ich liebe dich, münchen

from 7 am monday morning to 11 am wednesday morning, we explored munich with only the rare break. our hostel was conveniently located just a short walk from marienplatz, so that was our first stop. 

we then found ourselves at the viktualienmarkt, where we perused the food stalls. so. much. white. asparagus. everywhere.

afterwards, we ambled northwards along ludwigstraße with the intention of heading to the englischer garten for a picnic lunch.

in love with the abundance of green space in munich

bewildered yet impressed by the walking man sculpture

we never found out what this building was, but it was gorgeous

the englischer garten was lovely; bigger than central park, it contains fields and trails and ponds galore.

we sat on a park bench to eat our lunch, cheese paninis we had made from the hostel breakfast buffet. life hack: when you're on a tight budget and your hostel has a huge breakfast buffet which includes everything from yoghurt to peanut butter to three types of bread to a variety of sliced cheeses to multiple jams, and a panini press, but has a large sign on the wall that very clearly says "please do not pack a lunch from our breakfast options"... well, you pack a lunch. i mean, honestly... who uses a panini press at breakfast, anyway?

then we headed back down along ludwigstraße in order to meet up with our friend jessica, with whom we'd been a fellow volunteer back in argentina but who hails from germany. she lives in nuremberg currently, but she lived in munich when she was younger and is moving back to the city in the fall for university, so she was the perfect tour guide. it was so much fun to spend a couple of days hanging out with her! we reminisced about córdoba times, caught up on all our disparate travel adventures (she'd just returned from australia, the final leg of her gap year), and she showed us around munich- helping us navigate public transport, showing us all the sights, and even introducing us to a few of her friends who live here.

reunited with jessica!

the next morning, we visited schloss nymphenberg, which was phenomenal.

swans were everywhere.

so much luv

we met up with jessica at a brauhaus for lunch- aka pretzels- but got sidetracked on the way there by this BEYOND CREEPY shrine to michael jackson. like, there were bouquets and photos and poems and trinkets and photos of MJ holding babies (ew) and about 40 love notes to him written by somebody named ingrid. what.

this + mustard = extremely happy vegetarians

in the afternoon, we walked around the olympiapark, site of the 1972 munich olympics. there's a  (disappointingly small) memorial to the casualties of the massacre, but other than that, the olympic village has been repurposed- serving as a public park, concert venue, and containing fields and courts and swimming pools. 

such cool architecture 

whilst there, we stopped into the BMW welt next door to admire the all-steel-everything aesthetic and pretend to test-drive the cars.

back downtown, the entire city was buzzing in excitement for the bayern v. real madrid match tuesday night.



i didn't quite anticipate the level of bayern craziness in munich... i knew bavaria was football-obsessed, but some of the things being sold in the fan store were impossibly bizarre.

again with haribo... what is UP with this, europe?

an fc bayern panini press, in case you want to show your team spirit through sandwich embellishment

i even spotted bayern-themed lebkuchen, or traditional gingerbread heart cookies made for oktoberfest 

at dinnertime, we really wanted to try döner kebab because ~when in rome~, and luckily we stumbled across a vegetarian kebab shop offering seitan döner. so exciting and so delicious! 

so. good. 

afterwards, we took the u-bahn to meet some of jessica's friends at a bar to watch the match. we definitely felt like locals nursing our bavarian beers as bayern got crushed by real and the germans around us got progressively more depressed.

sad münchners post-match

u-bahn selfie

all too soon, we had to say bye to jessica and pack up our bags in order to leave munich the next morning.

xoxo ur fav derechos humanos gurlz

sad 2 say goodbye

wednesday morning, we were on our way to florence! our train ride took the bulk of the day, but it was beautiful. we passed through austria and northern italy, and the landscape was picture-perfect. 

i've never been to austria, but i'd love to visit for real someday. very unsurprisingly, the scenery was  similar to that of switzerland, one of my favourite places in the world, so i think i'd like austria preeeeetty well too.

of course, we had to disembark for a few minutes in austria so we could say we'd set foot in the country. pictured here, a little bit stir-crazy and a lot excited to be on the innsbruck platform.  

and by mid-afternoon, we were over the border in northern italy! 

first italian stop on the train, just over the border in brennero!

 after a few train transfers, we made it to florence in time for a dinner of pizza and gelato, but that'll be in my next post. i adored munich- i'd been wanting to visit for a while!- and all of its pastel buildings, urban green space, football culture, and efficiency (everything is on time! everything is clean! everyone speaks a million languages fluently and nobody ever has to run to catch trains!) if we'd had another day or two, it would've been fun to take a day trip to jessica's hometown of nuremberg ("oh, like the nuremberg trials!" -each of us/everyone ever upon first meeting her), or to visit the sleeping beauty castle, schloss neuschwanstein, in the bavarian countryside. but there's always a next time! someday i'll be back.

i loved germany's efficiency/punctuality/clearly marked signage/articulate people, but i was excited to go on to italy, full of winding streets, backwards rules, a laissez-faire spirit, and containing some of my best memories of vacations throughout my life. onto the next post.

x
M