Day 50 Cont'd and 51: Helsinki

Miles logged: 23,112
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Mom and I are on our way!

After picking up Mom at 6am in the D terminal of Amsterdam's airport, we flew together to Helsinki. By the time landed and found our hotel, it was 3pm. Mom was jet-lagged but holding strong, so we set out to check out Helsinki's famous design shops. Helsinki feels very orderly and scrubbed. The design stores even seem to reflect this perception: common themes seen in Finish designs are clean lines, functionality, bright colors, and original forms. Mom and I agreed that the Finnish make everything stylish, from scissors to tea kettles to dog parking.

Dog parking


I spent my afternoon watching Mom shop (it was tons of fun, of course), but interspered with some very nice cafe breaks. We agreed that one of the day's highlights was Stockmann's, the giant department store that sold anything you might want in very stylish choices We were amazed by the gourmet food shop in the basement, and ended up grabbing dinner from the store.

Awesome place


Mom was a trooper until about 8.30pm, when it was time to retire to our hotel room. We got a lot of sleep before heading back out the following day for more Finnish design, including a trip to the design museum. We both thought the museum was interesting, although I think I may have liked it more than Mom (shocker!). Mom and I continued to browse Finland's design stores, where I watched as Mom continued to reduce the remaining available space in her suitcase. A DHL shipment is increasingly inevitable (although I secretly wouldn't mind passing along some of my baggage, too). We also made stops to a few of Finland's notable landmarks, but I must admit that none of them completely wowed me. Finland was a rather pleasant place overall, but a tad dull, although the locals spoke amazing English and were extremely friendly.

More shots of Helsinki:

Three blacksmiths statue...the nakedness seemed like a bad idea.

Views from the Hotel Torn cafe


We reached Estonia via a high speed ferry, and this morning we met up with Mom's cousin, Epp, and her family. We spent the afternoon touring Tallinn's old town with her extended family and her son, Tarku. Along with the beautiful medieval old town, we visited Estonian's open air history museum. The museum was particularly interesting because it gave us a better idea of what life on my grandmother's family farm was like during the 18th and 19th centuries.

More is to come on Estonia and the rest of today soon, but it's getting late and it's time for bed. We're having a great time with the family, and more photos are forthcoming of the reunion.

Day 50: Amsterdam and Helsinki

Having too much fun with Mom to blog. Helsinki has been wonderful, and we've had more than our fill of Finnish design. Fish you were here!

Day 49: Amsterdam

My impression of Amsterdam has improved, but I'm still certain of my conclusion that the city is not a good choice for solo travelers.

I took a New Europe walking tour in the morning, which was very entertaining and gave me a much better appreciation for the city's history and its dedication to tolerance. As our guide stated twice, the general rule of thumb in Amsterdam is "if you're not harming anyone else, and you're good for business, you're free to do as you want." This tolerance has spanned everything from prostitution and marijuana to religion and same-sex marriage. Fun facts learned: the Dutch are the tallest people in the world, every year approximately 12,000 bicycles are dredged out of the canals and refurbished by the Dutch government, a good portion of these bikes ended up in the canals as part of a Dutch drinking game. There were lots of history lessons as part of the tour (I had no idea that the Netherlands has a royal family), and solid advice on Amsterdam. Our guide's first tip: never take photos of the women of the red light district. Those windows are actually doors, and they are known to chase down photo-takers, smash their cameras, and throw ready-for-this-purpose cups of urine on the offending tourists. 

The tour made Amsterdam's seediness seem more meaningful, and the tour guide was very knowledgable. After the tour, I joined the guide and a few other tour members for a quick beer. Two of the other tour participants were Canadian travel agents, and they had some great stories about their insane clients. It was a very fun conversation.

I hope this pink Vespa doesn't end up in the water


After the tour, I wandered back to my hostel, but I was getting bored with wandering the streets. I think Amsterdam is a great place for many reasons, but it wasn't my favorite place to hang out by myself. By yesterday afternoon, I was feeling a little done with Amsterdam. When I passed by a bar that was showing the Boston Red Sox game, I went right in and had my first dose of homesickness.

Go Sox

I was happy to spend my evening just watching the game as Amsterdam went on around me, and by the 6th inning it was getting late in Amsterdam. I grabbed my bags from the hostel and headed to the airport, where I had booked a Yotel "sleeping cabin" for the night. Mom's flight was due in at 6am, and I wanted to meet her at the airport, so I thought the inside-the-airport option would both allow me to get some extra sleep and also give her a place to crash when she landed.

