German Language Tour

Tag Achtzehn (Day Eighteen) by Sophie Bussell

Hallo von München!

I must say before I begin, that München is such a beautiful city. As whilst Berlin was amazing, Munich is so connected and really has a heart

We all woke up this morning for our breakfast at 7 30 am and despite a few of us accidentally sleeping in we all enjoyed the delicious breakfast that was on offer. With a huge variety of food and almost too much to choose from, we ate combinations of bread, cheese, salami, ham, tomatoes, cucumber, eggs, yogurt, fruit and cereal Along with a range of juices, teas and coffees

After putting on our sun hats and sunscreen, we stepped out into the town and boarded a train to the market square of Marienplatz. We walked over to a special fountain that you can drink from, planning to easily fill up our drink bottles for the day However, instead, we found a man washing his hair in the water instead Right in the middle of the street!

We wandered around the enormous market for a while before heading over to the clock tower called Old Peter We all wanted to climb to the top and see the amazing view but I don’t think we thought about how hard getting up there would be Now, when I say this I am not exaggerating as we literally had to climb up 16 levels and 306 steps! Like what! But don’t get me wrong, it was definitely worth it when you saw the view that was waiting for you Looking out over the whole city and all the buildings it was quite something special We could even see the German Alps with snow on them! Once we climbed back down we entered a beautiful church that had magnificent statues, architecture and paintings. Then, at 10.55 am we headed over to the town hall to see the clock strike 11 and hear the Glockenspiel music, whilst watching the statues turn around It was super cool! Some time was then allocated to explore the town and do any final shopping, before meeting back for the trip to Dachau.

We arrived at the Dachau concentration camp memorial and had the experience of seeing what life was like for the prisoners there in WW2 We learned how horrible and inhumane the conditions were, and that by 1934 there were over 30,000 people crammed in there, all of whom were faced with the poss education camp.

The words “Arbeit macht frei” meaning “work sets you free” on the entrance gate and the phrase “never again” serves as a reminder and an acknowledgment We finished looking around and sat out together on the grass to have some reflection time on the experience.

Heading back to Munich was much more complicated than getting there and luckily no one was left behind when the bus got too full and the driver forced some people to get out We then hopped on a train that turned out to not be working and had to switch to a different one quickly, for the remainder of the journey back. We were all relieved to find our restaurant for dinner called the Hofbrauhaus and sit down to relax and eat dinner Our 3 course meal consisted of potato soup, chicken and potato salad and Bayerisch Creme mit Früchten, (Bavarian cream with fruit) We also got to enjoy listening to the delightful music that was played by a band in the restaurant. I mean, talk about a fancy, special restaurant! It was so lovely!

However getting home required much more work and there were a number of misdirections before we finally made it back to our beautiful hotel

After the long day we were all exhausted and couldn’t wait to get into bed and go to sleep!

Bis gleich!