Saturday 25 August 2007

Munchen on pork knuckles

All of the BusAbout buses that i have caught from city to city averages out to be between 8-10 hours each where they play movies, sitcoms, music and it's a very comfortable ride. So it was from Vienna, passing through Salzburg home of the Sound of Music (and thank god i didn't stay there as the hostel plays the movie every night! Just joking, i will have to visit one day) and onto Munich. That night a pub crawl was on the engender and with a lot of heavy drinkers (Aussies) we were off to reward our taste buds on the best beers in the world. Drinking litre steins, multiple Jagameister shots and more beer, beer and beer and drinking them in the largest beer gardens in the world holding 9,000 people... i was gone and so was the rest of the group!
Back on it the next night after touring around Munich the next day, we had Pork Knuckles at the famous Hofbrauhaus where Hitler started his regime. Packed on a Thursday night we somehow found a table for our party of 10, ate our delicious meat injection and drank our steins with a small group of Germans where one was celebrating his 18th Bithday (he looked 28). With a traditional band playing and drinking more than us in-between songs wearing traditional clothing we sang, drank and swayed, clinking every 10 seconds. I learnt a German song! Don't know the exact words but if you mumble 'Prost, Prost, Prost...In the mood lick hard' you can sing along until your throat is sore (then you keep drinking). Stayed till closing time where we continued to sing and dance outside attempting the can-can (pic-you can pick out the 4 Germans). If i didn't have a tour booked in Egypt (coming up) i would be at Oktoberfest in the next few weeks. One day i will return!
Every shop in Munich can sell beer without a liquor license, McDonalds has McBeer! Beer here is not seen as an alcoholic beverage. So Germans in Munich don't have alcoholic problems, they technically have food disorders where the average German drinks 1.5 litres a day.
Oh yeah, i also did see Munich, beautiful city. Went to the nude park, watched surfers on a river and saw the odd church. I must admit, I'm a little churched out. I also visited another concentration camp called Dachau, this was the first ever concentration camp and the hundreds of others that were built afterwards was based on this one.
Off to Venice next for 3 days, Athens for a few more days and then i join a group touring the Greek Islands and then another tour travelling through Egypt for the next month and a bit.