Last Day and a Half

Here is a recap of my last day and a half in Munich Germany.

Monday morning I had to go back to the show to make sure everything got out as scheduled. I had planned out my day the night before by finding the closest Harley dealership and wrote out instructions on how to get there. My directions were right on and I made it to the House of Flames early in the afternoon. This dealership was stellar. It was the smallest I've ever seen but had more bikes than most I've been to. They had plenty of stock bikes but also had tons of custom bikes. I picked up a t-shirt for myself and my bro-in-law. It was the one souvenir I looked forward to getting.

Tuesday was my last day in town so I decided to sight see a bit. I took the train into town at about 10am and had an hour and a half before the bike tour I was going on started. I wandered about the platz and the markets until it was time to meet up with the tour.

This is the famous Glockenspiel. I didn't see the performance of the wooden figures on the balcony. From what I understand I didn't miss much. Our tour guide referred to it as "eleven minutes of your life you'll never get back."

I took the bike tour through Mike's Bike Tour. Our guide for the day was Rod who was from Sidney Australia. He was a fun guy who kept the tour interesting and enjoyable. On the tour with me were two nursing students from Ireland and a young couple from San Diego. The five of us connected well and had some good laughs.

This photo shows us going through the English Garden which is reported to be a third larger than Central Park in NY. The one word of caution we received when entering the park was about the nudists. They weren't lying. We saw a couple dudes without their knickers as the Irish put it. Yikes, I didn't need that sight on my trip.

This was a man-made river that flowed through the English Garden and was fed by the Isah River that flows through Munich. I guess these guys can't read German, can you? They would toss their boards in the river and jump on them like they were skateboards. It was quite impressive. The water must have been about 4 degrees Celsius.

After the ride through the park we stopped at the Chinese Bier Garden for lunch. Here I stuffed myself with sausage, sauerkraut, dumplings and a beer the size of my head. The food was delicious everywhere I went. We laughed about eating sauerkraut and how it wasn't good for the guy in the back of the bike tour. The guy in the back is referred to as "The Assman" and guess who it was on this tour. Yep, me. I'm the assman. It was my duty to make sure nobody was left behind.

By the end of the bike tour we had had so much fun together we decided to keep going as a group. Neville, from San Diego, knew the way to a couple of the popular brew houses in the area so off we went. We started at this one which was at a large fairground where we played carnival games but skipped the rides. The band was a blast. They played mostly American songs by Niel Diamond, John Denver and the like. We raised our glasses and sang along as the locals got up to dance on the tables. It was quite a scene.

After the fun here we walked to the famous Hofbrauhaus downtown to finish off our evening. We didn't stay too long as I had to get up in the morning for my flight home and the Irish girls had just flown in that morning and were starting to fade.

Overall I had a good time but wouldn't choose Munich as a vacation destination. The experience of a foreign city is always challenging but I managed very well. The first three days I had my co-worker with me who spoke the language but once he left I was on my own. I was pleased to find that most Germans speak some English. My German was limited to common phrases like yes and no.