The cabin was just that - a tiny cabin reminiscent of a cruise ship. I found that having 20 English TV channels was more entertaining than I expected: a luxury I haven't had in a while. After spending too long watching very bad TV, I went to bed far later than I had planned.

The good news is that I'm at the airport now, and Mom has landed! I am so excited for the next part of this trip with her, and I'm very happy to see some family after these last 7 weeks of traveling. Scandinavia is next!

Day 48: Amsterdam

Amsterdam...I don't think I'm in love with this city, although it's definitely different. The city is seedier than I expected, and not quite as charming as I hoped.

I started off the morning with something I've greatly missed: my morning jogs. The heat, hilliness, and generally acceptability of women in running shorts had made jogging difficult in Istanbul, so I was happy to finally get a good jog in. I didn't see a whole lot of other joggers on the streets (not a big surprise given the amount of anything that the Dutch smoke), but the city is very flat and great for jogging.

After spending my morning running around the city, I took care of laundry (the situation was getting pretty desperate) before heading out for some sightseeing to the floating flower market and other city landmarks.

In the afternoon, I walked to the Van Gogh museum, where I happily spent nearly three hours wandering through the largest collection of my favorite artist's works. The collection was interesting because it's a little light on Van Gogh's most famous works (many of which are in New York), but has an enormous collection of his sort of second-tier works (not that I think Van Gogh has any second-rate works, but you know what I mean). I was very disappointed that no photography was allowed inside the museum, because I saw several works for the first time that I would have liked to have reminders of later.

I spent the late evening wandering around Amsterdam before heading back to my hostel. My wanders included a tour of the large and beautiful Vondelpark,  a favorite place for the locals to lazily hang out. While spending the morning touring around city, I did find some nicer sections with beautiful streets and a more charming ambience. The area that I'm staying in, however, is pretty seedy. After dark, I don't really feel comfortable walking around the area alone. This apprehension is based on both my own perceptions of the people I see on the streets, and hostel guests' stories from the night before (a drunk guy tried to rob them). After 10pm, I feel a little like I'm on lockdown in my hostel, which is rather boring.

Amsterdam is probably not the best place to visit as a solo tourist, particularly the area that my hostel is located in. The hostel is basically at the center of the party, and I don't think it's a good idea to show up at this party alone. 

I did check out the neighborhood that Mom and I will be staying in for the last part of the trip, and it's far quieter and charming, so hopefully my impression of the city will improve (and hers will be nothing but wonderful).

More photos of Amsterdam:

Tulip bulbs

Vondelpark

Vondelpark

The city palace

Day 47: Istanbul and Amsterdam

Miles logged: 22,189
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From mosques to red light districts...I don't think I could have picked two more different cities to visit back-to-back.

I woke up late in Istanbul after a long last night, and had just enough time to complete a shopping request from Mom before heading to the airport at 11am. I really, really enjoyed Istanbul, although I felt like it was time to go, particularly because the friendlessness of one of the hostel staff was turning into more attention than I needed or wanted.

I flew Swiss Air with a connection in Zurich, so by the time I arrived in Amsterdam, it was past 8pm. I checked into my hostel, the infamous Flying Pig Downtown. When I was looking to book a room in Amsterdam months ago, I discovered that smaller dorm rooms were already gone, and not much was left. I only needed a room for two nights, so I decided to go for the full Amsterdam experience and booked the best option I could find: a 14-bed coed dorm at the infamous Flying Pig. I figured two nights couldn't kill me, and this will be my last round of hostels for a while, as Mom and I are staying in much nicer places.

The hostel actually isn't bad, but given that it's Amsterdam, it's full of stoned college students, and has a very mellow cat roaming the halls. After dropping off my stuff, I spent some time wandering the streets. My hostel is right on the border of the red light district...which I swung by, but found mostly just awkward and didn't stick around long. The canals are beautiful, the smell of pot is omnipresent, and there's a coffee shop every four storefronts. Still, the area seems relatively safe. I popped into a pub for dinner and ordered a Dutch specialty, pancakes. The pancakes were a little strange; they were more like crepes than pancakes. Nothing fluffy about them at all. After a phone call with my mom at 11pm, I headed back to my hostel and spent the evening at the hostel bar, which was in full swing. At 1am, I decided I was more than ready for bed, and headed up to the 14 bed dorm room and discovered I was the first person to decide to check in for the night. Impressive. 

