Irschenberg

Today we had a slightly later start to the day. We have been very fortunate with the weather in Munich, and today is no exception - blue skies and sunshine with temperatures in the mid 20’s.

Our first destination was Tegernsee, a picturesque Bavarian town situated on lake Tegernsee, about 55 kilometres from Munich. Again, as it was a sunny day, everyone was heading either to the mountains to hike or the lake to relax (eat and drink beer) or sail. The Germans love to hike through the mountains. On the trip south we passed numerous small villages, such as Waakirchen and Gmund to name a few. We also encountered a lot of traffic on the autobahn, and so the speed was restricted to between 80 and 120kms, which the Germans do not like. Yesterday, at times my cousin was driving at speeds of 140 to 160kms per hour and, even then, other cars were flying past us - they must have been going at least 200kms per hour! Way too fast for my liking.

Tegernsee is situated on a lake, and so we went for a bit of a walk along the shoreline, where we encountered people sun baking, swimming in the chilly lake and fishing, and even saw people having scuba diving lessons. We then wandered around some of the streets, to check out the architectural styles of the housing.

On our return to the lake, we went past the local brewery, church and many restaurants. We stopped at Alta, a lovely restaurant on the lake, to have a typical Bavarian lunch of bread with a range of spreads (like dips). We had tuna, artichokes and sun dried tomatoes, chicken and curry, smoked salmon and dill, mustard and honey, apricot and rosemary and a local cheese which are all mashed up with cream cheese - very nice.

After lunch we drove around the lake, and then headed back to Munich. I am glad we got to Tegernsee early, as the traffic heading towards the area as we were leaving was overwhelming, with traffic jams that went for over a kilometre.

Once we returned to Munich we headed to the English Gardens. See the next instalment about this green space in Munich.Read more