Museum Hopper

I have wanted to visit the Schloss Neuschwanstein FOREVER.  It is about 2 hrs outside of Munich, so I had never been able to pull it off with my short trips before.  I mean, look at it?!?! The logistics to get there from Munich are a little complicated.  There is a train/bus combination that works or you can sign up to take a large tourist bus.  Since we ended up going with our three other friends (so five of us in total), we ended up renting a car for the dya.  We were staying across the street from the main train station in Munich, so this was pretty easy to do.  It gave us a little more flexibility.   We purchased tickets in advance. Please pay close attention to what time you are purchasing your tickets for.  It is recommended that you arrive an hour before that.  We had a little bit of confusion about what time was listed on the tickets.  The time bolded on the tickets is the latest you can pick up your tickets for.   ...

I was in Munich in the spring of 2012 and had wanted to go to Dachau if I had just been there one more day.  My paternal grandfather was part of one of the first Army troops to reach it at the end of the World War II.  He never spoke about being in the military and I thought this would be an important way to remember the service he provided.   I did not take a tour to the site, but rather went by myself with the public transportation -- first with the train and then hopping onto a bus.   It looked a lot like I had imagined it -- barren, stark, extremely orderly.  The train truly had been routed to the front door.   They had leveled a number of the barracks, but left two so you could get a sense of scale.  By the end of the war, the camp which had been built for 6,000 people, held over 30,000.  The barracks were overcrowded and food was in scarce supply.   Four different religious memorials have been built within the site: ...

eek!  the last post from my trip!  right before i left for my night at the airport hotel, i went to the deutsches museum .   it is definitely the largest "museum of technology and engineering."  direct quote from the guidebook: the museum is a "tour de force."  yep, and it was.  the museum is huge.  it was difficult to find things at time, similar to the met or the louvre.  this did take it to an extreme case though.  this picture is an example of what i cut through to get to the music section of the museum.  i tried to hit the highlights, which included galileo's workshop, alexander graham bell's telephone and a wright brothers' plane.  they did have great descriptions for most of the museum.  the range of stuff is incredible.  i do not have much to say since the collection is crazy.  i felt that it could have have been edited slightly, but the massive size is what the museum is somewhat known for.  i cove...

while in munich, i decided to head to the schloss nymphenberg , which was a little outside downtown.  from the main train station, i needed to take a metro train and then a bus.  this palace was built in honor of future king's son's birth.  talk about a birthday present!  similar to the residenz , this building also was built in staged and continually added onto to make it what it is today. the walk to the main palace is quite grand.  it has a few canals and is surrounded by all of these pretty outbuildings.  the main entrance is in the middle between two staircases.  within the main entrance is where you can buy the admissions ticket.  i ended up buying the combination ticket , which got me entrance to everything, the main palace, and all of the park palaces.  my guidebook mistakenly mentions that the audio guide is free; it is no longer the case.  i was also slightly disappointed in the pamphlet.  it did not contain a map of the...

as my friend and i were wandering through the city, we decided to check out the residenz , which was the former residence of the bavarian kings.  i cannot believe that it was originally built in the late 1300s.  it was definitely built in pieces though, which was obvious reviewing the layout of the building.   it took us about 20 minutes to find the entrance to the building leading us through many, many courtyards.  the entrance was very poorly labeled.  and no, this was not a case of us not understanding german!  by the time we found the entrance, it was 505.  we had to spend about 5 minutes trying to convince the guard to let us in.  they supposedly close entrance an hour early, since it closes at 6.  really?  wow.  that is something.  i understand closing admission a half hour early, but an hour early (and of course, they were closed the next day). the rooms are beautiful.  we were quite happy we begged to l...

the last stop on my painting list was the alte pinakothek .  i was lucky that my friend, patricia from school, decided she would join me at the museum.  the museum was pretty close to my hostel, so we just walked over from there.   the museum has a reduced admission price for sundays, which was awesome.  it was just a EUR to get in.  ironically, this was also the only museum where i was asked to show that i had paid about halfway through our visit!   they had a number of great paintings.  again, no descriptions of the art except on two paintings.  perhaps this is something is expected or the norm in germany.  i am not really sure since i only went to two art museums in germany.  patricia and i did have a difficult to find the "gems" (according to my guidebook) in the collection.  we did notice there was a lot of glare on the paintings.  at times, it was really difficult to see parts of the painting.  we also wishe...

okay, last, but definitely not least, was my stop in munich, germany!  i decided to fly to munich since it ended up being cheaper, but it also gave me a full two days in munich!   on the first day, i was lucky enough to go to the  - alte pinakothek - residenz we also checked out the hofbrauhaus , the original one! then on monday, i covered some ground heading to the schloss nymphenberg seeing all of the outpost buildings as well.  i then headed to the deutsches museum, which is a large natural history museum.   four more posts to go!