Our lovely trip started out in Munich. We were greeted by Gacki and Mimi at the airport and taken great care of. After a nice meal out the first night, we headed into the city the next morning and Gacki showed us and Andrea around Munich. We walked through the english gardens, saw the surfing wave there and sampled beer in several beer gardens. This picture is from the Hofbrauhaus.
We did do a bit of sightseeing as well, and saw the Rathaus (town hall) with it’s famous dancing glockenspiel.
We left Munich early Wednesday morning to head to southern Bavaria and Castle Linderhof. The grounds that King Ludwig built his castle and other buildings on were gorgeous. It was all sort of nestled in the mountains and hills surrounding it with lots of woods to walk through.
After Linderhof we took another gorgeous drive through the mountains and after a picnic lunch by the lake, we went to find our hotel in Reutte, Austria. We found it, checked in, then drove to our next stop, Neuschwanstein. Only problem is that now we were late for our registered time to get our tickets. So, we parked and I made Tim and I run up to the ticket counter. Because we were “young” she let us go. Then we had about a 20 minute (at our fast still rushing pace) hike up to the castle. It was crazy mob scene crowded. We made our tour and saw the castle. It is pretty amazing. The tour felt somewhat rushed, but it was necessary to shuffle the mobs of people through there.
This bridge should give you an idea about the crowds we saw. And, as you can see in the picture with Tim, we all walked up to this overcrowded super high suspended bridge to overlook the castle totally covered in scaffolding. Not quite the romantic view of the castle I had in mind, but guess that’s how it goes.
After a nice low key night enjoying mountain views from the hotel balcony, we took yet another amazingly pretty drive to Garmisch-partenkirchen. There we got directions to the Partnachklamm hike and headed straight there (due to a late start that morning). The walk to the gorge was a bit toursity I admit, and I was getting a bit discouraged after our day of tourist action the day before. But, it was amazing. The walk to the gorge was along a river. Here is Tim at the first little tunnel entrance to the gorge.
The gorge was spectacular. The pathway was dug right into the wall, and there were a few pitch black tunnels to walk through. The gorge was very narrow in places with waterfalls and rushing green water below.
After the gorge we decided to continue along one of the trails. We walked for another 20-30 minutes and came to this breathtaking view. Being Germany, there was a hut to have a beer at, so we decided we should do that to further enjoy the view. Amazing.
Salzburg was our next stop. We stayed out on the Moosstrasse, which is where I lived for a year about 18 years ago. A piece of my heart was already in this town, and it certainly will stay there.
We did some strolling, beer drinking, eating, church looking into (Salzburg cathedral is wow. Amazing stucco ceiling), museum-ing and view looking at the Festung (fortress). While at the Stiegl Keller we heard the 3pm bells in the city during which all the church bells rang at the same time, then took turns ringing, then at the same time again, and so on for quite some time.
We took a day to ride bikes around Salzburg. This is the field that I used to cross on my bike so many years ago on the way to school or town. The Untersberg was out in full force this day and it was stunning as usual. There were wild flowers in the fields too. We explored on the bikes a bit, then headed to my old “spot” on caperzinerberg to do a walk around the hill. It was crazy hot and we ran out of water, so it made for an interesting dehydrating hike. Made to it some old church up top that, of course, was selling beer and food. We paid an obscene amount for some water then headed back down again.
We also did our own “sound of music” tour as we had watched that movie with the girls to show them where we would be. The house on the other side of the lake is the captains house in the movie for any fans out there.
From Salzburg we took a side trip to Berchtesgaden Germany. There we took the Jenner cable car up the mountain and did a bit of hiking around. Really any direction you looked was gorgeous. This one view looked out over the Konigsee down below. The paragliders were super high and it would be an amazing place to fly.
We went through the Salzbergwerk (salt mine) while there. It included some cute miner clothes, a train ride deep into the mountain, and some history. It also included two wooden slides that we sat on to get further down into the mountain. I’m kicking myself for not buying the crazy expensive photo of Tim’s terror stricken face coming down the first slide. It was the funniest thing I’ve seen in a long time.
Hallstatt was another nice town we went to. It is in the Salzkammergut lake district. The town is nestled right on the lake and was a pretty peaceful place to hang out.
As is fitting in Austria, we stopped to have a beer on a restaurant patio overlooking the lake. While there it rained a bit and we enjoyed the sound of the raindrops on the tarp over our table. This town was small but quaint. There is an old bone church, filled with painted skulls and bones. There is just a small graveyard, and after 10 or so years, the larger bones and skulls were removed, cleaned, treated, painted and then placed in the bone church.
In the town near Hallstatt, there is a super old huge ice cave. The ice itself is only 500-600 years old. It was all neatly lit up complete with a laser show in one part of the cave. After the ice cave we headed back to town and took a pretty neat hike. It was through the woods by a river for most of it. We then took the Gangsteig (a steep stairway carved into the rock) that took us up higher for quite a view. Then the hike continued down past some old glacial rock formations in a river that were stunning too.
Our last night we joined the rest of the town for some live music at a pub with some outdoor seating. The backdrop was one of the mountains, and it made the whole cheesy lounge jazz concert fun. After the music there was a quick swim in the lake by starlight. The next morning we took out the kayaks from our pension onto the lake for a bit before heading back to Munich.
On our way back to Munich we stopped at Dachau. The first and last concentration camp and also the training spot for all the others. Very impactful and informative. Some 32000 people died there (other camps were up to 2 million). Hard to describe in words. The next day we went to the Deutches Museum for a couple hours, heard and saw the glockenspiel (second photo, clock with dancing statues), then headed back to Mimi’s apartment to meet Miguel, Bettina and Gacki at a local biergarten. This Taxisgarten seats 1500 people. We were there on a Thursday night and it was full. It was also the hottest day of the year so that may have brought more people out to quench their thirst.
My little honey was enjoying practicing to be a beer garden maiden. He only has to be able to carry seven more of those liter beers (5 in each hand) to qualify.
This is the group of us at the end of our evening there. What a great way to visit. Hanging out drinking beer in a traditional beer garden in Bavaria.