With the help of ear plugs, I managed to get a great night's sleep (although I do remember the hostel bar music turning off around 6am), and woke up this morning at 9am to find that all the beds were now full, along with a extra guy sleeping on the floor. Amsterdam reminds me a lot of Bourbon street, but with the party taken up a huge notch. It seems like a fun town with clearly a very chilled out vibe. Still, Amsterdam is a little skeezy, at least the area that I'm staying in.

First shots of Amsterdam:

Coffee shops everywhere

Canal near the red-light district

The hostel cat

Day 46: Istanbul

After 6 days, I had seen most of the sights I wanted to cover in Istanbul, so I planned for an easy day.

I spent until the early afternoon taking care of some trip planning and figuring out what to do after my trip with Mom ends. I had originally planned on a slow cruise up the Romantic Road of Germany, filled with castle sightseeing and medieval towns. As my trip has progressed, however, I've found that I've already seen a lot of castles, cathedrals, mosques, churches, towers, and medieval buildings. And while they are all beautiful, they're starting to mesh together in my head. I find the cities far more interesting and memorable, so I decided to make a change of plans. After I drop off Mom at the airport in Amsterdam, I'm going to head to Hamburg before spending a couple of days outside Luxembourg, from where I fly home on  August 13th. 

Anyway, after trip planning, I spent the afternoon cafe-hopping with a bit of baklava sampling, which I was told I had to try before leaving Turkey. The baklava was good but sticky-sweet; most of the pieces had been soaked in honey. I wasn't a huge fan; I generally prefer things a little less sweet.

After I'd gotten my fill, I returned to my hostel for happy hour to meet up with some other guests I've meet along the way. Another American and I spent a while trying to explain the currently complicated and unproductive (or just plain stupid) American political dynamics and parties to an English guest, who assured us that things were not terribly more functional in the UK. 

I was determined to find good Turkish food for my last night in Istanbul, so I pulled up TripAdvisor and found a highly rated restaurant down the street from my hostel. Thank goodness for the Internet, because the food was fantastic. I ordered a lamb isklander kebab, and it was wonderful, along with the accompanying bread. The restaurant appeared to be only full of tourists, so perhaps the restaurant was simply catering to what Westerners expect from Turkish food. The more "local" places I've found were disappointing and bland. But even if the meal was fake Turkish food, I was happy.

After dinner, I returned to the hostel where I found that Ilyse, my Australian friend, was back for the night. I happily joined her and a few of the hostel staff for a long evening on the rooftop, and had a great last night. I am going to be sad to leave my new friends, but emails were exchanged, and hopefully I'll be in touch.

I unfortunately don't have any photos from the day to share, but I had a wonderfully relaxed, final day in Turkey. It's now on to Amsterdam, where I'll be meeting Mom at the airport in a few days.

Day 45: Istanbul

Sorry for the short post yesterday, but I'll try to make up for it with this post.

The morning of Ozge's wedding, I started my day at the Hagia Sophia, which was first constructed as a church in 537 and converted to a mosque after the Ottoman conquest in the 1400s. Some of the original Christian murals have been restored (they were plastered over by the Islamic conquers), while the important historical Islamic elements were preserved. Today the sight is a non-denominational museum. The building was beautiful, as expected, and it's amazing to walk through a building that was constructed nearly 1500 years ago and still is absolutely glorious. 

The Hagia Sophia from a distance

Inside the Hagia Sohphia

Artistic shot

The nave

Original mural



After the museum, I went back to the Grand Bazaar for a little more souvenir browsing. I picked up a silk scarf, a small coin purse, a bracelet, and some Turkish evil-eye magnets before deciding it was time to escape the crowded halls. 

One of the main entrances

This symbol is everywhere: it is to protect against the evil eye. I think they're so beautiful and fun.

