Days 4-7: Stuttgart & Munich

Day 4 Stuttgart (Saturday 5 February 2011)

In conversation aboard the 0653 from Strasbourg Paul and I agree on our now mutual and lasting dislike of all things to do with Croydon. I tell Paul about the antics of our other room mate and he is just as baffled by the thing as I am.

I do not actually witness our crossing over the River Rhine into Germany as it is still dark outside, but the names of the towns we pass through indicate that I am now into the second country of my journey. I have long felt an affinity with Germany and its people, not least for their appreciation and enjoyment of simple yet quality fare and the good times I have spent here before. I am very much looking forward to some Weissbier later today especially as a change in country has brought about a change in the weather and we are greeted with blue skies and a bright sun shining over us. On route we pass through Baden Baden a place that, had I had more time, I may have paused to explore for a few hours. Not today though, as we speed all the way to our destination, the capital of the state of Baden-Wurttemberg: Stuttgart. Known as the 'cradle of the automobile' after Karl Benz invented the motorcar and motorcycle here. Today the headquarters of Mercedes-Benz and Porsche and still based in the city. Paul is rather taken by this, whereas I am more impressed and pleasantly surprised by a city which is spread over a variety of hills, vineyards, valleys and parks. Not the industrial scene I had been expecting to find.

After the now customary trip to the tourist information desk to collect our city maps we head off in the direction of my chosen hostel, Hostel Alex 30 (30 Alexanderstrasse). Along the way Paul reveals this is the first time he has been away from the UK since his last backpacking trip nearly 10 years ago that ended with him being deported from Cambodia after a week spent in a cell. Something to do with his lax attitude towards keeping his papers in order. Having known Paul for about three days now this does not come as any surprise to me.

At thirty-five or thirty-six Paul is an extremely intelligent, almost, dare I say, nerdy guy, but by his own recognition has not put his talents, or his chemistry degree, to profit. He is happy driving a white van delivering fruit and veg to Bournemouth's restaurateurs, although the older he gets the more difficult the early mornings are becoming. He is good company, very knowledgeable and has that quality I find so attractive in people - that is, to have a story to tell, or know of some (ir)relevant fact, about whatever it is they encounter. One peculiarity I must say about Paul is that despite his rather random nature he is a worrier, a bloody awful worrier. Top of his list of concerns has to be meal times. Maybe it is the hours he keeps back home but at around five o'clock in the afternoon he starts to come across all stressed about missing the time he usually sits down to eat his dinner. I have witnessed him having to find a shop to buy and consume an obscene amount of food just to lessen the feelings of stress that have come over him. And this despite the fact he knows full well that in two or three hours we have plans to go out for a meal. That said I am fond of Paul. My time spent with him has been great with never a dull moment.

At Hostel Alex 30 the very pretty girl at work today lets us eat breakfast for half price as it is late and the other guests have been raiding the buffet for hours. After a feast of a breakfast we check into our dorm room that we are to share with one other person; a Swede who is obsessed by the price of everything. While Paul takes a shower, I get to know my latest room mate a little better. He tells me how his train to Copenhagen tomorrow is costing him just 48 Euros, the two second hand shirts that are proudly hung in the wardrobe cost him just 5 Euros, and, most curiously of all, he describes a place in town that serves a hot meal each day for just 1.50 Euros. I nod enthusiastically, not wishing to offend him, but the only conclusion I can come to is that he has been spending his holiday gatecrashing homeless shelters for a cheap feed. Apparently Paul had got the same story whilst I was taking a shower.

Schiller Platz flower market

There are markets in the old town on this sunny Saturday afternoon and Stuttgart offers a lovely few hours spent exploring the inner city. Heavily damaged during the second world war, it is an interesting mix of reconstructed historic buildings and modern post-war architecture. Should you ever visit, be sure to walk the area around Schlossplatz and Schillerplatz. The pedestrianised Koningstasse is the main street and links the Hauptbahnhof and the inner city. Stuttgart Hauptbahnhof, built between 1914 and 1927, is one of Stuttgart's most memorable landmarks. The station tower stands 56 metres high on the north axis of Konigstrasse. A rotating Mercedes-Benz emblem is its crowning glory and the striking red, black and gold tower clock keeps the good people of Stuttgart punctual. Inside the station, left of the platform entrances, we enter a lift which takes us to the top for the views back down over the city. Looking down to the east from the tower I can see the Schlossgarten. This linear garden forms a network of parks that give Stuttgart a very green quality which punctures the urban form of the inner city and brings the countryside right into the very heart of the town. After descending from the tower we take a walk in the park, stopping for a Weissbier and generally basking in the sun that makes this February afternoon feel like it could easily be May or June.



