When my friend Emily told me she wanted to go to Munich for the weekend, and she wanted me to come too, I have to say that I hesitated. My husband, however, saw clearly the decision that needed to be made. "When is the next time Emily will be in Europe? I think it's a great idea." I saw his point.
So an email was dispatched to our friend Karin who lives in Munich, and she very sweetly allowed us to spend two nights in her apartment. We arrived on a Friday evening and left on Sunday evening, and in between we crammed in a lot of great food, took in the many sights, bought a few souvenirs, sampled the beers and met new friends.
Karin was a very knowledgable guide, and she took us on a quick tour on Friday after supper, starting with the famous Hofbräuhaus (the fascinating history of which you can read about
right here.)
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| This is a rack of beer mugs. At the Hofbräuhaus the regulars have their personal mugs locked up here, waiting for them. When they are done they can wash them out in the completely awesome sink you see there. These are just some of the mugs; there are more that you can't see. |
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| The Hofbräuhaus. (Sorry for the yellow.) The place is huge and was quite crowded. Under the archway in the back you can just see the "oompa-loompa band". I apologize for not taking a picture of their lederhosen. |
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| Upstairs. All brew houses should look like this. |
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| This may not look like much, but during Oktoberfest this fountain flows with beer and a lady stands on top filling up mugs and passing them out. |
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| Day Two in Munich, inside St. Michael's church. |
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| This church was pretty devastated by WWII, but they clearly worked very hard restoring it. |
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| The next church we saw, Frauenkirche, has some gorgeous stained glass windows. Most of my attempts to capture their beauty were failures, but this gives you an idea of the vivid colors. |
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| The old city hall. |
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| The new city hall. They really kicked it up a notch for this one. |
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| Another church which I forgot the name of. There are so many. |
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| St. Peter's church. |
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| St. Peter's houses the jewel-encrusted bones of a female martyr. |
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| Theatinerkirche, a church designed by Italian architects and built by one of the local royalty to please his Italian wife who missed the styles of her homeland. |
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| I love the look of this church. |
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| In the afternoon we felt the need for some refreshment, so we popped in to a rather fancy little restaurant and had dessert. It made Em pretty happy. |
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| Chocolate ice cream, a kind of chocolate brownie thing, and chocolate mousse. |
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| Em ordered the apfelstrudel, because you can't go to Germany and not eat this. It was delicious. |
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| A surreptitious picture of the restaurant. |
Well, as they say... "to be continued"...