Turkish ceramics


After getting back to my hostel and changing for Ozge's wedding, I took a slightly terrifying taxi ride through very dense and aggressive Istanbul traffic to the wedding hotel. With traffic, the drive took over an hour, and I arrived just in time. The wedding was at a beautiful hotel overlooking the Bosphorus. I would estimate there were 75 guests, which made it easy to meet some of Ozge's family -- and it was easy to guess who were family members, because the women in Ozge's family have such a wonderfully strong family resemblance! The wedding was very similar to a Western style wedding, but with a few interesting Turkish traditions. The most interesting was the presentation of gold bracelets from the families to the bride-  family members and friends traditionally give gold as a way to provide a nest egg for the new couple, since gold has long been more stable than any currency. The bride then wore the gold bracelets for the rest of the evening. There were also clearly a few traditional dances - at one point a Turkish Wharton friend hurriedly excused himself from the table for the "groom's dance." The wedding also included a fireworks show, which I'm not sure is traditional, but was fun nonetheless. The food was amazing - finally some great food in Istanbul!

Wedding!


I was happy to see some familiar faces from Wharton, and the eight or so of us reminisced a bit about the not-so-distant past and caught up on each others' progressing summers. It was fun to learn that even though it was a rather diverse group of Wharton students (I believe I was the only American in the group), we all had developed almost the same impression of Istanbul: wonderful, massive, hectic streets, crowded, more expensive than expected, fascinating, and disappointing food (excluding Ozge's wedding).  

We danced at Ozge's wedding until nearly 1am, before we had to say our goodbyes. I grabbed a taxi with another Wharton couple that was staying near my hostel. When I arrived I said hello to my new friends, the hostel staff, who were hanging out in the downstairs cafe, and then headed to bed.

I woke up the next morning and decided to do some touring of Istanbul's Asia-side and the islands between the two continents. Istanbul straddles both Europe and Asia, with roughly half the city on each continent. Most of the major tourist sights are on the European side, as was Ozge's wedding.

Istanbul runs public ferries between the two sides, so for a little more than the cost of a tram ride, you can enjoy beautiful ferry rides between Istanbul's two coasts. My first stop was to Kadikoy, a neighborhood on Istanbul's Asia side. The 30-minute ferry was spectacularly scenic. The Asia side was much less touristy: instead of merchants yelling to me in English to come to their stores, I was chased by pamphlet-distributors yelling at me in Turkish to take one of their fliers for English language courses. I thought this was amusing. 

View of Topaki palace from the ferry

Europe to the left, Asia to the right

Kadikoy had some nice cafes and markets, but after grabbing lunch, I decided it was time to move on. I then took an hour long ferry to the furthest and largest of the Princes' Islands, Buyukada. The islands are known as the Princes' Islands because they were where Sultans used to banish any sons that showed signs of unruliness or power-thirstiness.

Buyukada was beautiful, although packed full of others that decided an island trip was a good way to spend a hot Sunday. The island architecture reminded me a bit of a toned down New Orleans, and the flowers along the streets were wonderful. Cars are not allowed on the island, so the fastest way around is by (kinda smelly) horse-drawn taxis. After walking around a good deal of the island, I took a break at a cafe overlooking the docks with a wonderful view of Istanbul.

Pulling into the island

Island main street

Such beautiful flowers on the island

Horses and beautiful scenery

View from the cafe

After a little more touring of the island,I hopped a ferry back to the European mainland, and decided to make the hour long walk between the ferry docks and my hostel. As I walked home, I was reminded that Istanbul is certainly one busy place.

Bridge across the Golden Horn

The busy docks

After stopping for a doner kebab along the way (disappointing again), I reached my hostel about 8.30pm. By the time I had showered, I was due to meet up with some other hostelers that I've met over the last few days: two Canadian girls, Jamie and Emily, and a English guy, Stewie. We were joined by other travelers from England and Sweden on the hostel roof, who were also staying in the hostel's 30-bed dorm room that goes for about $9-$11 per bed per night. Although the 30-bed dorm room apparently is a dump and has a resident cat, the room seems to create a strong bonding experience and results in a lot of new friendships. I'm still feeling pretty good about the premium I'm paying for a pretty decent 6-bed room, but I'm glad I've been invited to join this group's evening hangouts without having to suffer the colossal dorm room. The hostel I'm staying at has been a fun place to hang out; both the staff and the guests are very fun and friendly.

I've got one last day in Istanbul before I'm off to Amsterdam. I'm planning on taking the last day easy, before trying to fit in a lot of Amsterdam in less than three days. I'm hoping for a break from this heat, too!



