Europe

We are staying at a place called Pöcking which is a village about a 45 minute train ride from the centre of Munich. We decided to spend the day in Munich today given things close by 2pm in Germany on Saturday. At the train station, we were buying our tickets for the train and a German couple came up to ask us if we needed any assistance. Then another man came over and started chatting to us. We talked for the 10 minutes whilst waiting for the train and the 40 or so minutes in on the train. He was a 62 year old psychotherapist, and a lovely guy. We had an interesting conversation about the psychotherapists across the world and their opinion of Trump. I had read a number of articles previously about his narcissism and sociopathic traits. Since I last read up about it, a lot more literature has appeared online! Anyway, both those instances in the space of an hour go against the general information Mena and Mia (our German au pairs) have given us about grumpy and unfriendly Germans. We will continue to monitor if that changes during the next few weeks ;-)

The train spat us out at Marienplatz, the main town square, so we were able to hang around there, go up the tower of the Rathaus (town hall), and witness the Rathaus-Glockenspiel "show" in the main tower which consists of 43 bells and 32 life-sized acting out one of two songs and stories. Up in the tower, we were able to give Finn a glimpse of the Bayern Munich home ground, Allianz Stadium.

We had a walk through the Viktualienmarkt, which is an open market place packed with all sorts of shops selling sausage, cheese, mushrooms, mulled wine, fruit and veg, bakeries... and a maypole.

Finn was on the lookout for every sport shop known to man now that he is in football country, so that he could buy a pair of away game shorts to go with his away game jersey for Real Madrid. We found a lot of shops, but all were either sold out or didn't have his side. He can now nag us until we get to Berlin about finding a sports shop. Oh yay.

We went into the Bayern Munich Fan Shop which was on three levels and had everything branded with Bayern Munich you could possibly think of (babies dummies, toothbrushes, dog bowls - you name it!). Finn sweet talked us into his birthday present (training shirt, shorts and socks, and they threw in a cap for free), which he now needs to wait two months to receive. Birthday shopping done!

We had lunch in a bierhaus. So one thing we have already noticed in Germany (or perhaps this is unique to Bavaria) is that if they say something on the menu to describe the meal, it is quite literal. The kids ordered traditional Bavarian meatloaf for lunch. The menu described it as "200gm meatloaf". What arrive was a white plate with 200gm slice of meatloaf. That's it - no garnish, no sauce, no anything. Just a lump of meatloaf.

I ordered something described as "white sausage salad with gherkin and onions". What I received as the most gigantic pile of thinly sliced sausage scattered with red onion rings and 1/2 a gherkin with a clear vinegar type of dressing over the top. No actual salad item. It is quite bizarre.

One of the other things I had noticed in the villages we drove through yesterday and again in Marienplatz is the blue and white stripey poles. They are mostly ornately decorated. Googled that too and note they are Maypoles. There is one outside our AirBnb and even a small one in the garden.Les mer