Weekend in Munich (pt 1)

Greetings to the 3 or 4 of you who actually read this blog semi-regularly. :) About 7 months after she started writing this blog, and just over 5 months from the time that we arrived together in Zurich, Amanda has finally succeeded in cajoling me into writing a blog post to demonstrate to everyone that this is a joint effort between us. She's done a great job chronicling our activities here so far, so I'll oblige her and contribute some content. (In fact she has assigned me a backlog of posts that I'm still supposed to write -- regarding the mobile conference that I attended in Barcelona back in February, and the Geneva auto show, and my more recent work trip to Moscow -- but for now this one will have to suffice.)

Back when we made the decision to come to Switzerland, Amanda and I agreed to make an effort to take the best possible advantage of our time here by traveling regularly to see the sights around us in Europe. I'm not gonna lie -- these days, I'd just as soon spend most weekends hanging out on the couch at home, since a week worth of juggling tasks at work can leave me fairly drained. But Amanda continually prods me to commit to various weekend trips, and she's become much more adept herself at planning itineraries and working out travel arrangements, which lightens the load a bit. This past weekend was a particularly good one to take off, as it was time for the church's semi-annual General Conference and so we didn't have to worry about our usual teaching responsibilities on Sunday morning. (We decided to watch conference sessions later this week, both because the live online streams can be a little finicky and because the sessions get started fairly late at night here.)

For this weekend, we agreed to pay a visit to Munich, the largest German city that's within a few hours' train ride of Zurich. On Friday afternoon, I took off from work a few minutes earlier than usual, stopped by the house to grab our bags, and Amanda and I headed down to the train station. The train ride was pretty uneventful, though it's always a little awkward to sit facing total strangers for ~4 hours while your feet and knees periodically bang into each other in the space between the seats. Our hotel was just down the street from the train station; we crashed there with cell phone alarms set earlier than we usually get up on weekday mornings. (So much for a restful and relaxing weekend excursion.)

The first stop on the itinerary for Saturday was the Deutsches Museum, which is billed as "the largest museum of technology and engineering in the world." I can't say that I much doubt the claim: the museum has 7 large floors, with sections on topics ranging from helicopters and cartography to nuclear physics, musical instruments, and pharmaceuticals. The museum's primary claim to fame (aside from its size) is its collection of famous and important scientific instruments used by historical figures to make significant discoveries. The telescope below is an example; supposedly it was the one used when the planet Neptune was first discovered. Other notable technological gadgets from various eras of modern history are on display too: the second picture below shows an Enigma code machine used by the German military to encrypt its communications during WWII.

The main entrance to the Deutsches Museum

Telescope that was used to discover Neptune.  They used to display the one that discovered Pluto, but since Pluto was downgraded from planet to minor space rock, that telescope has hidden in shame in a warehouse out back. 

Enigma code machine

As a person who (somewhat obviously) has an interest both in history and in broad-ranging technological topics, I had high hopes for this museum, but I must confess that I was disappointed somewhat by our actual experience at the museum. Though there were numerous interesting areas in the museum, most of them couldn't hide their age, and there were quite a few areas that were either entirely closed for renovation or where the display cases were marred by taped-up signs saying that the exhibit was missing or out of order. Whether because they were gone or our map was insufficiently detailed, we couldn't find some of the most famous instruments that are supposedly kept in the museum, like the room full of Galileo's scientific tools and the machines that were used to create synthetic nuclear fission for the first time. Despite the huge potential of the museum, I thought the experience compared somewhat poorly with other top-notch technology centers like Boston's Museum of Science or the Museum of Flight that Amanda and I visited with her grandparents in Seattle back in 2009. Since we had a lot on the agenda for the day, we decided to cut our losses and move on by shortly after noon, even though we hadn't yet made our way through the entire museum.