 
 

Day 44: Istanbul

I'm sorry, but this post is going to be short. After spending my day continent and island hopping, it's already later than I expected and I'm supposed to meet up with some other hostel guests any minute. But I'll try to make up for it tomorrow!

Yesterday was great, I spent my morning at the Hagia Sophia, and then the evening wedding was wonderful. Ozge looked stunning and extremely happy. It was great to see some familiar Wharton faces and reminisce about the past (all of 2 months ago).

More details will be posted tomorrow! Sorry again!

Day 43: Istanbul

There's something a mesmerizing about Istanbul. I'm not certain what has caused me to turn into a lazy puddle of contentedness: maybe it's the 100-degree heat, the fact that I have 6 nights here with no need to rush, too much time spent watching ships along ocean the from the hostel's rooftop, the tranquil sounds of the mosques' call to prayer five times a day, the beautiful ancient architecture, or the easiness of spending a few hours browsing Turkish crafts in bazaar halls. Whatever the cause, I believe in Istanbul that I have now achieved maximum relaxedness. This tranquility seems in contrast with the city itself, which if I had to describe in one word, I would use "aggressive." The city is massive (15 million people), the streets are crowded and chaotic, and the shop merchants will chase you down the street asking you to come back and look (along with young men yelling, "beautiful, will you be my wife?"). But I think it must be the local Turkish that exude this contagious tranquility with their passion for herbal fruit teas, sofa-lounging cafes, hookah bars, and extreme friendliness (once it's taken a little getting used to, and no longer feels overbearing).

After a leisurely breakfast, I visited the Topkapi Palace, where previous Sultans lived until about 1910. The palace was interesting, but shoving room only through certain exhibits, which made the visit rather uncomfortable. The Ottoman architecture and tile interiors were gorgeous, particularly the tour through the Harem section of the palace.

Pictures of the palace:

After the palace grounds, I visited the Blue Mosque, one of Istanbul's greatest architectural achievements. Tourists are only allowed to visit during non-prayer times and are confined to a small area of the mosque, but the interior is massive and impressive.

Images of Blue Mosque

After spending some time at the hostel recovering from the heat, I grabbed dinner at a self-service cafeteria restaurant. I will say that one thing that has disappointed me in Istanbul is the food. Eggplant, hummus, and yogurt are three of my favorite foods, so I expected that Istanbul would be a food love-fest. So far, the food has just been ok. Everything tastes very simple and basic. Even ice cream that I ordered in 104 degree heat was just ok, and at that temperature anything frozen should automatically be amazing. 

I spent my night hanging out at the hostel rooftop, again with some of the other guests and the hostel staff. The night turned a little long, but it was hard to go to bed when there were chess games to watch, a friend of the hostel singing traditional Turkish ballads, a cool breeze, and the moon rising over the Asian part of Istanbul. 

Although I find the aggressiveness of the streets a little more that I care for, I'm still loving slowly passing time in Istanbul. The wedding is tonight, so I'm going to have to un-trance myself to cheer Ozge on the dance floor!

Day 42: Istanbul

The first thing I wanted to take care of in Istanbul was getting a dress for Ozge's wedding. Ozge is Muslim, and the wedding will have a lot of traditional Turkish elements, but the reception is being held at a hotel and will be very much like a Western-style wedding reception. Based on talking to Ozge and some internet research, I had learned that most guests will wear the same sort of things as American wedding guests, but in Turkey guests get VERY dressed up. Thus, some shopping was in order.

My Lonely Plant guide informed me that Western-style clothing shopping was best at the more modern malls across the Golden Horn, so I thought I would take the tram over to the area. After arriving at the tram station and watching the stampede to get into already jammed cars, I threw away my metro token and decided I'd rather walk. The walked ended up working out well; although the weather was quite warm and the walk was lengthy, the views when crossing over the river and the small shops along the way made for a pleasant morning. 

Istanbul


Finding a dress turned out to be a little more difficult than expected, given that I needed something formal, but also wanted something that would either get packed in my dufflebag or donated elsewhere upon leaving. I finally found a dress that I hope will be appropriate, but it took a few hours. By now it was early afternoon, and I started the walk back to my hostel.