Stuttgart Hauptbahnhof



Eventually we decide to catch the S-Bahn back in the direction of town. Earlier at the hostel we had asked the receptionist what she would do with just one day in Stuttgart and she recommended we walk to Bopser, just up the hill from Alexanderstrasse, and climb the foothill to an old tea house that is a favourite but lesser known hangout amongst locals. A great place to relax with a pot of tea and delicious slice of cake. We board the S-Bahn in Schlossgarten and to our surprise bump into the Swede from our dorm. I half expect him to start telling us how much his ticket cost when the doors open and we all jump out. At Bopser station we should have followed the path that runs up the steep hillside above and then over the road and onwards up the hill to the tea house. However, we do not notice this path and instead follow the road that stays at a much lower level than where we need to be. Some time later, having scrambled up many steep hillsides and asked half a dozen people directions, we eventually reach our destination only for the people arriving moments before us to buy the last of the cake. All that effort and no reward! Its now almost five o'clock and I can tell, as we sip our beers (why have tea if there is no cake) and look out back across Stuttgart from our vantage point, that the lack of cake has been a cruel blow for Paul.

Later at Alex 30 a group of the staff and their mates are gathering in the bar to watch Borussia Mönchengladbach take on VfB Stuttgart. A match with added significance given that Stuttgart, Bundesliga champions in the 2006-7 season, are currently just one place above Mönchengladbach who themselves occupy last place in the league table. I am not sure how well my footballing cliché of 'a must win game' goes down, especially as after half an hour Stuttgart trail 2-0 . During a frantic second half Paul misses two Stuttgart goals which are both scored at times he has gone outside for a smoke or 'a burn' as he says. We get up to leave in the dying embers of the match and I joke that as soon as Paul has left Stuttgart will score the winner. We close the door behind us but do not hear the anticipated cheers (although the following morning we discover that moments later, in the last seconds of injury time, Stuttgart were awarded and scored a penalty to win the game). Before all the excitement the guys had recommended a place to eat which they say serves the best traditional Swabian food in town. From what I can tell traditional Swabian food seems to consist of Spatzle, a shredded pancake that comes with everything on the menu, savoury or sweet.

Day 5 Munich (Sunday 6 February 2011)

We leave Stuttgart at 0912 for the two and half hour journey to Munich. Sharing our cabin is a German girl who I guess is a similar age to myself and she is returning home from two months spent travelling in Australia. She tells me about her various backpacking trips and it is clear that she is quite an adventurer having travelled in places as unknown to me as Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. She is intrigued as to why people would backpack around Germany and asks me if I think it odd that people do so in Britain. Unfortunately her memory of York is not fond and she tells me how at nineteen and travelling alone she missed the last train to Edinburgh and with nowhere booked to stay in York and with very little money was forced to rough out the night at York train station, eventually sleeping on a table in the women's toilets until 6 o'clock and the first train. It is good that we get chatting as she helpfully points out some areas of Munich I should try and visit, places that are not on the normal tourist trail. By the time she leaves the train two stops before Munich Hauptbahnhof I have an itinerary full of things to do and see that I may otherwise have missed. As she hauls her backpack over a shoulder and we say our goodbyes I can not help but notice that her excitement at being home is mixed with a heavy regret that for her the adventure has come to its end.

Towards the end of our time in Stuttgart I had decided that, as good as it has been, once in Munich I wanted to go my own way from Paul. I know where he is staying and it is different from the hostel I have in mind. Maybe Paul is thinking the same thing, I do not know, but it still feels a little awkward saying this to him. It has nothing to do with wanting away from him but everything to do with wanting to be on my own again. Travelling in a pair is a totally different experience. It is a great feeling to have companionship and someone to share the experience with, but there is a tendency to become slightly insular in the friendship. It is my opinion that when travelling alone I am far more open to new experiences, and even more to meeting new people. At this stage I have no idea if this will be the case, although I have a definite feeling that I would not benefit in the same way were I to become too attached to any one person or group of people for a majority of my journey. Still I cannot help feeling slightly guilty because Paul has changed his, albeit loose, travel plans to buddy up with me. We part as firm friends and I wish him the best of times.