One of the axioms of traveling with Amanda (actually, living with Amanda) is that she must be fed prodigious quantities of food at regular intervals or her capabilities of rational thought and decision-making will quickly evaporate. :) Accordingly, we made our way into the center of the old city in search of sustenance. The crossroads of old Munich is a city square known as Marienplatz (Mary's Plaza), around which a number of historically significant buildings (and now of course countless restaurants and retail stores) are situated. For lunch we used Amanda's meticulous pre-trip planning to find one of the tourist-oriented but generally traditional old sausage restaurants in the old city. Out of the various choices available, we settled on the "Nürnberger Bratwurst Glöckl am Dom," just across the street from the Frauenkirche (details on the church to come). Though the weather was beautiful (sunny and ~70 degrees), the tables were uniformly full, so we sat inside for lunch. The picture below shows a discreet snapshot of the interior of the restaurant, which had a semi-authentic hearty Bavarian feel to it. Amanda picked a fairly staid "Munich city sausage" off the menu, while I went for a Bavarian sausage sampler. This, as it turned out, was not such a great choice -- the primary choices on the plate seemed to be made entirely of fat, gristle, and/or liver, none of which much resemble the taste of Cinnamon Toast Crunch, which of course is a universally applicable benchmark for food of excellent taste. (Bear in mind that I don't really like sausage to begin with, but I felt that I needed to be adventurous to have a legitimate Munich dining experience. Next time I think I'll err on the side of less authenticity.) But the upside of the heavy lunch was that Amanda was sated and capable of continuing on our odyssey around the city.

A view down the Isar River while walking toward the old town

The interior of the sausage-crazed restaurant where we ate lunch

After lunch we took a 2-minute stroll over to the entrance of the Frauenkirche, which is perhaps the city's most recognizable church. (Its two greenish copper domes at the top of parallel towers are fairly well-known around Europe as an icon of the city.) The church is a bit over 600 years old, though (like many old buildings in the centers of German cities) it was damaged somewhat by bombing during WWII and so it doesn't have quite the same ancient feeling inside as the cathedrals that we've seen in other places (like Strasbourg or even here in Zurich). The picture below shows one view of a stained-glass window in a small chapel alcove in the apse; note that the glass is substantially cleaner than the windows that you may have seen in pictures from previous trips. We wandered around the interior of the church for a few minutes and then decided to head up the tower to get a panoramic view of the city center. Thankfully we didn't have to take the narrow stairs all the way up to the top of the 320-foot towers; we just walked up a little ways and then hopped in an elevator to go the rest of the way. The view at the top was nice; you can see in the picture below a birds-eye perspective on Marienplatz, the neo-Gothic Neues Rathaus (new city hall), and St. Peter's Church.

The two towers of the Frauenkirche.  One is all wrapped up for some kind of renovation. 

Little chapel area in the Frauenkirche

Amanda heading up the steps of the tower

Nice view of the old city center; the Neues Rathaus is the large gothic tower on the left side

After completing our tour of the church, we decided to head out of the city center to take in a site almost as holy as the Frauenkirche: the headquarters of the Bayerische Motoren Werke, known more commonly to the American bourgeoisie as BMW. My family is aware of my long-standing desire to acquire one of the fine pieces of automotive engineering produced by BMW, which is headquartered in Munich, and I must confess that it required some self-control during this visit *not* to seek out a salesperson and order a new vehicle for delivery when Amanda and I head back to the states. I was successful this time, but I make no guarantees about my continuing resistance once I've saved up a bit more money and I'm back in car-happy California (or somewhere similar).