I made a detour to the Spice and Grand bazaars, which are massive markets with beautiful goods, but the merchants are some of the most aggressive I've seen (except maybe for China where they physically try to grab your arm as you walk past). After the long morning I wasn't really feeling energetic enough to handle the intensity, but I did discover a fun game. As the merchant started in with a English spiel to come see his goods, I'd simply say "no English" in some fuzzy accent and see which nationality he guessed or tried next. I got multiple Russians, a couple of Spanish, and one Italian guess. Fascinating, and rather entertaining.

Lantern shop at the Bazaar


I went back to my hostel to take a break, where I found Ilysa, a very nice Australian about my age, also in the room. We chatted for a while, and then decided to go grab dinner together. Ilsya is traveling for a full year, and has been in Turkey for two months. She recommended going back to a place she'd been before, near where I'd been shopping earlier, so I made my second trek of the day across the bridge.

Istanbul at night



The restaurant, a small cafe on the 6th floor of a side-street building, did turn out to be quite good and we had a lot of fun. After dinner, we came back to meet up with one of her Australian friends, Kate, and we spent the evening hanging out with the hostel staff at the hostel cafe.

Istanbul is filled with street dogs and cats. Most of the dogs have ear tags, which means they've been fixed and given shots. They're very friendly and docile, and appear to be generally homeless but well feed by the local restaurants. The cats are a little less clear - some seem to belong to shops but cats are generally independent creatures. One of the evening's entertainments involved feeding a small kitten that had made its way near our table. While I kept my distance, the kitten was rather adorable and was more than happy to be passed around the table for belly rubs and behind-the-ear scratches. The kitten became the main source of entertainment for the evening.

Now that the dress is taken care of, I've got plans for more sightseeing and touristy stuff today. It's nice to go a bit slow given the heat, but I hope to have more insights on Istanbul soon.

Day 41: Munich and Istanbul

Miles logged: 20,682
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I could tell from the moment I landed that Istanbul was most likely going to be awesome.

I took a last cold, rainy jog around Munich before grabbing a 3-hour flight to Istanbul. The flight itself was awful - one of the most turbulent 3-hour flights I've ever taken, with a screaming baby behind me and three siblings fighting to my right. I landed and took a very orderly metro into the center of the city and to my hostel, which is in a fantastic location right in the heart of Sultanahmet. Istanbul is hot- I passed by a sign on my way to the hostel that read 40-degrees Celsius, which is 104 fahrenheit. I walked and sweated around the city for about an hour before deciding to wait until past dusk for more touring. The city is amazing and hard to describe, but its such an interesting mix of Oriental influences, ancient architecture, Islamic traditions, and modern Western culture. 

Turkey is known as relatively safe for female tourists, but men can be a little aggressive towards women on the streets. This is more an annoyance than a real threat, but given this reputation and my first encounters, I decided that after dark it would be best if I stayed in the immediate area of my hostel. My hostel is on a small block, with a few cafes and other hostels as its neighbors. I grabbed dinner at a cafe across the street from my hostel, but was disappointed by my eggplant, and then spent the evening reading and admiring the views from my hostel's rooftop. 

I've got a full 6 days in Istanbul, so I'm looking to take things a bit slower, but the wedding should be a ton of fun.

Shots of Istanbul:

A Bazaar up the street from my hostel

View of the hostel street from rooftop cafe, with Blue Mosque in distance

The Haghia Sophia at night, from the rooftop

Day 40: Munich

I'm not going to dwell too much on yesterday in Munich, because the weather failed to cooperate again and thus the day was a tad dampened.  Also, I've just landed in Istanbul. The city looks amazing, and I'm ready to get out and explore.

The rain was off and on again yesterday, but I was able to fit in a morning tour of the beautiful Nymphenburg place grounds, along with returning to the open food market to get my last fill of Munich cuisine, which was fantastic. The bread and bakeries here are so good, along with the amazing variety of sausages and meaty fare. Yesterday, while touring the market, I pointed to something that looked good, and was then handed my choice between a sliced roll, or "mit semmel." The sandwich was absolutely fantastic, and I added a little spicy mustard. When I looked up in my guidebook what I had just polished off, the description was "pork liver meatloaf." I'm not certain I would have made the same order if I had known the contents first, but even after I knew what I was eating, I still thought that a second sandwich sounded pretty tasty.

The palace grounds


Other fun discoveries of Munich included learning that dogs pretty much go anywhere, including department stores, bierhalls, restaurants, pharmacies, etc. My favorite example of doggie pervasiveness was watching a dalmatian wait with  its owner for the elevator in H&M. I kind of thought it was great, although one of the most important travel health guidelines given by student health services is "don't touch any animals..." So hard to follow when they can be so cute!

