A Short But Slow Trip From Salzburg to Munich

Friday September 10th

Today I got to take them to Munich and it was a nice short drive but a tough one. There were some mighty hills and I don’t really do hills. It didn’t help that there was a travelling fun fair on the road going fairly slowly up the hills. What a difference travelling on a Friday. I have got so used to travelling on a Sunday. There were trucks and more trucks and lots of cars and campervans as well. But it was an uneventful trip. Alan had programmed the Tom Tom to take me right to the campsite and this it did without a hitch. I got them here in time for lunch and they were able to choose a prime spot and get the awning out. Some of the places would have been too small for that.

I hadn’t pulled up long when another campervan pulled in nearby and the fella said, oh you must be our near neighbours ,from Australia? And they said no, NZ, don’t you recognise your own flag? He said an unmentionable word and felt really stupid. He rushed into his van and put up his Silver Fern flag with New Zealand written on it. That was enough for Mary to put Ka Pai and Patariki in the front window. Ber Lin was too shy so Pania stayed on the back seat with him. He and his wife come from Auckland and they are nearing the end of a seven month campervan tour!

After lunch the big people decided to leave us all here and take a quick trip into town to see what it was like and find their way around so it would be easy tomorrow.

Another bus /underground combination to sort out but an easy one thank goodness. The bus stops at the camp gate and takes you three stops to the underground. Once there we had to work out which line and which way it was going and how much to pay. It was all very confusing but we finally got a family ticket sorted that was good for 2 -5 people for the day. The train line was obviously one they had developed when they had the Munich Olympics as it had the Olympic Park on the list of stops and it was of that era. When we emerged from the subway we were in the centre of town and we walked into the most vibrant and electric environment so far. To put it mildly, Munich Rocks! It was a special day in town. They were having a festival with musicians and dancers and other entertainers performing all over the large central city. Large stages had been erected and seating and bars set out. There were tourists and locals everywhere and it was definitely party time. We had a good wander through the main pedestrian area and decided to eat in town and not rush back to camp.

While I did a bit of shopping Alan explored the town and listened to some of the entertainment. The shops are great and the window displays are full of Oktoberfest costumes. There is a wonderful choice of traditional outfits ranging in price from reasonable to very expensive.

We had taken the laptop into town as there was no Wifi at the camp, only connections by Lan cable which I didn’t think i’d need so didn’t bring and it costs silly money as well. So we spent a bit of time trying to find a cafe that had Wifi. We finally went back to the Info centre and the woman there told us where there was coffee shop with a hot spot. It was worth the price of a coffee to get a good fast connection. I think we will be regular customers. Got all the blog up and email dealt with and had a quick look at Stuff. I checked my bank account and found the money I had just spent had been deducted already. These debit cards are really good and better than a credit card as the fees are lower. I have started to just hand it over and they think it is a credit card and you have to sign but it actually works the same as a cashflow card at home. Interestingly the debit card attached to our English bank account still takes several days for the money to come out. NZ must have one of the best banking systems in the world.

Then it was back into the street to enjoy more of the entertainment. We bought a few nibbles and a drink and listened to some very classy jazz and then slowly walked back to the underground. We were nearly there when we came across three girls singing with two guys on keyboard and drums. They were awesome and had a huge crowd around them. They were doing very good cover versions of Queen, Leonard Cohen , Rocky Horror, Sister Act etc. They had attracted a huge crowd so we listened to them until they finished and then caught the underground and the bus back to camp neither of which we had to wait any time for at all. Tomorrow we will start using our 3 day travel/tourist card and see the sights.