The helpful Canadian girl we meet in the train line in Pisa showed up at our hostel in Munich! How crazy is that? Julia decided to join us on our adventures today, it was nice to have her company. It is just been the three of us for so long it was great to add another voice to the mix.
After the two hour train ride we got our first glimpse of the Neuschwanstein castle. It is the castle that the Disney castle in Florida is modelled after.
We stood in line to get tickets but soon realized that you HAD to take a tour to go inside the castle. The next English tour was more that 3 hours away and we didn't want to spend our entire day waiting around for the tour.
We headed up the mountain to get a closer look at the castle. We saw some interesting sights on our way up. This is the biggest snail I have ever seen. He was the size of my palm.
The mountain was covered in trees and moss and there were a couple of little waterfalls we walked past.
The view on the way up was great.
If you looked out across from this mountain you could see the Hohenschwagau castle up on the side of the another mountain.
The castle wasn't as big as I had suspected once we reached the top. Don't get me wrong it certainly wasn't small but I just thought it would be much larger.
It was very hard to get good shots when we were up close.
On the way back down the mountain we stopped at a snack shop and got some delicious warm fresh donuts to share.
At the bottom we took advantage of another great fresh water fountain to fill up our water bottles.
We had some fun waiting to take the bus back to the train station.
The food in Germany had been awesome. There are street vendors all around the train station and near our hostel. You have have sausage or curryworst or practically anything else your little heard desires. Tonight I had a donair- German style and Nicole and Ryan had curry.
After dinner we were off on a beer garden challenge. It's basically a pub crawl of some of the beer gardens in Munich. We had 12 people in our group, 5 Australians, one Brazilian, one American, two Dutch and us 3 Canadians.
We started off with a beer outside the train station. You can drink anywhere you want in Germany. It has been interesting to see people just walking down the street, all times of the day, with beer in their hands. You can even take open beers on to the subway- you just can't drink it while you are riding.
We followed our guide around. He was full of a lot of interesting facts. Beer gardens are like big fest halls, like the Concordia Club in kitchener.
They are all famous for a certain type or brand of beer and they have been around for hundreds of years.
Each one has it's regulars. In order to be considered a regular you have to have been coming to drink at least 3 times a week for more than 15 years. This table is reserved for a group that has been drinking together at the same beer garden since the 60's
We had pretzels, one place had a live polka band playing and we good some German pub food.
I don't drink beer but I did try a little of each one the garden was famous for.
You really could taste a difference. Nicole is a much better beer drinker than me.
We had a great night. It was so much fun talking to all the other travellers and hearing the stories of their adventures.
The castles look amazing. That photo you took up close gave it a great perspective. So now there is a picture of you drinking a beer, never thought I'd see that.
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