I don't think this dog likes shopping.

Anyway, after enjoying Munich's oversized pretzels, enormous beers, and multiple varieties of schnitzel, it might be time to switch to some lighter fare in Istanbul. I'm looking forward to eggplant, hummus, and yogurt for the next few days...

Overall, I thought Munich was a great city, although probably not best suited for solo travel (who wants to sit in a biergarten alone?). I won't hold the weather against the city, but it was hard to fall in love after four rainy days. 

I'm off to see Istanbul!

Day 39: Munich

Munich's weather just won't cooperate with my visions of spending warm summer evenings in crowded biergartens, eating large pretzels and enjoying Munich's finest beers.

The morning weather was ok, but the forecast was for rain showers to return in the evening. I took advantage of the morning weather to take a walking tour of the city. The first highlight was at the New Town Hall clock-tower, or Glockenspiel, where at certain hours the clock bells ring, followed by a cuckoo -clock like performance commemorating a royal wedding. The mechanical show involves a Bavarian horseman jousting against a French knight as part of a wedding festival (guess who wins), followed by cheerful beer barrel makers dancing to ward off the plague. I've seen snow-globes with more intricate performances, but the sudden fall of the  French knight invariably draws a happy, collective "ahhhhhh" from the onlooking mass of tourists. 

The new town hall


The other tour highlight was a trip to the Viktualienmarkt, which is Munich's collection of outdoor food stands and shops. 

After the tour, I wandered towards the English Gardens, Munich's famous 1,000-acre park. The two highlights I found were the surfers that ride the waves in one of the canals- see photos below - and the biergarten at the Chinese tower. There are a few biergartens within the park, but the one at Chinesischer Turm is the largest. I arrived and found that the place was nearly empty due to the cold weather, but decided to go ahead and have my first bier at a Munich biergarten. I ordered the summer brew in the standard Munich size - an entire liter - and sat down to watch the other tourists around me (since the locals were probably smart enough to drink inside during the cold weather). I think the summer brew may have been particularly strong, because finishing the entire liter was much harder than I expected, and by the time I was done I was feeling a little more than "biergartened." Thinking a nap would be a good idea, I headed back towards the hostel as the forecasted rain was starting.

The famous Surf 1 site.

Surf's up!

The very empty Chinese tower.

This beer is as big as my head!




The walk back was lengthy, and notable for only one reason. I've had a lot of fun Blue Oval spotting on this trip, but yesterday was my first Bain & Co spotting. I have to say, the Munich office is in a nice spot. I made a mental note to be careful while wearing my Bain fleece (which I was wearing at that moment) in Munich's biergartens.

Can I get anyone a cup of coffee? Pretzel?

I felt better by the time I reached my hostel, but I killed some time with photos and blogging. I decided to do the touristy thing for the evening, and headed to the Hofbräuhaus, the former official brewhouse of the Bavarian royals, and  arguably Munich's most famous bierhall. Hofbräuhaus is kind of a tourist tap, but it was cold outside, and the hall also offers live Oompah band entertainment. So I thought I'd at least try having one beer there.

When I got to the hall, I found it was packed. After wandering around for a while, a group of older men and women beckoned over to me to take an empty chair at their table. Given that they had one of the best band-viewing tables in the place, their offer was hard to turn down. The group members were friendly Munich locals, but spoke little English and had clearly been at Hofbräuhaus for a while. The only size beer that Hofbräuhaus offers for its original beer is the one liter, so I ordered my second liter of the day. The original was a little easier to drink, and the music was fun (although the band appeared to play half the time and drink beer for the other half). My group of locals were highly entertaining, particularly the older gentleman that read my palm and then kept repeating, "young Frau...so powerful." I hope this was a sign of good fortune but I'll never be certain. He seemed disappointed when an English-speaking Swiss couple that joined the table were able to explain that I was not a Pisces (his guess), but actually a Libra. The table next to us also included a very nice, young couple from LA, and we spent a while exchanging travel stories and advice. After my liter of beer it was time for me to go...

The band on a beer break

Me, trying to roll with the locals.

Here's a shot of Munich at night. One more day in Munich, then off to Istanbul for Ozge's wedding!