Morning Market and the Glockenspiel

Munich's Maypole.

The first real day in Munchen/Munich.  (I probably should drop the whole "Munchen" affectation, given that I am too lazy to properly spell it with umlauts.  If you're omitting the umlauts, what's the point?)

This was the morning to take care of a few agenda items.  For the B-I-L, it was to get a pickled herring sandwich.  For me, it was to see the Glockenspiel in action.  So it was off to the downtown market, which is very close to Marienplatz, with New Town Hall, with the Glockenspiel.

It was a busy Saturday morning in downtown Munich:

Street action above the Marienplatz U-bahn station

The market is a short walk from the U-bahn station.  Incidentally, "U-bahn" is your German term for subway or metro.  "U" for underground, "bahn" for railroad.

Crowded at the market

The crowds were out, with vendors selling fruits and vegetables, meat and game, mustards, and a whole lot of good German eating.  But there also was the pickled herring.

The B-I-L proudly displaying his picked herring

I am not one to judge.  And I have made major travel detours to get to foods that I crave.  So the fact that the B-I-L's #1 item on his Munich to-do list was to eat this sandwich is something I do not judge.  More than that, it's something I can appreciate.  Except for the fact that we're talking pickled herring.

Strong flavored fish soaked and pickled in brine  Topped with pickles, cucumbers, soaked and pickled and brine.  Put on a roll with onions.  It's Germany so I'm positive the roll was good.

Anyway, B-I-L says the pickled herring sandwich was delicious.  Perhaps even worth the trip.  While we were seated at the long tables at the marketplace so the B-I-L could enjoy his fine sandwich dining experience which could not be replicated at home, we were told by a woman from Austria who was sitting at our table and could only speak German that we -- us! -- should learn to speak German if we are traveling to Germany.  Can you imagine!  This women travelled to another country and could not even speak English!

(Aside:  the woman was joking with our friend who guiding us around when she said this.  And the level of English language proficiency in Munich is sky-high, comparable to a U.S. city.)

Sandwich then eating, agenda item for B-I-L checked off, it was time to check off my agenda item for Munich: the Glockenspiel.

New Town Hall with the Glockenspiel about halfway up the tower

The Glockenspiel plays at 12:00 noon and 5:00 p.m.  We missed the 5:00 p.m. performance the day before.  We were not going to miss the noon performance today.  And neither were others!

Glockenspiel-anticipating hordes at Marienplatz

Crowd watches and listens to an accordionist in giddy anticipation

Then, at the stroke of noon, the bells chime, the music roars, and the statues come to life.

Glockenspiel in action. (Well, not "action" as it's a still photo, but it's a still photo of an action sequence.)

More Glockenspiel action

State of the art animatronics from the early 20th Century.  Actually, it was mildly disappointing to read that it was from 1908.  I thought it was more of a peer of the Astronomical Clock in Old Town Prague, which dates back to 1410, with "animatronic" figures being added as early as the mid 1600's.  Actually, the Glockenspiel was impressive, and still very impressive for its time, but it got me to appreciate the Prague Astronomical Clock even more.

So the item that I got to put on the Munchen to-do list got done.  I will go back to being a passenger for the Munich part of the journey.

One last look at the Glockenspiel, behind some Cherubs of the Marian Column

The Vacation Begins in Munich

Oktoberfest in Munich! It's only a couple of weeks away!

Willkommen to Vacation 2014, part dois.  It all begins with a few days in Munich.

Why Munich?  If you've been following my vacation blogs over the last several decades, you understand that the answer to every "Why?" question is "Why the [heck] not?"  Actually, there is a reason this time.  This is a vacation trip that I am taking my sister (hereafter, the "Sister") and brother-in-law (hereafter, the "Brother-in-Law," or "B-I-L"),  In the interest of maintaining my promise to keep their internet presence they shall be referred by these names that will leave no internet footprints.

Me, on the other hand, I am totally OK with my sasquatch-sized internet footprint.  It's part of the territory when you are one of the few known Spretnaks in the internet era.

