Saturday 18th August: Weather 19°C to 26°C sunny and hazy and warm, same as yesterday
Munich: Another 20k sight seeing day in Munch to Nymphenburg Palace
Accommodation: Hotel Monaco Munich
Breakfast in the park
Nymphenburg Palace
Lakes in the Gardens
Admiring the decadence
Down the canal to Nymphenburg
Victorinox Steak Knives
Gotta have one
Dinner at the beer garden
Buying breakfast and lunch at Aldi
Frozen spinach keeps lunch cold
Another day sight seeing in Munich. We’re both awake at 3am again but manage to doze off til 6am. A quick cup of tea before leaving to buy breakfast at Aldi around the corner - apple, nectarine, banana, raspberries and yoghurt, 3 varieties of pastries and real cream for our coffee. Then we’re off and heading to the Nymphenburg Palace, the favourite summer residence of the rulers of Bavaria set in a magnificent 500 acres of gardens.
The palace is about 7k away up busy roads with cycleways/footpaths either side. After 10 minutes, it’s time to find a garden seat for breakfast. We take our time eating fruit, yoghurt and a creamy pastry, followed by our billy boiled coffee with cream. It’s a cool morning, about 19°C and overcast so very pleasant relaxing in the park before heading on up the road again. By 10.30am we’ve reached the Nymphenburg Palace, and wander through the extensive gardens, finding a place for a cup of tea. We’re still too full from breakfast to eat another pastry just yet. The setting is magnificent with several mansions scattered through the woods, and filled with decadent decor for the use of the guests of the palace.
We take a different route back along footpaths besides busy roads - not quite the English Garden from yesterday, and follow google maps on Ian’s phone towards Marien Platz in the heart of Munich. One of my oversights was that in my effort to cut down on weight, I brought two plastic knives instead of our trusty Victorinox steak knife, and today after cutting a pastry in half, I realised a plastic knife wasn’t going to be so good for cutting bread or cheese. So we’re on the lookout for a department store to buy a “proper” knife when I spy a specialty shop with knives in the window - Victorinox steak knives and pop in to buy a bright orange handle so it doesn’t get easily lost. It’s 3pm when we meander back through the crowds of people in the central mall heading back to our Hotel Monaco.
It’s quite a warm day now and our room faces west - good for drying clothes but not so good for having a cool nap on the bed with our feet up after another 20k day. Time to repack and organise for a quick getaway at 6.30am in the morning to catch the 7.34 train to Novara - an 8hr trip with changes at Verona and Milan. Then it’s a quick walk up to the Novara Decathlon, 3k from the station, and back to catch another train to Pont Saint Martin. That’s the plan.
It’s almost 5.30pm when we walk back to Marien Platz and head for the Hofbrauhaus Beer Halle with seating for 1,000 people. It’s noisy, hot and crowded and with waiter service, looks like it would take 2 hours to get served. We don’t have 2 hours. We’ve planned to get back to Aldi to shop for breakfast and lunch on the train in the morning so it’s back to our favourite Biergarten am Viktualienmarkt where I buy the 2 half litres of beer in 3 minutes, and Ian buys the standard sausages and sauerkraut in 6 minutes, at the self serve counters.
The meal is wonderful, but we’re more thirsty than hungry and buy another beer before setting off back to Aldi. We’re running a bit late, as I had to stop off to check out more hiking shoes. My UK Trespass that I bought in Cornwall are starting to tear leaving a ragged edge that rubs my little toe - still ok, but will my toes last I ask myself. Nothing fits properly so I decide that 2 pair of socks will ease the rub.
Aldi is packed with last minute shoppers and we have only 5 minutes to run around and pick up some fruit, bread, butter, cheese and yoghurt and 2 blocks of frozen spinach. The spinach isn’t to eat but the frozen blocks will be good as ice coolers in our mini esky to keep our breakfast and lunch cold overnight and on the train trip tomorrow.
Some last minute packing then bed at 9.30pm. It’s still 25°C in our room.