Bernhards Random Ramblings BACKUP

The town of Partenkirchen has a former locomotive of the Zugspitzbahn prominently on display on the town hall square. It's unfortunately surrounded by cars, the main road on one side, and a car park on the other.

This morning we boarded an ET 442 running as RegionalBahn to Garmisch-Partenkirchen. The weather forecast looks favorable, so we decided to ditch the city for the Alps.  The clouds followed us all the way. Almost there. A bit skeptical if the weather will clear up more tomorrow.

At the Bavarian Hunting and Fishing Museum we were greeted by this friendly fox. The museum was closed already, so we headed over to the Frauenkirche, where we managed to visit during church service. Out of the 4 churches we visited this weekend, there were ongoing services in 3 during our visit. I love the clean lines of gothic churches. Frauenkirche didn't disappoint. Ready for dinner! Marienplatz at night. Now with people. I saw these musicians on Friday, too. They played well-known classical pieces. Very good. It was cold. At Stachus we hit the S-Bahn, went back to the hotel, and called it a day.

Daylight Savings time is over in Germany. We slept in, had a nice breakfast, and still joined the crowds at Deutsches Museum shortly after 10am. We ended up waiting over half an hour. Once inside we were a bit overwhelmed by the options, but I had prepared a few things I definitely wanted to see. The replica of the Altamira cave was first on that list. Afterwards, we wandered through the various departments staying longer in areas that were interesting, or had ongoing demonstrations, and faster or skipped stuff that didn't. I knew Mining was impressive, but I had forgotten how well executed the various exhibits are. Narrow passage ways and lots of people added to the claustrophobic feeling. Marine Sciences, marine travel, and vessels was well done and a lot of fun, too. Even though we had a good time, we didn't stay as long as I expected. After some consideration we settled for the Munich tram museum. Turns out there was an art show with local artists in the exhibition area bet...

We took the U-Bahn out to Olympiazentrum and walked over to the BMW Museum. Neither one of us is a real freak about cars, but nevertheless this was interesting and the museum is doing a good job placing the fascination of technology and fast cars in historical context. The BMW Marketing department was maybe a bit overly involved in writing the descriptions of the exhibits Transparent walls with backlighting add to the futuristic atmosphere of the museum. The Isetta exhibit was lovingly done with  pictures and audio stories of (former) Isetta owners. The Elvis Presley love affair with a German woman and German engineering has a special spot near the exit. Since we went through the museum faster than I expected, we headed over to the Olympiapark and its unique architecture. 3 Euros gets you a visitor pass to the inside of the stadium. We could have gone zip lining across the field, too, but decided to pass. I love the construction of the roof. The wind made the visit both adventurous...

The surfers at Eisbach were a must-see item on our to-do list. They didn't disappoint. I was surprised how much we both enjoyed walking through the fall English Garden, despite the wind and cold. Monopteros was the next destination. Very windy and uncomfortable here, but neat effects with clouds, light, and the city. The Biergarten was shut down. No-one considered sitting outside ... What a nice walk in the fall.

We started the day with a tour of the office and then moved on for a quick visit of the Aldstadt ("old city"). St. Michael We got to Marienplatz just in time for the noon performance of the Glockenspiel . The line for climbing the tower of Peterskirche was so long, that we decided to skip that part. Both of us had been on the tower before, so we headed over to Viktualienmarkt for lunch at the Suppenkueche. That's some serious selection of potato varieties.