BMW World

The interior of BMW World

The actual headquarters building (tall) and the BMW Museum from the outside (the shorter round one)

The first building that Amanda and I entered after exiting the subway was "BMW World," which is basically a giant showroom of the latest BMW models that anyone can visit for free. The unique architecture of the building cleverly conceals a series of small but incredibly powerful tractor beams that mercilessly grip car lovers walking by and draw them in to salivate over bright yellow Z4s and fire-engine-red M3 coupes. The only escape from the building is across a bridge that leads straight to the front door of the BMW Museum. Amanda and I paid our 12 euros each and headed in. I was a bit skeptical when we entered that Amanda would get much out of the experience, but the quality of the museum exhibits won her over, despite the fact that cuteness is the single most important consideration for her when deciding which car she'd like to drive. The museum's one minor problem was that we didn't find it to have a very logical sequence of displays -- they were neither chronological nor clearly organized according to vehicle types or other such categories -- but overall we really enjoyed seeing the exhibits of both historical and newer cars, motorcycles, and engines. (Did you know that BMW started as a manufacturer of aircraft engines? I won't hold it against you if you didn't.) Below are a few pictures of cool vehicles that we saw in the museum, including a real James Bond car and the museum's closest approximation to Amanda's beloved Ford Fiesta.

The BMW 328, which dominated its class of road racers during the '20s and '30s.

One of the radial airplane engines that BMW manufactured before it started making cars and motorcycles.

A great ad: it says "A Mercedes can bring driving joy too" and shows a Mercedes car carrier truck with a load of BMW sedans.

A 1989 BMW M3.  The "M" series is BMW's line of very high performance sport sedans, intended to bring race car-like performance to everyday driving.  

The Isetta from the mid-'50s.  To get in, you open the whole front of the car.  It basically has a lawnmower engine that sits behind the driver.  Natural fit for Amanda, eh? 

The actual Z8 driven by Pierce Brosnan for the James Bond film "The World is Not  Enough."  (The movie was fairly mediocre but the car won awards for its superb performance in the film, with special recognition for its built-in surface-to-air missiles.) 

Some concept cars from BMW's alternative energy labs.  

By the time we finished at the museum, it was almost 6 pm, and we headed back in to the city center to grab dinner before the next scheduled appearance of the Hungry Monster. But first, Amanda wanted to check out the Englischer Garten (English Garden), the main public park in downtown Munich. As you can tell from her earlier blog posts about taking walks around various parts of Zurich, she is a big fan of strolls around public spaces, so we decided to make a go of it and enjoy the nice weather in the early evening. The park was filled with people who had clearly had a similar idea: there were probably a few thousand people scattered around the various large lawns in the park and riding bikes and roller blades (somehow the fad never died out in Europe) on the many paths through the garden. Here are a few pictures of the environment:

A (surprisingly) empty path through the park.  

Locals enjoying the warm spring weather. 

Amanda posing by the pretty stream. 

After navigating the park, we headed back downtown. On the way we passed a few impressive buildings, like the Residenz (a former small palace of Bavarian kings, now a museum), the Theatinerkirche (a notable baroque church), and the Feldherrnhalle ("field marshals' hall," a 19th-century monument to Bavarian military achievements). Interestingly, this last building was the scene of the 1923 march where Hitler and his followers demonstrated against the government and came into conflict with the police (leading to a prison term for Hitler himself). Once we reached the Marienplatz area again, we got some handy advice from Google Maps and picked a restaurant to eat dinner. Amanda and I both tried something off the seasonal asparagus menu and enjoyed it quite a bit, though of course we also chafed a bit under that bane of Americans eating at restaurants in Europe: infernally slow service. After dinner it was back to the hotel to crash for the night.

One side of the Residenz, with the Theatinerkirche in the background. 

Theatinerkirche (right) and Feldherrnhalle (left)

Though I can hardly claim to be an expert on Western European cities at this point, I will say that of the ones I've seen thus far, I think they're more similar than they are different. Obviously Munich has some attractions that aren't available in other places, but the feel of the place actually seemed quite similar to Zurich, Stuttgart, Strasbourg, and other such cities that we've visited. Of course, that's not necessarily a bad thing, and in any case you can't see the BMW Museum anywhere but Munich, so that alone is enough to make it worth a visit. :) All in all, I think we had a pretty good day on Saturday. Now you'll have to wait a few days to hear Amanda's description of the second half of the trip... and if you wait another 6 months or so, maybe you'll hear from me again. ;)