We awoke to the German countryside just pulling into the rail station at München (Münich) it, in a word was wonderglortastical (patent pending). The train station alone was a model of efficiency and modern design, I mean consider the WC (bathroom) it may cost a Euro, but it is cleaned after every use and you have the option to brush your teeth or even take a shower.

Outside the station the city is clean & extremely bike friendly. In fact I have never been in a more bike friendly location: bike lanes everywhere, every traffic light has special lights just for bikes, just wonderful. And they make use of it, bikes everywhere, more bikes than cars.

The city has many impressive historic buildings, and most German’s seem very proud of their heritage, there were even many stores dedicated to traditional German dresses and shorts-lederhosen combinations. We arrived in the middle of a marathon and there were venders giving out fresh fruit (bananas, apples, very sweet tomatoes) and various bandages and such. We walked through just in time to see the first people cross the finish line. We finished our short stay by getting some traditional Münich fare, I had weisewurst (white sausage, veal and bacon) with a giant pretzel.

We boarded our train bound for Venezia, traveled through the breathtaking beauty of the Alps, (you’ll have to wait for the better camera pictures, the iPhone ones do not do it justice). We made a brief stop in Innsbruck, Austria to board a bus to bypass construction on the rail line and got back on the train a few miles down.

As an aside, I’ve often been told I have a European look about me, yesterday seemed to confirm that. Several times we would walk up to say a cashier or the ticket taker would come in, they would speak to Mitch and my Mom in English, then come around to me and start up in German, even in Italy this continues to be the case with Italian. Amusing.

Anyway, so after descending through the Alps we arrived in the warm humid pleasantness of Venice. Beautiful, unique city with its narrow alleys and aquatic streets. I’m having breakfast outside by a canal way, a pigeon starring at me from the opposite chair. It is peaceful, and much slower and relaxed pace from elsewhere. More about this tomorrow.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 25th, 2012 at 9:31 am and is filed under Germany. You can follow responses to this entry through the Comments RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.