, fun way to meet other travelers and is guaranteed to be much cheaper than any hotel.
So to being we left (well were supposed to leave) Thursday night by train from Aix to Strasbourg, but we both miss read our train tickets (we bought our first ticket so we could take an over night train, rather than use 2 days of our travel passes) but it turns out our train left at 9:30 rather than 11:30, so we had a moment of panic and then ran to the bus stop to catch the last bus to Marseille to try to take the next train out of there and get to Strasbourg ASAP! Well the next train wasn't until 5:00 am the next morning, so we hung out in the train station for 5 hours waiting. We found a cluster of benches to sprawl out and try to sleep a little, but the security guards made us gather with the other over night travelers where we could be observed for safety. We tried to find seats to recline in, but they all seemed to be covered in a brown murky substances that smelled like poop. Yes, it twas poop! This is really disgusting so if you'd like you can skip this part. There was a (what appeared to be) homeless man strolling the train station with a motocycle helmet and a suitcase without wheels. He reeked of some god awful smell and we assumed the mess had come from him. We had to keep moving to get away from him and his stench. Luckily for Cathy she had a stuffy nose and couldn't smell him, but o my god could I and it was probably the most disgusting thing I've ever smelled!!! Our train finally comes and we are a little to anxious to get out of there and on that train to snooze for a little while. I end up passing out on the train in need of sleep, and about 30 minutes into the ride Cathy wakes me up and tells me we need to move to another part of the train. Why?! Smelly pants is on the train!!! Yes that nasty homeless looking man was on our train and just a few rows in front of us. So I jump up, collect my stuff and move to the next car down where we couldn't smell him. We had to make a connection train in Lyon, France so we tried to tour the city but could do only so much with an hour layover. Our next train took us to Colmar, France. Our first stop. Colmar is in north east France (the Alsace region) very close to the French German border and has many Germanic influences in the city. It is a small city that can be toured in about 2 hours (believe me we did it). Since we missed our first train we were behind on our schedule and had to cut some things out, but we at least got to see the good stuff. There is a small canal that runs through the center of the city and quaint little wooden tudor style homes and buildings line the canal. There were a couple churches and cathedrals and a market in the city center, but other than that not too much to see. I kind of felt like I had walked into the story of Snow White. You'll see why when you scroll down to the pictures. Once we'd made our tour of the city, we caught the next train out of town to go check out Strasbourg, France. A town even closer to the French German border and at times seems more German than French. This is because this city and region was once under German rule, but has now been taken back by France.
When we arrived in Strabourg we figured we should double check our train to Munich. Good thing we did! That train was not running today, but luckily we met an absolutely lovely lady at the train help desk that printed off timetables for all our trains for the rest of the trip and got us on a train 30 minutes later to Munich so we wouldn't have to take an overnight train. She was an angel in human form and I had happened to bring easter decorations that my mother brought me during her stay in France. I figured since we wouldn't be in the apartment over the easter weekend we should bring them with us to put in our hostel for a little festive fun. Cathy and I decided it was a better idea to give one of these little easter figurine statues to the train lady for all her hard work (and the fact that she is the first nice French woman I have met). I think she was going to cry she was so touched. Heck it was just a little easter chick statue. So at this point we had about 6 minutes to run to our next rain out of France and on our way to Munich. Needless to say we did not get to see Strasbourg this time around. We met another very nice Swedish woman on our one of our 4 trains from Strasbourg to Munich. Another connecting station we were supposed to stop at was closed for construction so we had to take another train, then a bus, then another train just to get to another station to take another train just to get to Munich. Yeah it was hell. When we finally made it into Munich I was never so happy to see Germany. We followed the directions from the hostel website to find our logging for the night. Turns out in all the mess of planning out trip I forgot to book a night in the hostel. Oops! Luckily there were 2 open beds in a mixed dorm we could take for the night. We got in pretty late, around 11 pm, so everyone else in the room was already asleep. I quickly made my bed (in hostels you have clean sheets, but you have to make and unmake your own bed). I was never so happy to sleep on a rock hard mattress in bunk beds with 6 other strangers in the room. The next morning we woke up a little early to move