Marienplatz

As an aside.  I do know people who caution that you should never announce on the internet when you are gone on vacation, whether to Munich, Croatia, or anywhere else on this fine planet.  I understand your point.  Yes, I do realize there are marauding gangs lurking on Facebook and elsewhere on the intertubes just waiting to find out when the Bob Spretnaks of the World(TM) leave town on yet another Big Adventure Holiday Vacation Extravaganza(TM).  For those of you lying in wait, hoping to attack Casa del Spretnak in the while I'm cavorting in Deutschland, the joke is on you.  (1) The cat is still there and she is one angry pussycat when left alone for a few nights.  So be warned if you break in.  (2) I got nothing worth stealing!  I really don't.  Take my furniture.  Please!  (Aside: if I knew in 1984 when I set up my first apartment that I would still have about half of the furniture 30 years later, I would've bought MUCH better stuff.)

So what's that got to do with Munchen, as us International Jetset Travelers Who Pretentiously Call Places By Their Name in the Local Language(TM)?  Nothing really.

The Munich/Munchen leg of this trip is something different for me.  Sister and B-I-L were here before, a few years ago.  Loved it.  Wanted to see it again before we start the Croatia/Slovenia part of the trip.  So I'm along for the ride.  Which -- speaking exclusively in sentence fragments here -- is not my usual vacation style.  I normally plan the trip meticulously,  Have a sense of what I want to see.  And flexibly move things around when the mood hits.  Can't do that on a multi-person vacation.  So I'm Munich-ing, too.  But without my usual font of knowledge of things I'm seeing because I meticulously planned on seeing them.

The Glockenspiel. Lying dormant. Foreshadow: it will come to life on tomorrow's adventure.

Which is cool.  Well, for the first few days of the trip.  When we hit Croatia, I will be large (sadly) and in charge.  In Munich/Munchen, I am a passenger.

Thankfully uneventful flight to Munich.  The connection in Toronto was very tight, but despite the fact that Toronto Pearson is gi-normously huge, it is extremely well-organized and the line at passport control was one person deep.  It was awesome.  Eight hours later we were in Munich.  And about an hour later, we were having lunch at the Ratskellar, a restaurant the size of Toronto Pearson Airport, underneath the New Town Hall (New "Town Hall," rather than "New Town" Hall), which is the home to renowned Glokenspiel.

There will be pictures of food later in the Vacation Blog. But not at the Ratskellar. I was jetlagged.

Lunch was an array of seven sausages, shooting out from two potato pancakes on a bed of sauerkraut.  Trez German and muy delicioso.  (Multi-cultural irony)  (Multi-cultural irony aside:  I know the German word for "thank you" is "danke," yet to say thanks to the German speakers I keep wanting to say "obrigado."  Which is Portuguese.  I'm still stuck on my last vacation.)

The sausages, sauerkraut and potato pancakes temporarily re-energized me to handle a walking tour of the churches of the Marienplatz area.  And who did I see?

Bas relief of the Bavarian Pope

Benedict!  The Pope Emeritus!  At the Cathedral Notre Dame de Munich.  The church interior was magnificent as you would expect:

Next it was off to St. Michael, with its beautiful white interior:

Mad King Ludwig, as history has chosen to call him, is buried in the basement.  We visited him.  But I took no pictures.  He wasn't looking his best.

Sister, B-I-L and I then headed off with Leo (our friend and Munich/Munchen local) to see the Oktoberfest grounds.  Oktoberfest was still under construction, although it will be opening soon.  (Oktoberfest is in September.  One of life's great ironies.)

Oktoberfest is a big deal in Munich.  Except maybe for 1970s-era Donna Summer/Giorgio Moroder Euro-disco, it's probably what Munich is most famous for.

And overlooking the Oktoberfest grounds?

Miss Bavaria 1844

The Bavaria statue in Munich's Theresienwiese neighborhood.  You can go up in her, a la Statue of Liberty.  The spiral staircase of 123 stairs (guessing from middle of the night memory here) is not too claustrophobic, at least not until you get inside her head

But the view of the Oktoberfest grounds, and surrounding neighborhood, through the eyes of Miss Bavaria 1844 was quite nice:

And then it was time for supper:

Pictures of food! As promised.

Kalb!  Which in English is veal!  And like the Baby Jesus in the old German Christmas carol "Stille Nacht" -- it was so tender and mild.  Served up with some cheesey potatos au gratin and some firm carrots, good eatin'.

And then it was time for this ...

Bedtme at the Ambassador Apartmenthotel near the Vaterstatten ubahn stop in the Munich suburbs