Europe Day 53 of 59, Munich to Berlin

The first day of our last week was, appropriately, entirely devoted to travel. We opted to take the train to Berlin to see the Bavarian countryside and to enjoy the simplicity of rail one last time.

We shall skip right over the room service breakfast. After all, you've seen eggs on a plate 34 out of the last 52 days. No need for a picture of eggs on day 53.

We took a cab to the train station. He seemed to go the long way, which is the sort of thing that really bothers you after you have studied a map of the city for four solid days.

We arrived terribly early to the München Hauptbahnof. We took up residence at this counter and ordered two Cokes. (I panicked and ordered Coke before seeing that they had my beloved Schweppes Lemon Soda.)

Rail Portrait. Waiting.

I took my time on this one, making sure that you could see our destination on the screen as well as our slick looking ICE train.

The Bavarian countryside. Time for me to be a jerk. More than a few people told us that this ride was going to beautiful. Well... it was okay. Not sure I would recommend it as a "must see" countryside. In fact, I think the train ride along the Rhine between Frankfurt and Bonn was prettier. And, look. When you live in California all your life, natural beauty is not a rare occurrence.

Rail Portrait. Working.

Nürnberg was raining. Hard.

Rail Portrait. Leaving.

I managed to get a picture of Leipzig. No, I do not count pulling into and out the train station as having "been to" Leipzig.

Rail Portrait. Sitting.

We reached the suburbs of Berlin. Look close enough and you can see the Ikea sign.

Rail Portrait. Reading.

Pulling into the Berlin Hauptbahnof was an experience. First of all, outside the city center you dive down into a tunnel and your normal passenger train suddenly becomes a subway train. Then you arrive in this sparkling almost Copenhagenishly clean train station.

You realize just how deep you were when you take three long escalators up to street level. And you realize how amazing this station is, with platforms at different levels and bringing trains and subways in and out from different directions. There was no way to get a pic where you could see all four levels, which is a shame.

You know what's next. Don't you.

I took a pic from outside, but the horizontal flip is much, much cooler. This image doesn't exist in the real world without a mirror.

A dreadful pic from the taxi of the Berlin Hauptbahnof. But this taxi ride was... exciting. The sights of the city all came out terrible from the moving taxi. Ironically it was magic hour, but that meant there was not enough light for me to get a stable image. But back to the excitement. Berlin has an electricity that I cannot explain. The mix of old and new architecture is beautifully done, and there is a life to this city that I think you only get with a major metropolis.

Walking through the doors of Hotel De Rome, you are greeted by a lobby that steps in front of you like a swimsuit model and says, "I am not average."

Time for a hotel room tour.

You enter and see your little hallway with its stylishly red closet doors. And soon you see the matching red desk chair.

Talk about a theme.

Hard to see in this light but there's black, grey and red everywhere. I'm tempted now to skip these and take some tomorrow with the sun's assistance, but I have a feeling that tomorrow there will be way too many pics to upload.

How hip is that couch between the two loungy chairs? And dang if that coffee table ain't got red in it.

Nice to be greeted by fruit instead of a bottle of champagne that we (1) will not bother drinking and (2) often stick in the big back that goes over my shoulder and I do not have to tell you how much lighter that bag got after we gave my brother and his wife two bottles of champagne plus a bottle of red.

Barbie had an idea called, "Hit the pool after five hours on a train." Basement pools are always funky and cool.

This pool is great. Just below skin temperature, so you can jump right in but then instead of feeling warm it feels refreshingly cool. It also is deceptively long, for the fanatics who swim laps.

That would be the steam room. I did not take the iPhone with me into the steam room or sauna.

Hotel De Rome used to be a bank headquarters, and here you can see that they chose to leave some of the original floor visible. That is such a banky floor.

Room service...

Salmon with artichoke hearts.

Spaghetti with tomato & basil sauce, with extra parmesan on the side.

My left shoulder and neck in general are kind of dicey from a bad choice of pillows at the Mandarin Oriental, so I am hoping this firm Rocco Forte Collection Hotel bed does for me what it did in Frankfurt. That said, these hotels have one flaw. No wireless in the room. I may have to do all my Berlin blog research in the lobby.