our luggage to our actual rented rooms. This time we had a 6 bed female dorm. This room was so much cleaner and bigger and the bathrooms were super duper nice for a hostel. This day Cathy went on a tour of a castle about 2 hours outside of Munich and I went on a tour of Dachau. Dachau was the first concentration camp during World War II, and has been transformed into a memorial site for visitors and mourners to come and spend sometime. This has been something I've wanted to do for a very long time not only for myself, but in memory and honor of all those who lost their lives for no real reason. We had found a fabulous tour company that gives a whole list of different tours in most large European cities. If you ever take a trip to Europe, I highly recommend using this company: New Europe Tours. I got a discount with the company by going on their tour and a tour guide went with us by train and bus to the site and then gave us a fully guided tour through the site with lots of info and stories. Visiting a concentration camp is something I personally think everyone should do at some point in your lifetime, but I also realize this is a very heavy subject and not something for everyone. I have read as many books as I can get my hands on about World War II and specifically the concentration camps, I've seen just about every movie that's out there about the occurrences, but to stand on the grounds of the site and to walk through the barracks (where the prisoners slept), and to see the check in stations where every possession they had on them was noted and collected only to never be returned. I saw the torture chambers and the roll call block. I saw the electrified barbed wire fences and the death trench only two prisoners ever escaped. The "ideal" thing about this particular concentration camp was it was the first to be erected during World War II and become the model camp for all others to be model after, and had a SS training camp located just outside the barbed wire fences. So if anyone was able to escape the camp, they would also have to traverse the Nazi policy training head quarters. Apparently only one man escaped and lived to tell the story. He has written and as soon as I'm back in the states I am getting my hands on that book, that's one I have not read. The tour ended with a brief walk through the "showers" chambers and then crematorium. It was a humbling experience and something I will never forget. It seemed you could still feel their spirits surrounding you as you walked through the small chambers from room to room. Like I said this is not something everyone should see or experience, but it is something I think everyone needs to be educated about and aware of. I be choosing to not post photos or go any further into my experience at the memorial site for those who don't chose to know more or want to see more. If you would like to hear further stories and see the photos I took you're welcome to contact me privately and I'd be more than happy to share all of this with you, but it's not something for everyone and I know that. On the tour I met a lovely girl from Ohio who is currently working in London as a marketing and advertising agent. She was traveling alone as I was that day, so we paired up and chatted most of the day. She had a lot of great advice for how to choose the different paths in life after college and had a lot of great personal advice to share with. Me had a great spunky spirit and I'm really glad I got to spend the day with her.
When I got back from the tour and to the hostel I moved my luggage from the storage room, where we stashed our stuff as our next room was being cleaned during the day. I waited around for a little bit till Cathy got back from her tour and did a little exploring and shopping through the neighborhood our hostel was located in. When Cathy got back from her tour we headed off to the Englisher Garten in north east Munich for dinner. I instantly fell in love with the Englisher Garten. When you see my photos you'll see why. It was about 7pm at this point and we were both hungry and knew there was a beer garden at the northern point of the Englisher Garten, so in the dark we trekked our way to the beer garden. It was literally pitch black and we could not see a thing, except when a bike drive past with their lights on. We stumbled upon two young guys where the traditional lederhosen walking in the direction we were headed, and figured they were going to the beer garden we well so we figured it can't hurt to follow them and hope we're both going to the same place. What an experience! There was a Chinese gazebo all lit up and food stands everywhere and picnic table after picnic table filled with locals in their lederhosen and tradition costume drinking beer and singing beer songs. I bought a bratwurst and a country potatoes and a VERY large beer that was mixed with lemonade. It was so good!!!! Once we finished our beers (and felt a little tipsy) we made our way to the northern exit of the garden to find the metro stop to go back home to our hostel. We found a Haagen-Dasz ice cream shop, and while the name is supposed to be Swedish and was founded my two Polish people and we were in neither of those two countries we figured we were close enough geographically in the world and bought some ice cream.