Like Stuttgart, Munich is unseasonably warm and sunny for February and the short walk to the Easy Palace Hostel, fully loaded with my backpack, is hard work and it proves to be a wasted effort as the hostel is completely booked out. I hope to have more luck at my back-up choice the 4 You München on Hirtenstrasse. Alas on arrival I am told there is nothing available, however as I turn to leave the receptionist says there is one family hotel room available for the next three nights and he is happy to charge me the price of a bed in a dormitory with the catch that, should anyone else turn up asking for a dorm bed, he will put them in with me. A fair deal: I agree. 4 You München has hostel dormitories on the first and second floors which are currently closed for refurbishment during the winter season. My room is therefore in the hotel on the floors above and once inside I find three single beds, two of which are pushed together into a double; I decide to take the the third bed fearing new arrivals later.



Hofbrauhaus



This evening I visit a few of the famous Munich Brauhaus, or beer halls. All of the Bavarian breweries have a Brauhaus in town, each serving gallons of their own Weissbier, Helles (Pils) or Dunkel (Dark), and plates of Bavarian cuisine to as many as one thousand revellers at any given time. Imagine being sat at long wooden benches packed in at twenty to a table – it is a pretty sociable affair. I think that in Munich the Brauhaus is to the autumn and winter months what the Biergarten is to the spring and summer months. My advice should you only have time to visit one Brauhaus is that you simply must make more time, as you cannot come to Munich without experiencing at least two or three Brauhaus. Guidebooks will tell you that the Hofbrauhaus is the premier choice, however I find it to be somewhat of a tourist trap and extremely busy. My favourite is the Augustinerbrau at 27 Neuauser Strasse, followed by Weisses Brauhaus at 7 Tal; the latter is home to the Schneider Weisse beer, to which I am partial. Platzl and the surrounding streets, where many of the Brauhaus are found, is an area full of places to eat and drink. For dinner I try Augustiner am Platzl on Orlandostrasse; here I am joined at my table by a Englishman who now lives in Dublin, and his two colleagues from the United States. They are salesmen in town for the annual International Trade Fair for Sports Equipment and Fashion, which I have never heard of before, but they assure me is a big deal. They have evidently been enjoying the Munich night-life over the last couple of evenings but the fair opens to the public tomorrow morning so a less raucous evening is planned for tonight. Looking at the English lad I have to ask how he came to get the whopping great hole that is stitched-up in his forehead. His mates cannot wait to tell me the story of how last evening, in the Hofbrauhaus, they had all enjoyed a few Mass, or litres, of beer too many, and once back at their hotel room a drunken play fight ensued. Given the eight stitches in his head it is not difficult to guess who had lost. Still, he is back on the beer tonight!

Day 6 Munich (Monday 7 February 2011)



View from St Peter's tower



I spend my morning on a self-guided tour of the old town with my guidebook for reference. If you get the opportunity, be sure to climb the tower of St Peter's. On a bright clear day such as today I can see the whole of Munich and, I should think, almost all of Bavaria too. From here I am looking directly down on Marienplatz and the maze of streets that surround it, worth an hour or two's exploring of anyone's time. At lunchtime I head for the Viktualienmark, Munich's largest and most central food market, where, perhaps unusually for February, the biergarten is packed with people enjoying a cold beer in the sunshine. I am feeling pretty pleased with myself as I sit with my Bier and Bratwurst. I had not expected the climate to be such that I could enjoy the Englischer Garten at this time of year, but given my luck with the weather this is an opportunity to do just that. The Englischer Garten is almost 4 square kilometres of city park and despite it being rather soggy under foot (only last week it had been covered in thick snow) the sunshine has brought the people out. I do, however, think the people sun bathing have got a little carried away. Eventually I find dry ground and yet more refreshment at the Biergarten at the rather out of place Chinese Pagoda.

 

Leaving the park west at Isarring I walk into the Schwabing district. Schwabing contains the University and has a popular night life that my friend on the train recommended I experience. Wandering amongst the students who are busily coming in and out of the coffee shops, pubs and campus buildings I pass an English bookshop and inspired by Paul's stories from the book I go in and treat myself to a copy of Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London. Then I am spoilt for places to sit, relax and read.



