Deutschland!!

We will are back from Germany in one piece, very very tired, but we made it! We left central London around 2:30 on Thursday afternoon and had to ride the tube to a different train station to buy a train ticket out to the airport. It is sort of strange how far away from the city the airports are here! Our flight was late leaving by almost an hour, and we had possibly the worst behaved children in the history of the world sitting behind us! So, needless to say, it was an interesting flight! We got into Munich and passed customs no problem, and got train tickets into the city again! We had a little trouble finding out hotel, but thanks to a nice English-speaking woman with a map, we found it an got checked in! Originally it was just Jordan and myself planning to go to Munich, but last week our friend Tayler decided to join us too! We definitely liked having another traveling companion, but our double room made our hotel stay a little interesting!
On Friday morning we got out, and after a little trouble getting a train pass, managed to travel to Dachau concentration camp. It was very interesting to see, and of course a very sombering place to visit. There were lots of people there and the weather was very hot. On our way home the sky turned very dark and it began to rain while we were waiting for our train home! We didn't plan our afternoon according to rain, so we scratched our planned bike tour and headed to Hofbrauhaus the famous beer garden in Munich. We were amazed at the size of the place, no restaurant in America is that big! In Europe you seat yourself most of the time, and just have to find a place, but it has been interesting because you share space with people and we have gotten to meet and talk to a lot of different people! At Hofbrauhaus we ate pretzels and beer, and tried their traditional "Radler" a lager beer mixed with lemonade! Jordan is a good traveler and always eats the traditional food, so she had bratwurst and saurkrat, I tried a beef noodle dish and Tayler had a roast with potatoes. We noticed that they add meat to pretty much any dish they serve, lots of protein! There was a live oompa band, and a table full of locals dressed in the tradtional Lederhosen near us and we really enjoyed watching all the tourists interrupting their meal to take pictures of them! (We did too of course!)
Everyone we talked to told us that Austria was their favorite place they saw or visited while in Europe, so after a long debate, we decided to take advantage of our close proximity to Austria. On Saturday morning we got up and took a day trip to Salzburg, and we loved it! Our tour took a 2 hour train ride over, and we had a guided walking tour that lasted about 2 hours. Then we had another 2 hours of free time, which we really enjoyed, it unfortunately started raining about halfway through our trip, but we still got to see all the sights! It was fun to see the places where they filmed "The Sound of Music" and to see Mozart's home and birthplace. There were even locals dressed in traditional garb singing in the park we visited! We tried some wonderful pretzels and to-die-for desserts! We have had nothing but good food since we have been traveling, lucky us!
On Saturday night we decided to visit the infamous German night club scene, and we were overwhelmed! They know how to party there, and spend a lot of time doing so! The clubs didn't open until about midnight, and didn't close until 8am (don't worry, we didn't wait around to make sure that was true!) They had sort of an amusement park of clubs, bars, and lounges and you could just wander from place to place. We chose a dance club called "Rafael" which played mostly 80s music, and we loved it! We definitely need a place like that in Austin!
On Sunday morning we checked out of our hotel, and were ready for a beautiful day. We headed to the main train station to put our luggage in lockers, and when we came out it was pouring down rain! So we sat in the station for about 2 hours talking and people watching, and the rain started to clear up! We headed to Marienplatz, the main shopping area and city square, where we on a whim decided to do a double-decker bus tour! After a few minutes the sun was out and they opened the top of the bus and we had a great view and tour of the city! We were really glad we had a chance to see the sights we had missed. We were very sad though because we left our shopping until Sunday, and apparently everything shuts down on Sundays! No stores were open, and even some restaurants were closed! We ate a long lunch at an outdoor cafe in the center of the square, and even had the chance to check up on the Wimbledon match on a TV inside! After lunch we headed out to Olympic Park because there was supposed to be a festival going on...well we never found the festival, but got to have a look around the old Olympic facilites from the 1972 games! We also visited the BMW facility, skipped the musuem, but got to see their fabulous showroom of cars! We can dream, right!?! From there we headed back to the train station and started our long journey home! It took a long time, another delayed flight, but we managed to get home safe and sound and made it to class this morning too! This afternoon we are touring Chelsea Football Club stadium, and we begin our real schoolwork, we have a paper due tomorrow! We aren't too crazy about that for sure! We will write more soon, love anna and jordan!