Day 10
This marked the last leg of our trip. After an hour and a half by train from Salzburg, we arrived in Munich (München). For me, after riding the high wave from Salzburg coupled with fatigue, Munich hadn’t instilled as much fire in me… at least initially. I forgot to mention that Salzburg was the first time we booked an actual hotel instead of a hostel, so we actually had a little more peace and quiet. Upon arriving to Munich at another hostel, and a popular one at that, I definitely did not have the energy to deal with it at first.
We followed the similar routine as we always did, drop our stuff off in day lockers and walk around the city until it was time for us to check in. We walked the famous Marienplatz, which I characterized as the Michigan Ave of Munich. It’s filled with your Gucci’s, Versace, H&M’s, blah, blah. It was a cool street to walk down, but very commercialized. We stopped to take pictures at the New Town Hall in the center of the plaza, which was pretty dope. We also walked inside St. Peters church along the Marienplatz. It’s incredible how large and detailed these churches are. I could have sat there and looked around for hours. There was a service going on, so I didn’t take any pictures inside, nor do I feel comfortable taking pics inside a church for some reason.
After checking in, we walked back through Marienplatz to check out more views of the city. We ended up walking down the river and seeing a bunch of buildings and neighborhoods. Nothing too, too crazy. Munich is a massive city in comparison to Salzburg and we frankly didn’t plan to thoroughly on what to see. Regardless, it was awesome taking in the views. This was one of our more chill days, especially in that we didn’t drink one ounce of beer. After walking around, we decided to go to the restaurant that Silvia had mentioned: Brenner grill.
This is where things got kind of ridiculous. We were wearing sweats/travel clothes all day because we wanted to be comfortable. Upon entering, everyone was staring at us funny. I was just assuming that since it was a halfway fancy place, they just thought we were grossly underdressed. The waiter greeted us and took our orders. After taking our drink orders he asked if we played for the Roma Soccer Team? Me and Paul looked at each other confused, and before we said ‘No’ he had brought over all of the chefs at the restaurant and they asked to take pictures with us.
Before you knew it, everybody that walked by would stare and point at us. Pbo and I felt super uncomfortable because we already in too deep at this point and didn’t want them to be let down. After our meal, the head chef came up, gave us free espresso and thanked us for coming in, and expressed how many Roma players come there to eat in Munich. We both nodded graciously and got the hell out of there before they realized that we indeed were not soccer players. I blame it on Pbo for somehow looking like every person with a beard and having the Euro combover.
On our way back home, we stopped by a carnival that we noticed was going on in the distance. We didn’t stay too long — we just bought crepes and headed back home.
It was a much needed break. The next day we planned on seeing the Allianz Arena.
Day 11
The docket for this day was to see Allianz Arena, stroll through English Gardens, and try the ever so touristy Hofbrau Haus. We rented bikes and went on our merry way to Allianz. The bikes were named after actresses. I got Scarlett Johansen and Pbo got Natalie Portman. The arena was an hour away by bike and unfortunately one of ScarJo’s tires got a flat about 65% of the way there. I decided to walk the rest of the way.
Since there were no games going on, Allianz was pretty empty. They have a designated path for tourists, so we checked that out, took pictures, and got some food. I got some hilarious pictures of Pbo jumping in front of Allianz. After that, we took the train back to the shop so I could get a new bike. I had a definite upgrade from Scarlett Johansen….Penelope Cruz!
Once we were back on the road, we headed to the English Gartens, which I would liken to Central Park in NYC. It was a massive garden with so many places and things intertwined, including a raging river where people surf. I had never seen anything like this before. After that, we rode to a Chinese themed Biergarten in the middle of the garden. Pbo and I were trying to figure out why there was a Chinese themed beer garden inside what was called the English gardens in the German city of Munich. It was like one of those Russian toys.
After a couple beers, we went to the Hofbrau Haus, which was even more toursity than we had anticipated. It was nothing like the Augustiner Bierhaus in Austria and was filled with all of us gringos. Pbo and I didn’t stay there too long. After that, we walked into another brew house nearby and ate with an older couple from Ireland: Aidan and Mags. They were some of the coolest people ever. We shared our travel stories and they told all about growing up in Ireland and what they were doing in Germany. Pbo loved talking to them since he was in Ireland not too long ago. Once we finished here, we stopped at this restaurant because we hadn’t eaten anything substantial all day. It was a cool spot with bamboo trees everywhere while playing a really good hip hop playlist.
Here, Pbo and I were trying to recollect all of the memories that had happened over a blur of the past 10 days, talking about what we liked, what we didn’t like, and how crazy it was that we’d be back in the states soon. The next day we would be heading back to Barcelona for a day and a half, which I was excited about. We decided not to go out out this night, since we were planning on going hard at Shoko one last time before heading home. We needed to go out with a bang.