 Viktualienmarkt biergarten



Day 7 Munich (Tuesday 8 February 2011)

My last full day in Munich. I take the U-Bahn 1 as far as Gern from where it is a 15 minute walk along the linear pond to Schloss Nymphenburg, the summer palace of the Elector Ferdinand Maria, built in 1664 to celebrate the birth of his son. I cannot say if the 8 Euro entrance fee is good value as I baulk at the price. However, the palace gardens are well worth the journey and relaxing under a tree I write these notes. Tram 17 picks me up outside the palace grounds and takes me back into town. Alighting at Isotar to explore the banks of the River Isar it is not long before I wish I had my swimming shorts with me as I discover Muller'sches Volksbad, an Art Nouveau bathing temple, with thermal baths and a Roman steam room.

 

Olympiapark 1972


From Marienplatz, the U-Bahn 3 takes me to the 1972 Olympic Park where I climb the hill, constructed from the rubble caused by second world war bombings, for another panoramic perspective of the Munich skyline. At dusk the city seems so peaceful from here. Whilst at at the top it seems as though the done thing for the procession of joggers is to reach the summit where I am standing; indeed one girl seems particularly pleased with this achievement judging by the proud smile on her face. Looking back down towards the various Olympic arenas you get an appreciation of the vast scale of the enormous web-like roof structure that from where I am stood appears malleable enough to have been pulled and stretched into place over the Olympic complex.



 

Trio Grenzenlos

Tonight I have chosen to trust my friend from the train once again as I am going out in the area around Gartnerplatz, a public space in the centre of six streets all lined with popular restaurants and bars that reminds me of Seven Dials in London. Although the area is close to the city centre (just a short walk south from the Viktualienmark) I have been told not to expect many tourists out in this part of town. Attracted by the Franziskaner beer sign hanging outside I enter a pub named Gaststatte Frauniofer Spatenbrau, on Fraunhoferstrasse, and find a seat at a long wooden table. I get chatting to the couple sitting beside me - I find a simple 'Prost!' is a good way to endear oneself with the locals. Claus and Maria are from Munich and live here during the autumn and winter, spending the spring and summer in Italy, where they also have a house. They are here tonight for have a quick meal before going to a theatre behind the pub to watch a Bavarian folk music concert. Maria says it is a pity I cannot come with them as the concert has sold out. She tells me it is a very special concert and an experience that not many people from outside Bavaria will get to enjoy. While Claus and I are chatting Maria gets up from the table and is gone for a while before she reappears and to my surprise presents me with a concert ticket. I am extremely grateful to her and then again when her generosity means she absolutely refuses to allow me to pay her back for the ticket.

 

There is only five minutes before the start of the concert so I need to quickly finish my dinner, rush outside, and turn right through the archway into the tight little square in front of the hidden Theatre im Fraunhofer. Inside the tiny, packed auditorium a crowd of no more than one hundred are already in their seats. There are just two minutes until curtain up and to my horror my hosts seem to have vanished leaving me alone to negotiate finding a seat. Tickets are unallocated but the show has sold out so there must be at least one empty seat somewhere. I see it at the end of a row up against the wall. My gaze is fixed on the seat; I notice the lady in the next seat smile and with this I squeeze along the row until a disgruntled, red-faced man, who I take to be her husband, seems to get himself all in a bother. With no clue what he is saying all I can do is apologise and keep moving. Once in my seat I am separated from the angry man by his wife who, to my great relief, has a word in his ear, after which he gives up on whatever point he was trying to make. I glance behind me and see Claus in his seat towards the back of the theatre but I cannot see Maria anywhere and get an awful feeling that she may have given up her ticket so that I could attend. Fortunately, seconds before show time I catch sight of her and breath a sigh of relief.

Trio Grenzenlos puts on a terrific gig. A measure of how much I enjoy myself is that their set flies by. One difference from other folk bands I have seen previously is the string instrument being played with such assuredness by band leader, Rudi Zapf. In the interval I ask Maria what instrument he plays and she tells me it is a Pedal-Hackbrett (or a hammered dulcimer in the English translation). Maria also says that Rudi Zapf is a virtuoso on the instrument. He is accompanied in Trio Grenzenlos by two younger musicians, maybe ten years his junior; a girl who plays the fiddle and and guy on double bass. The tunes are unanimously good fun and what impresses me most is the flawless technique of all three whilst playing at brake neck speed. Herr Zapf must be a part time comic too, as between songs he has his audience rolling in the aisles. I have no idea what he is saying but everyone is laughing so hard it is all I can do to resist fake laughing along with the rest of them. I suppose for all I know it could have been a joke at my expense! Having thanked Claus and Maria I return to my room feeling very happy at how this evening has worked out and really grateful to them for showing me such kindness.

(c) Robert Beardsworth