The next day we took a FREE tour of Munich with the same tour company. It was easter so we decided to wear our easter dresses and went to the city center about an hour before the tour started and checked out a church just off the main square. So we did go to easter mass, but just for a little bit since our FREE tour was starting soon. We visited the Church of St. Peter and climbed way too many steps to the observation deck at the top of the church. There was a fabulous view of all of Munich. There is a canon ball stuck in the wall of the exterior part of the church, and since Munich is so hard headed and founded in tradition, when the small canon ball falls from its hole in the wall the people of Munich pick it up and put it back in its place, and it's still there today from way back in history during the first World War. There are also 3 cross at the tops of three steeples on the church and legend has it, that there was a bad storm that knocked one of these crosses off the steeple. Since Munich is so hard core about tradition, the cross had to go back up but it's a long climb up to the top and pretty dangerous. So the people of Munich went to a local beer hall and found the town drunkard and got him to climb all the way to the top and put the cross back in its place. Success, the only thing is he was drunk and put the cross back on facing the wrong way and it's still like that today. O well... When we came back down from the climb we headed to Marian Platz or Mary's Square for the FREE Munich tour. Our tour guide's name was Liz, she was from Leeds, England and had a great humor about her that had us cracking up the whole tour. The tour started with the Glockenspiel, at 11 and 12 and 5pm everyday the Glockenspiel goes off and little figurines on the main tower of the parliament building in the square dance around to music (which no one can identify the tone of) and it's in commemoration of some Duke's wedding that the people of Bavaria wanted to commemorate for years by playing a little tune and having figures dance around on a track in circles for about 10 minutes. The whole thing is concluded with a jousting dual and there is a winner. I took video of the whole thing, so if you're interested in the ridiculousness I can show it to you. On the tour we saw ALOT. Here is just a brief list of all we saw: Hofbrauhous (world famous beer hall), Fraunkirche (church of our lady "built by the devil) (legend has it that when the church was being constructed the devil stopped by and saw that in construction it was a dark damp place that he thought would make a great place to worship him, unlike a church that typical has many windows and is bright with color and religion. He made a deal with the contracted to no put no more windows in this church and the devil would have his men finish the job in half the time it was taking the current construction team. They made a deal and in just a few years the church was complete. When the devil paid a visit to see the finished work there was light pouring in from windows and birds flying around singing and children laughing and people in pray for God. They devil demanded why the church looked like this when that's not the deal they made. The contracted said, "You said to not add any more windows, not no windows at all. So if you see the windows that are here were preexisting at the time we made the deal." The devil was furious and stamped his foot into the cement floor and stormed out, refusing to take the credit for such a place. Apparently the foot print is still there in the floor, but I couldn't find it. We went to an outdoor market, and the royal residency, the old and new town hall and the national opera house. There was a fire in the opera house way back in the day, but the architect had built a basin into the ceiling of the building to hold a pool of water in case of fire so they could just open the trap doors and all the water would fill into the opera house and put out the fire. Indeed there was a fire, so they pulled the trap doors but nothing happened. It was winter and the water had frozen, so this being Bavaria (beer country) they decided to try to put out the fire with beer. So they made a chain of men from the beer halls to the opera house and handed barrels of beer down from person to person. Like I said this is Bavaria, beer country, so people started taking sips of beer has they past the barrels down. So by the time the barrels got to the opera house they were emptied. So the people of Bavaria Germany tried to fit a fire with wood. Ingenious! We also saw a couple more beer halls and a beer garden or two. The tour ended with the Memorial of German Resistance. Hitler's famous Beer Hall Putsch took place in Munich, where Hitler made one of his first attempts to sign up many German officials to his National works union or the Nazi party. We stood in a street with a gold strip running down the middle of it, which marks the path many Germany military and political officers took before the days of Hitler's dictatorship and the Third Reich to avoid having to cross the Nazis stationed in the street corners and having to give the Hail Hitler salute to these soldiers. Over time the Nazis caught onto this side street many people took to avoid having to cross their path and was later blocked off and turned into a giant brawl and many lives were lost. The gold path in the street marks the path they took. There was a plaque in the city square next to this street in honor of the lives lost during the fight, but the plaque was in honor of Nazis, even though only 1 Nazis died the story goes that the other people who died were fighting on the side of the Nazis because they wanted to join the Nazis party and lost their lives in the process of trying to cross sides. Bunch o crap to me, but that's Hitler for ya. The tour guides for the FREE tour work off tips, so Cathy and I tipped her for the wonderful job she did. I got to stand on a monument type building where Hitler gave one of his infamous speeches. After the tour we went back to the Englisher Garten to see it during the day. SO PRETTY! I fell in love with Munich this day. Munich was by far my favorite city on this trip. We made it back to the beer garden and got more beer (a different kind this time) and I bought a pretzel. It was just like the soft pretzels we have in the states, but everyone was eating them so I figured I should too. On our way back through the garden after our snack, and after stealing the beer mugs (yes I stole a GIANT beer mug) we laid around in the dandelion field for a while to relax, and then noticed an old man sun tanning in the grass, completely naked as the day he was born. So we left.
