Day 2

Greeting!

So today was quite an eventful day.

I went to bed at 8 PM last night and was rudely awoken at 9, 10, 11, and 12 by obnoxiously loud spanish people, ugh. So finally at midnight I fell asleep until 5 at which time i fell back asleep until I woke up at 6, 7, and finally at 9 (and somehow managed to sleep through my alarm clock. Luckily it was set for 8:30 so I was only 30 mins late getting up. I proceeded to the washroom where I took an ice cold shower until right at the end when it got warm. What's worse was the water pressure was so low you have to stand in the freezing water for longer.

So anyway, I went to pick up my camera battery at the reception desk where they were charging it for me, and the people were on break so I couldn't get it till 11:30!! I wanted to leave at 11 but it was ok.

So I ate my avocado, picked up my battery, and headed to the Hauptbahnhof where I was supposed to catch the S-bahn (train) to Marienplatz. Well there was some problem so the S-Bahns weren't running. Luckily, I understand enough German to understand what the annoucements were telling us. So I had to go upstairs and catch the U-Bahn 5 to Odeonsplatz and then switch to the U-bahn 3 or 6 and take the to Marienplatz. Luckily I left myself 1 1/2 hours to get there. So I even got there 30 minutes early so I stopped to get some water and a bite to eat. Then I met my tour group under the big Glockenspiel. It was an English speaking tour so we had a diverse-ish crowd. There was me, a girl from Canada (who I befriended and we learned we are staying at the same hostel...she is 20 and her name is Jordan), a guy from Finland, a dad and 2 sons from Pittsburg, a couple from New Mexico, and another guy from America (don't know where). They were all nice except for the couple from New Mexico who were obnoxious.

Unfortunately the tour was a bit messed up due to the S-bahn shut-down so we had to just stand on the square for a bit. We found out that the S-bahns were running from this station about 6 stations away. So we hopped on the U-bahn and headed to that station. It was only about 10 mins before the S-bahn came for us, yay! So we rode the train for 15 mins and then hopped on a bus and finally we arrived at Dachau concentration camp. We had our own personal tour guide, it was cool. We walked down the road where the trains full of people came in and where the people walked into the camp. Then we walked through this museum (where we didn't need to reed any of the signs). Then we watched a 22 minute video about the history of Dachau. We walked to the old crematorium, the new crematorium, and the gas chamber (which was never actually used). Then we walked down the "freedom road" (as the prisoners called it) and we got to go into one of the bunk houses (although it was actually rebuilt as the original one was torn down after the war). They re-built 2 of them but there were originally 34. Then we walked down to the memorial and then we left. It was very interesting, although as Jordan and I discussed, incomprehensible. The whole trip took 5 hours.

When we got back I wandered around Marienplatz, took some pictures and got some food. Then I hopped on a train to the Olympic park. I wandered around and then went up in the Olympiaturm (Olympic tower...something like that). I took lots of pictures and got to watch the sun set from up on top-so cool! I (of course) ran into the base of one of those binoculary things and now I have a huge bump and bruise on my leg, haha-but at least I didn't fall.

Then I went to the University cause I have never been there but my camera died so I decided to leave (I will be back tomorrow if I wake up early enough). Then I took the U-Bahn to the Hauptbahnhof and hopped on a tram back to the hostel.

Oh, funny story-so today I had a person ask me if I speak English-so funny! I blend in quite nicely. Apparently I don't look blatantly American...all the German keep speaking to me in German, yay.

Oh, but at the Olympiaturm, I asked for a ticket to the tower in German and she responded in English, how rude...so I kept talking in German and she didn't get the point...people! Munich is supposed to be the city that speaks in German to everyone...oh well.

So tomorrow I go to Salzburg!!! But first I am going on the Third Reich-Hitler's Munich tour. It is a 2.5 hour walking tour (man am I going to be tired). Hopefully at some point I will get to go back to the University and go to the Soccer stadium. Then I have to come back to the hostel, grab my stuff, and trek back to the Hauptbahnhof. Trains leave for Salzburg at 20 after and 20 of every hour.

I should probably go to bed soon (it's after 11) but they're having a bonfire and I may want to check that out first. Then I have to bundle up and curl up under my 4 blankets.

I'll post pictures soon.

That's all for now, be back tomorrow if I can!