Day 150-seeing the sights in downtown Munich

   June 2-Our lack of sleep the night before almost made us feel jet-lagged today.  At least that is the excuse we used for sleeping in this morning.  We finally got up and around, dropped by a bakery for some yummy German pastries and rolls, and arrived at the Zink’s around 11 am.  Martina was off celebrating the birthday of a work colleague, so Hape and Julia showed us around Munich.

   We headed downtown to watch the glockenspiel, shown above, play at the neues Rathaus, on the right, at noon.  Then, we wandered the pedestrian zones with all of the other tourists, checking out the shops.  We walked through the Fraunenkirche church, which gave the kids an idea of the Gothic style of decor.



Statue of St. George killing the
dragon, inside Frauenkirche.



   Our wanderings finally led us to the Obletter toy store, which had been Spencer’s goal since we had arrived in Germany.  He had been told for the past couple of months not to buy any more Playmobil toys in Iceland, because they are cheaper in Germany.  Finally, the moment had come!  Sally and the girls were also looking for Playmobil figurines that were only released in Germany, where Playmobil is based.  Spencer came away happy; prices were definitely cheaper than in Iceland.  However, the others did not have any luck finding German-only Playmobils.  Thereafter, Spencer’s primary interest was to return to the hotel so he could play with the new toys!  Unfortunately for him, we did not do that, but continued to see the sights of Munich instead.  

Fruit stand in Viktualienmarkt.



Traditional May Pole in Viktualienmarkt.

   Since everyone was hungry by this point, we walked through the Viktualienmarkt outdoor market which had all kinds of food vendors.  Only Shan and Hape found sandwiches to their liking, so we all stopped in at a Bierstube restaurant and Sally and the girls had more Bavarian dishes.  We also drank some fine beers from Schneider-Weisse brewery. 



Strolling through the English garden.



   Martina caught up with us there and we all walked through the Residenz, which housed the government offices of the Bavarian state in the Renaissance and early modern times.  We crossed into the English garden, which is a wide park that follows the Isar river out of Munich to the northeast.  Spencer found a Hofbräuhaus Mass glass, which we picked up to save for him.  We wandered around the park’s paths and enjoyed the Sun and warm

Surfing Munich.

weather.  Hape led us along a canal of the Isar, that it was built solely for the aesthetics of the park.  In one location, the underlying concrete generates a wave in the canal and this wave has become popular among the locals to use for surfing.  We stood and watched them for a while.  One guy was quite good at it.  He boogied around on the wave for a while and then would slide back into the side and sit down on the concrete wall.  All of the others would take short runs before falling into the water.  

Martina, Hape, Sally, Alex, Spencer, Shan, and Joslyn
enjoy the beer garden at the Chinese tower.

   Continuing on, we came to the beer garden at the Chinese tower.  There we stopped for a couple beers and pretzels and to listen to the band play some traditional beer hall songs.  Spencer got to pull out his Playmobil toys and play with them and the kids also ran off to explore the area, so everyone had a good time.    We also got to watch a parade of various bachelor and bachelorette parties wander through.  It looked like they were all having a lot of fun.  Sally and I found a new mixed beer drink that is very tasty and refreshing: the Russ’n, which is a mixture of a Weizzen and limonade.  It has joined the Radler (biker), which is a mix of the helles (light) beer and lemonade that was popular over here twenty years ago, as a refreshing summer refreshment in Bavaria.  



Spencer slides down the hill.

   We left the beer garden and headed back towards the city center.  Along the way, we came across a hillside with one side covered in a plastic mesh.  I think that the plastic is in place to protect the soil to allow the grass to recover, but the many kids out enjoying the weather were using is as a long slide, instead.  We wandered around downtown for a short bit and then made our way back towards the hotel and Hape’s place.  We said good-bye to Hape and headed to our hotel.  Shan put the new SIM card he had bought today into his phone, so he now had a phone that works on the Continent!  The kids finally got to play with their toys for about an hour.  Then, they went to bed, and we adults got a little work done, before we hit the sack, too.