Later that night night we went on a beer challenge tour around Munich, but first we knew we should eat a pretty good size meal to help absorb all the beer. There was a really cute beer hall called Augustiner across the street from our hostel. I ordered pork sausage and speatzle. It reminded me so much of the Gerst Haus back home, and yes the Gerst Haus is authentic Bavarian food and decoration. We started off in the central train station and as soon as we were signed up for the tour we were handed a beer. Pretty cool! We then walked about 10 minutes to our first beer hall, all the while drinking our beer and meeting the other people on the tour. We made friends with a couple from Portugal who are doctors (we think they were dating but they claimed to just be friends) and then another couple from England. I asked them why they weren't in their country for the royal wedding, and they said they left England on holiday for a reason: they don't support monarchism. They were pretty fascinated that I was really into the royal wedding and had been following the details of it for a while, but I told them it's just something we don't have in the states so I find it pretty cool. Our first beer hall was the Augustiner beer hall. At each beer hall or beer garden you had to buy your own beers, it was just the first and last beers of the tour that were free from the company. I passed on spending even more money on beer. The next stop was a beer garden and along the way we passed the least popular beer making facility in all of Bavaria and Germany. Pretty funny to go from the most popular to the least popular. We just saw it from the outside. At the beer garden we were told they served the pope's beer. The current pope is Bavarian and he has a personal supply of beer shipped in from Munich from this particular beer distributed we were visiting, so of course I had to try the pope's beer. It only came in a giant rattler (as they are called) so Cathy and I split one. It was probably my favorite beer in all of Munich so I can see why the pope loves it too. On the beer tour we learned that authentic beer gardens will only have chestnut trees in them. This is because back in the day before refrigeration they would bury the beer in the ground and chestnut trees have the biggest leaves to provide optimal shade. So if you ever go to a beer garden and don't see chestnut trees it's an impostor! We also learned that since Bavaria is basically the beer capitol of the world many other countries tried to come into the region and start mixing their recipes with Bavarian beers and then selling it to the public. Of course the people of Bavaria and Munich don't like change so they had to put a stop to this and slapped down a law that authentic Bavarian beer is made with only 4 ingredients: water, alcohol, hops, and yeast (they used to think yeast was actually magical spirits turning their mixtures into beer, but they later got a brain and learned it was just another ingredient they could include). This is still the law in Bavaria and is printed on all bottle tops of beer to prove authenticity. Lets hope my authentic Bavarian beer will last the plane ride home. One more fun fact! So in the beer halls the main objective is to drink and drink a lot, so back in the day women were only allowed in the beer halls if they were waitresses, only men could enter and drink at all hours of the day. We all know what happens when you drink a lot, you gotta break the seal or pee. When you're at a big table of friends and don't want to have to make everyone clear the bench to get to the restroom, they got the bright idea to put troughs below the tables to pee in. There was a central drainage system in all the beer halls to remove the waste. Our guide made a joke of this and said, "all the men just open their leder, and out comes their hosen". It's a play on words with the traditional bavarian dress lederhosen. Ok maybe a bad joke, but I laughed. Now sometimes these men would splash on each other's shoes and just make a mess so they started carrying canes to tap the leg of each person sitting around them to notify them that they are about to pee so move your feet to not get them wet. Pretty cool! The taught us a beer hall song that everyone in the hall sings together and then chugs their beers together. Our tour guides were off having fun with their friends on the tour so we never got to sing the song, and I do not remember how it goes, but I can imagine how much fun it could be to sing it together. The last beer hall was a lot quieter than the others, no singing or dancing or authentic costumes, but with the great spring weather I can see why no one would want to be inside. In the basement of the beer hall they had all the old instruments and machines used to produce the beer. We ended the tour at some other hostel (not sure why this locale was chosen...?) and had one more beer with the group and then a shot of jagermeister. I'm not a fan of licorice so one shot was more than enough for me. Cathy and I left the beer challenge tour pretty tipsy, but had a great time drinking and making friends.
This has been a lot of info and stories so far and I still have 4 more cities to detail, so I'm going to end this blog post for now and I'll be back later with another one. I don't want to overwhelm you or anything. If you're tired from just reading all of this, just imagine how tired I was living all of this! I'll be back soon with another entry of even more pictures and stories!!