Tomorrow... Berlin!

Europe Day 52 of 59, Munich

After a few days in Munich, we finally began day 52 "Madrid Style." You see, next to our hotel is the Hofbräuhaus. Across the courtyard from the Hofbräuhaus one finds the Hard Rock Café. And a few doors down from the Hard Rock one finds...

The Starbucks. Or, as silly people say in fake German accents, "Schtahbüks."

Madrid Style. Barbie's breakfast on the right, your truly's breakfast on the left.

We had little agenda for the day, as we had covered about all one could on foot. It didn't take us too long to decide to head out to Schloß Nymphenburg.

You saw the Residenz in the heart of Munich. Outside town the Bavarian Royals kicked it here, generally during summer.

They started building this in 1664 and kept it up for around 70 years, each generation doing their best to put a personal stamp on it.

Inside, Schloß Nymphenburg is less ornate than the Palacio Real in Madrid, but I think it brings enough to the table to get any respectably angry mob of peasants going.

Honestly, rooms like this just impress you with their beauty and even a player-hater like me forgets to be disgusted.

This room is, in a word, hilarious. King Ludwg I is clearly High Hefner's idol. King Ludwig I ordered painter Joseph Stieler to paint 36 beautiful women from all classes, ranging from the daughter of a shoemaker to the daughter of a king. (There was no information on whether he slept with them before or after their portraits, but I think it is relatively likely that they all got the royal treatment at some point.) This celebrated "Schönheitengalerie" (Gallery of Beauties) was open to the public and was a main attraction back in the 1800's.

Ludwig was also an eccentric and notoriously bad poet. He became tainted with scandals associated with one of his mistresses, Lola Montez, and his affair contributed greatly to the fall from grace of the previously popular king.

Lola Montez, Countess of Landsfeld. Don't be fooled by her name. She was born Eliza Rosanna Gilbert and went by the stage name Lola Montez. She was an Irish-born dancer and actress who became famous as a dancer and then as the mistress of King Ludwig I of Bavaria, who made her Countess of Landsfeld. (I am winning the fight against comparisons to other actresses who slept with politicians.)

The Green Room. Not a great pic, but it is fun to call it The Green Room.

Just like a royal family to insist on a wildly fancy ceiling.

Another Chinese room. You might recall the Chinese themed room in Palacio Real.

Yours truly in a royal bedroom.

The back yard.

Not a bad entry hall, if you think about it.

It took quite a long time, but we finally have another metapic.

A painting of Schloß Nymphenburg circa 1730. Pretty much the same. I love how the foreground includes laborers. What good is a palace without laborers?

It takes serious cajones to paint the Saviour with a nation's flag that didn't exist in his lifetime, doesn't it?

On the way out, I took a pretty good swanpic. After taking this pic, I took a dozen pics that put together will make a 360 panorama of Schloß Nymphenburg, but I will wait until I get home to stitch them together. Home? That's in a week? Really?

After Schloß Nymphenburg we grabbed some fast food, met with a dude from the hotel for drinks (iced tea, to be specific), and generally kicked it in the hotel room. Nothing particularly photogenic until we went out for a traditional Bavarian dinner.

At dinner I ordered dark beer. Finally, a restaurant with a dark beer. It was great.

Barbie's potato soup.

My bread soup, which was actually a meatball in broth.

We shared this pot roast in sweet and sour sauce with a bread dumpling. We were very, very full after this meal. And we shared an entree. The average Bavarian must weigh 300+.

Walking the streets after dinner, we came across chamber music beggars.

It was pleasantly warm in Munich tonight. I took one last picture of the Odeonsplatz, the first one taken at night.

We made it all the way to our favorite Theatinerkirche, for one last pic. By the way, it is impossible for me to not notice that church is kirche in German, kirke in Denmark, and kerk in the Netherlands. How long does it take different dialects of the same language to become different languages?

One last pic of the Feldherrenhalle, this time at night.

If you think I got into the World War II stuff in Munich, just wait. We have called an audible at the line of scrimmage and are skipping Slovenia for a visit to Berlin. Tomorrow we get on a train for the capital of reunited Germany.

Nighty night.