Munich, Germany

The train to Munich was to last three hours and it was so packed that I sat those three hours on one of the steps descending to the door. Not my most comfortable train ride but it actually went by quite quickly thankfully! Here we stayed a bit farther out from the old center of town in a nice hotel called Munich City and had a longer walk into central Munich. We spent the rest of the day and part of the next wandering the streets, entering massive cathedrals like Saint Peters, marveling at the huge main square called Marienplatz and smaller surrounding ones, and going into many more tourist shops and crowded Christmas markets. 

                Our second day in Munich was Christmas Eve and mum had heard that things would be closing in the early afternoon so we picked up some things for dinner and listened to the glockenspiel in Marienplatz before going to our reservation at Hofbräuhaus München for lunch. It was in a large tavern with a rowdy bottom floor and a calmer more elegant upstairs where we ate sauerkraut, potato dumplings and roast chicken, or alpine ox like Jesse ordered! 

                At a little convenient store on the way back to the hotel, Hunter talked my parents into getting some orange colored “wine”. Back in the room we played cards for quite a while and when it was time, I cut up some bread, cheese, sausage and fruit with a new knife Hunter had purchased. I only cut my finger once, which is pretty good I think :p Anyways, the people had told my parents that the alcohol they bought went best with milk, so they went to another shop, and thought they bought some. But after reading the ingredients, smelling it, and eventually tasting it, we found out it was nothing of the sort! It was made of carbonated water, cow yogurt, lemon juice and salt. It was totally gnarly. Hunter got 6euros to chug the bottle though! And he made it all the way through. But the wine was actually flavored vodka and ended up being left at the hotel along with the salty yogurt drink! But something that did go well, I had been in charge of choosing cheeses and at least those were a success! We got raclette (didn’t smell great but was the favorite), emmental, and brie. So for dinner we combined all these ingredients and made little sandwiches and snacked on fruit from the market. It was a lovely dinner!

              The rest of the evening was spent playing poker, using gross candies as poker chips. What a lovely Christmas Eve indeed! 

Don't forget to try a pretzel!

Heidelberg

         After a few hours of train rides including one delay, we arrived in our first German city! On one of those trains, a guy we met told us about a restaurant called Bier Brezel and told us we should eat there.

poker on the train

 More on that later, we didn’t get into the town until it was already dusk and so we walked around and mum did some tourist shopping down the main street and as we hadn’t had the time in all our train rushing to eat lunch, we were all quite hungry. My papa had his TripAdvisor app open searching for this restaurant that ended up being literally right under our noses! Right smack dab in the middle of the shops was the acclaimed restaurant. Prices were quite good even for the area, so we decided to eat here. I got spaetzel (type of eggy pasta) with mixed veg and everyone else ordered a different flammacuchen (similar to a flat pizza).  The atmosphere was warm, welcoming and very authentic and the food was incredible. No crumbs were left by the time my brothers were finished! 

     While perusing the Christmas markets down the streets, up on the hill you can see a castle all glowing and luminous, my mum had read about it online so after buying more chocolate and a schneeballen (interesting dessert tasting like a crunchy doughnut), we followed the signs up up up to the top of the steep hill to the castle. This building was originally built in the 12^th century but had been bombed and some of the outside looks a bit crumbled. It’s free to enter the grounds and the center of the castle is beautiful and doesn’t look like it was ever harmed. If you walk through to the other side you come to a view point offering panoramic views of all of Heidelberg, the river, and beyond.    

      One neat thing about these Christmas markets and the others around Germany is that each stand selling hot wine serves it in a different ceramic mug saying the name of the city you are in

and coming in different shapes and colors. Jesse began collecting them in different cities.

                We wandered towards the bridge, home of an infamous statue my mum told us about. It’s a monkey. And apparently touching different pieces of him will bring different things like wealth, a return trip to Heidelberg, or if you touch the little mice on the side (which my little sister accidentally did) you will be blessed or cursed with many children.

                Whether that will happen or not I don’t know, but I would be happy with the return trip to Heidelberg as it was an enjoyable little town.

Beer and chocolate

Early, and I mean early like a quarter to 5 am on the 19^th of December I walked/ran to the train station at Gare de Nord to board my train for Brussels airport. Upon arrival I waited a few hours near the arrivals gate awaiting my family. If I’d been anywhere else in the station I would have been bored out of my mind but it just so happens that the arrivals gate is the reason why I love airports as much as I do. I love the emotion that pours out of people waiting for their loved ones in suspense and the excitement that ensues when the anticipated person(s) finally walk through the doors. I’m pleased to say that I was just as ecstatic to see my family as they seemed to be about seeing me.

We made our way to the old city center after a short train ride where we dropped our bags and went to explore. But before any exploring could take place, the family had to try frites! Or fries, or chips, or however you prefer to call them. Mayonnaise seems to be the condiment of choice, yuck!!

 I do recommend trying monk made beer though, which you can find most anywhere including little convenience stores. Brussels is covered in dozens of chocolate shops and at least a few should be tried as part of the Belgian experience! Everywhere you go there are icons of this statue of a bronze boy peeing, following the signs we made it to this statue which ended up being incredibly small, smaller than the stone one that my mum has at home!

 We perused the Christmas market and ate little things along the way, none seeming to be specifically Belgian though.  Each city we went to seemed especially magical because of the many Christmas decorations and lights strung through shops and streets. So once it got dark and we had eaten, we walked around enjoying the scenery, down one road different banners of lights were hung that signified the different constellations. My favorite thing in Brussels was the light show on the buildings in the main square. All the buildings flashed different colors of lights in time to music that was playing. Sometimes it jumped from one building to the next and you were left spinning in circles trying to take it all in!

Our next day was spent in Bruges. I prefer this little quaint town over Brussels, because of its traditional and bright buildings, random flowing waterways and giant windmills. We ate lunch at a little restaurant called Humpty Dumpty which was pretty cheap and offered tasty sandwiches. Christmas markets were spread around here as well but offered mostly the same kinds of things like food and souvenirs. I again recommend trying some different beer and chocolate! We spent the day walking around the city in its entirety, which doesn't really take that long! Just outside the main central area of tourist shops are some really beautiful rivers flowing away from the center and just a little further out are some wonderful tall windmills that you can walk a short grassy hill up to. There are plenty of little places to stay and local things to enjoy in Bruges.