Day 25 Tuesday 25 April 2017 (Anzac Day)

Dreary rainy day in Munich, but in the interests of providing my readers with more interesting and entertaining stories I donned my coat and ventured forth.

Immediately I was struck by an opportunity to include a food picture, see below;

The Bavarians and the Germans as a whole are mad about fresh asparagus and it is currently the middle of the asparagus season.  Their asparagus is very white and often quite large almost the size of a banana.  Asparagus and strawberries are sold all over the place from these streetside stalls, as above.

I did a walking tour this morning, again a good way of getting a bit of a feel for the place.  During our walking tour we visited the largest of the beer halls, the Hofbrau Haus.  Whilst we were there the tour guide explained how there is a system of regular customers marking their tables and heaven help any innocent traveller/drinker who may inadvertanatly sit at one of those tables, she also advised that sometimes the indicators may be subtle and vary from bar to bar.

We were also taken to Munich's favourite (only?) surfing place.  Wow, I hear you say, Munich is 100s of kilometres away from the sea, how do they go surfing?  Patience little ones, all will be explained.  There is a swift flowing stream that runs through the English Garden, (Munich's equivalent of Hyde park or Central park) anyway at a certain point the water in this stream crosses a weir wall producing a major wave and this is what the surfies surf on.

So this is how you go surfing in Munich.

So now for a funny story.  After the tour finished I was lookng for a suitable establishment for some lunch and rehydration.  I found a nice little bar/restaurant and found a handy bench to sit at near the bar.  The bar wasnt very busy and was only about half full.  Anyway I ordered my lunch, meat loaf with warm potato salad, served with two different types a mustard and a beer poured from a wooden barrel. Anyway I was halfway through all this and a respectable older German gentleman entered the bar, greeted everybody by name and sat down at the same bench as me but opposite.  I thought, 'this is strange, there are lots of other places for him to sit' but we nodded greetings and he went about his beer.  I finished my lunch ordered another beer and drank that feeling a little uncomfortable.  Then the man's wife came in, ordered a beer and sat at the same bench, it was getting a little crowded by now.  Looking casually around the bar I observed that some tables and benches had a wooly halo thing over them.  I looked up and there was a little wooly halo over my bench.  Then I recalled the tour guide's advice from this morning, I was sitting at this man's private bench without realising it.  I must admit he took it very well, didn't glare at me or anything.  I finished my beer and with gracious auf wiedersehens all round made my exit.

I have just found out it is going to be 4 degrees tomorrow!  I am going to do a guided tour to Dachau tomorrow so will need to get rugged up for that.

I have just got back from dinner, schnitzel, a mountain of fried potato, a small salad and apfelstrudel mit cream and ice cream and a couple of beers.  Lucky I am walking a lot.

I will finish up with this little story.  The tour guide today mentioned the mistress of one of the King Ludwigs of Bavaria and the mistresse's name was Lola Montez.  This name rang a bell with me, it turns out that after Lola ( who was English born) had to flee Bavaria and seek refuge in Switzerland she somehow turned up in the goldfields in Victoria as a dancer.  She danced a dance called the 'spider dance' in which she showed her knickers, or would have done if she was wearing any.  Imagine the furore that would have caused in Melbourne in the 1850's.  There is also a story of her horsewhipping the editor of a Ballarat newspaper for giving her act a bad review.  Great story from royal mistress in Bavaria to exotic dancer in 1850's Victoria and various other adventures before, during and after.

On that note good night from me.