Day 149-Munich zoo

   June 1-We all got a little sleep on the flight to Munich, but not much, since it lasted less than four hours.  Our family filled the first row of seats.  Unfortunately, that is not first class on Air Berlin!  However, it was the first time ever that we have been the first passengers to deplane.  We quickly collected our luggage and walked through the “no item to declare” customs hall.  That was it, we were in Germany!  We thought it was a little odd that there was no passport control but certainly did not miss waiting in another line. 

Hape and Shan with the Weisswurst.

   We rented the car and drove straight to Hanspeter Zink’s (Hape’s) apartment in downtown Munich.  He and Shan roomed on the same floor when Shan studied at the University of Regensburg during the 1992-3 academic year.  We hit it off and have remained close friends ever since.  At his apartment we finally got to meet his wife, Martina, and their 6.5 month old baby, Julia.  They served us a Weisswurst breakfast complete with pretzels and Hefeweizen beer.  It was good to be back in Germany! 

   Properly fortified, we headed to the zoo.  It obviously surprised the Zinks that the zoo was so high on the kids’ to-do list.  Normally, tourists go to the tourist sites and the locals go to the zoo.  However, the rural nature of Gunnison and Bifröst (and Iceland in general) makes zoos rather exotic places for the kids.  In any event, the Zinks were up for it, so they led us through the S-bahn and U-bahn subway systems and a short time later we were at the zoo.  It was actually a very nice zoo and there were a number of young animals there, which the kids loved.  The whole family had Leberkäse and pretzels for dinner and liked it.  They seemed to be taking to the Bavarian cuisine quite well.

Joslyn stares down the alligator.  The glass probably makes her a little braver!

The kids eat dinner at the zoo's beer garden
before running off to play on the playground.

   The lack of sleep during the night finally started to catch up with us and the kids were fading fast by the mid-afternoon, so we returned to the inner city and checked into our hotel.  Sally, Spencer, and Alex took naps while Joslyn wrote in her travel journal.  Hape took me over to the post office to liquidate my Postsparbuch account.  Twenty years ago, this account had been a very good deal, since the money in it could be withdrawn from post offices in any country in their local currency.  I left it open when I left, because I figured that when I returned to Europe, I would be able to use it to get some starter money easily in any country.  However, the ubiquity of ATMs and the use of the Euro as a common currency today have made the Postsparbuch rather antiquated.  It turned out that the money I had left in it actually had been drawing a small amount of interest over this time; about enough to pay for supper.  That was a nice surprise. 

   Afterwards, I went over to the Zink’s for Brotzeit.  After catching up over a fine German sandwich and a couple Weizzens, I returned to the hotel, where the family was waking up.  We walked down the street to the Paulaner brewery and the Zinks joined us a short time later.  The kids had spätzle dishes and Sally and I had Schweinhaxe, Sauerbraten, Hefeweizens, and a special helles beer.  It was definitely great to be back in Bavaria!  Joslyn finally hit the wall and went to sleep at the table, and the other two kids started to get sleepy as well, so we all headed back to the hotel to finally get a good night’s sleep during a night that was actually DARK!

Day 148-leaving Iceland

   May 31-I taught at Hraunborg one last time today.  The kids have shown more improvement in their English over the past four months than I have shown in my Icelandic!  Parents and teachers claim that they hear kids using English words more and are asking more questions about English.  Overall, they all seem to like what I have done.  Spencer's teacher, Ingibjörg, even gave me one of the polished “wishing stone” she had brought back from New York City

I get my final farewell hugs from the kids.

in April. 
   Back at the apartment, we all continued preparations for our imminent departure to Europe.  Spencer finished with his packing and went to Þorsteinn’s 5^th birthday party late in the afternoon.  At its conclusion, the rest of us showed up and Emma and Pálmar made hamburgers and pizza for us.  We relaxed until 8:30, and then returned home, packed up, and left a little after 9 pm.  We arrived at Keflavík a little after 11pm and parked in long-

We found a place to "camp out" while we waited
for our flight, which was a little delayed.

term parking.  Ironically, these parking spaces are closer to the terminal than the short-term park spaces are at Denver International Airport!  We waited in long line of passengers checking into AirBerlin’s four flights that were scheduled to leave between midnight and 1 am.  The Sun had been up the entire drive to the airport and it finally set over the open ocean at 11:30 pm while we were checking in.  Our flight boarded a little after 1am and we were off on our grand European adventure!