Stadthotel Augsburg

... to the mountians in the morning. twe got back around mid night and crashed and we were glad to finally get some sleep. day7 the aralm went off at 6am ! (which was about 4hours to early for the amount of time we had been up the last two days!) and we got up and got ready and headed to the mountians! our first stop was neuesweinstein castle the most famous castle in germany where ...

... I wish I were a man sometimes.      We walked around the city centre for a bit trying to decide what we wanted to eat.  We were so tired we didn't want a sit-down-dinner at a restaurant so we decided to get take-out somewhere and eat in our filthy drain-stinking room.  One homemade pizza and two cans of lime Beck's later, we were sound asleep and I forgot all about the smell, the dirty lace curtains, the potential bed bugs, or this bump on the Romantic Road.

Today we visited Dachau which is a 20 min S-bahn train ride outside of Munich. Dachau was the first concentration camp. This is a somber and depressing place as we see the worst side of what human beings can do to each other. Terry and I had visited Dachau back in 1991 and I really had never planed on returning but since we were taking our friend Steve he wanted to visit. The concentration camp has changed a bit since we last ...

... I took a guided tour with transportation from Munich operated by a private company but I wouldn't recommend it. I thought it would be like Auschwitz, which is difficult to get to from Krakow, especially with public transportation. I realized afterward that Dachau is right on the commuter rail line and very easy to get to via pubic transportation. In addition, the museum and memorial site have lots of English signs and very cheap audio guides ...

... and the like in line ("Do as the Nazi party says or you'll end up here"). During the war the camp expanded to POWs, Jews, priests etc... Officially 32,000 people died here but the real figures are probably double that as some groups such as Russian soldiers weren't considered important enough to have their deaths recorded. Dachau did have a gas chamber (built by the prisoners) but was never used. Nobody knows why but my guide ...

... as they eat it, and you hope they are not too close to the cement lined area of the man made wave when they go down. We were transfixed and stuck just staring at them for a long time. Now the park is something out of a movie, it's enormous, and a huge river cuts through, with small lake where you can take out paddle boats, where swans, ducks, all kinds of animals just hang out in the wild. There is a slight mist that hangs, but the park is full on Sunday with everyone, volleyball ...

... theyre huge!!! So a couple of people we were with last night are meeting up tonight. today I visited the Neuschwanstein castle , which Walt Disney used as inspiration for the castle of sleeping beauty. I will stry to get those pics up sooner or later!!! Italy is next :) ps if you see errors.. keep in mind im not editing and these keyboards are not the same :( :)

... t completely finished because he died before it was completed. We saw the 16 finished rooms but climbed about 300 stairs in the spiral staircase. We saw the throne room, the servants quarters, the kings apartments a rather strange cave room and the music hall. Really ornate. We made our way back down the mountain to the train station for our 2 hour ride back to munich. We were approached by an enthusiastic local who wanted to show us our mars orbiters. He proceeded to pull out ...

... not too expensive) as well as rather nice beer. At the end of the meal our waiter took the opportunity to practise his English with us and enquired as to where we were from, what we were doing in Germany and how the hell we'd ended up in Deubach. One of the boys piped up 'We were looking for a Beer Garden!' which amused and puzzled the waiter no end. He was like 'So you guys travelled all the way from Munich (which is filled with beer gardens) to here, just to sit in a beer garden?!' Uh ...

... The large number of people and all the tents, 14 in all and each tent average 6-7000 people in and outside. We stayed in the Hofbrahaus of course. It is the Aussie, Kiwi and Canadian tent. Lots of AUSSIE/KIWI chants. I had 6 mauses and blast of a time. A bunch of us bought these stupid grey hats and I bought a shirt. A lot of people on the tour had a little to much to drink. Some peoples different personalities came out this night. Oktoberfest is a world class event. I WILL BE BACK !!!!