6 days in Bavaria. Places to visit, things to do.

I returned from a trip to Wolfratshausen, south of Munich, where I stayed with friends, in July. I last visited in 2016 on this visit they lent me their car to allow me to explore further afield during the week while they were at work.

On the weekend we visited castles, Christmas shops and attended a Medieval festival and in the week I explored the town where they live, on foot, caught a train into Munich, drove into Austria through the Alps and visited the local lakes while my hosts were in work.

I visited here in 2016, so wanted to explore new places and revisit in further detail some of the other places I'd already visited.

It's not expensive to visit the attractions in Munich, a few euro to enter museums and churches were free, although a donation is welcomed.

As I've lived in Dubai for the past 3+ years, the driving was easy for me, although it's been a long time since I've driven a manual car and some of the villages in the Alps proved tricky with testing my hill starts. Before entering Austria I had to stop at a garage and buy a 'vignette' to allow me to pass through the tolls freely. The road signs were easy to work out, I set my GPS before I left each day, downloaded an app called 'visit a city' and was able to download routes and places to visit in advance. I had a data package on my phone and there was plenty of free wifi.

There isn't a lot of English spoken in this part of the world and as I don't speak any German and had difficulties with translating the menus, I lived off Mozerella and Tomato sandwiches when I was out. When I asked for a latte I received a Latte Macchiato, which I wasn't too fond of, so stuck with the international word for cappuccino. I got by with miming and pointing and managed to buy train tickets as the machine had an English option and all announcements were in English and German. There didn't appear to be a return ticket option as the prices vary according to the time of day one travels. The S Bahn was undergoing works and my journey time was doubled.

There are so many things to see and do in Munich, Wolfratshausen and surrounding areas. All churches are free to visit and most of the attractions only charged a few euros to enter. Most of my spend was on public transport, fuel, coffee and food. In a couple of places my credit card wasn't accepted and my debit card declined as they only accepted local cards, which was awkward when I insisted on paying for dinner one night.

There are a lot of things in Bavaria that I find strange to see, I tend to notice more things from living abroad and always wonder when I visit new places what it would be like to live there.

There are maypoles in every town

Cigarette vending machines and advertising

Traditional costume is still worn freely, it's very pretty and expensive

There are chairs in the town centre so you can just sit down and watch the world go by

All the buildings are beautifully decorated

If you want to see the places I visited and get some ideas of things to do in this part of the world, then please feel free to click on the links below:

Day 1Ettal Abbey, Linderhof Palace and Oberammergau.

Day 2 Kaltenberg Knights' Tournament.

Day 3 Wolfratshausen, Bavaria and Marchenwald Fairy Tales Land

Day 4 Munich by train.

Day 5 Innsbruck Austria and the Olympic Ski Jump.

Day 6 Starnburg Lakes.

Dachau Concentration Camp is located 30 mins by road and 40 mins by public transport from Munich, it was a very moving experience to visit, but not for the feint hearted, it was an extremely emotional visit.

I'm looking forward to my next visit, hopefully in the summer of 2019, I'd like to venture further afield and explore the neighbouring countries some more. I did pop to Italy for an ice-cream in 2016.

Innsbruck Austria and the Olympic Ski Jump. 6 days in Bavaria. Places to visit and things to do.

It was around a 2 hour drive to Innsbruck, driving through narrow lanes in villages through the Alps. The route I drove took me through the old border crossing, otherwise I wouldn't have known I'd crossed from Germany into Austria.

At the border to purchase my vignette

Driving through the Alps

Like the rest of Bavaria, Innsbruck has some fascinating buildings, churches, lanes, markets, churches, restaurants and souvenir shops. It was a very pretty town to photograph and wander around. I didn't visit any of the museums or attractions, I just spent my time wandering around in the sunshine, drinking coffee and people watching. I've now got an excuse to go back.

And of course no visit to Innsbruck is complete until you've visited the Bergisel Ski Jump

Bergisel Olympic Ski Jump, Innsbruck, Austria.

The current ski jump building was designed by Zaha Hadid and completed in 2002. Zaha is a British Iraqi architect and she also designed the Opus Building in Dubai, that I featured earlier this year. The tower stands at 47ms tall.

A couple of weeks I go I also showed you around the Ski Dome in Dubai If you think that was big, wait till you see this weeks My Sunday Photo.

The first ski jump was erected here in 1925 and in 1964 and 1976 it was the venue of the Winter Olympic games.

Skiers use the same elevator to reach the tower which is at a height of 250ms and is reached within 2 minutes. I opted to walk back to the bottom.

The inrun which is 98ms long, with an incline of 35 degrees has a plastic track, in summer the jump and slope is lubricated with water, in winter it is packed with 30cms of snow.

Jumping skis measure 3ms and within 4 seconds the jumper reaches speeds of 90km/h.

The longest jump at Innsbruck was recorded at 138ms  in 2015. The world record ski jump is 253.5ms recorded in 2017 in Vikersund, Norway.

The views from the tower are spectacular and if you look closely enough you'll see there's a cemetery right at the end of the landing zone.

 

If you're interested in seeing some of the other construction, building projects and life in other countries then click on the links below:

Week 158 Dubai Bluewater Islands and Dubai Eye. Man made island a 210m high Big Wheel
Week 159 Dubai Dubai Marina - Reflections
Week 160 Dubai Dubai Frame. A window between the Old and New Dubai and a 150m high glass floor.

Week 161 Dubai Dubai Marina 3 years apart.

Week 162 Dubai Dubai Water Canal Bridge Construction and reconfiguration of roads

Week 163 Dubai New Metro Line for Expo 2020
Week 164 Arizona and Nevada Hoover Dam 2002 - 2010
Week 165 Dubai Dubai Opera House What a difference a year makes
Week 166 Dubai Unfinished buildings. The Pentominium
Week 167 Coventry Mixing the old and the new. Coventry Catherdral
Week 168 Dubai New Dubai Metro Station 
Week 169 Dubai The new extension of the Dubai Mall and Burj Khalifa 
Week 170 Dubai Hotel fire After the Address fire 
Week 171 Dubai Unusual designs The Opus Building
Week 172 Dubai District Cooling. Keeping the desert cool.
Week 173 Dubai Can I visit the Burj Al Arab
Week 174 Dubai The Almas Tower
Week 175 Dubai The Cayan Tower
Week 176 Toronto The CN Tower
Week 177 Nevada The Paris Hotel 
Week 178 Dubai Ibn Battuta Gate
Week 179 A Wedding
Week 180 Dubai The World's Tallest Tower
Week 181 Dubai and Wales Al Fahidi Fort and Chepstow Castle 
Week 182 Dubai New Metro Station in Al Furjan 
Week 183 Dubai Cleaning the windows on the world's tallest building
Week 184 Dubai Ski Dubai
Week 185 Another Wedding
Week 186 South Africa Life in a township