April 26th is National Pretzel Day in the USA

Meanwhile, in Germany......it is pretzel day every day!

 

 

With breakfast, with bier, at home or away...with friends or on your own...the pretzel could be considered its own food group here in Bavaria. Go on, you know you want one.....

 

HAPPY PRETZEL DAY!



Spring is in the air!

Finally, we are peeking out from under our woollens, down jackets and boots here in Munich. Yesterday the Hub and I were able to meet up with friends at the biergarten and we stayed long past dark, chatting and finishing up those big beers.  It was wonderful, and I really hope that the sun decides to stick around for a while.

 

 

I'll leave you with a few signs that Spring has come to visit....

 

 



What better way to return to blogging.....

... than to hopefully lure you in with sunshiney Alpine pics?  (These were taken near Kitzbühel, Austria during the first sunny weekend here in what feels like since forever and a day.)

 

Personally, I cannot think of a better way to beg for forgiveness. And, yes, I am shameless.

 

 

It has been a long time.

I have several excuses, none of them fantastic.

I suppose that at some point I will write a few down for you...but today I am full of promises (again).

Looking forward to seeing you soon, I say, with earnest hopefullness.

 

I haven't forgotten you!

Oktoberfest stats 2010

It is getting to be that time of year again here in Munich, so with many apologies that this post has been so long in coming, let's talk Oktoberfest!

 

In researching the statistics for you from last year's Oktoberfest, there are a few highlights to point out before the Wiki list.  Last year holds the new title for the most litres of beer consumed, at over 7 million liters.  Sheesh. That is a lot of beer.  The previous record of 6.94 million liters was set in 2007.  A Mass holds approximately one liter, just so you know.  This does not include the 310,000 liters of the special Jubilee Beer  that were consumed in the "Antique Wiesen", a beer that represented a never before moment of cooperation between the city's six big breweries -- Hofbräu, Löwenbräu, Augustiner, Hacker Pfschorr, Spaten and Paulaner.

With that, the recorded theft of the glass Masses was down last year comparatively...to 130,000 in 2010, more disturbing is the report of the rise in the weighty Masses being used as weapons last year in fights had seen an increase.

In the past 50 years, the consumption of pork sausage seems to be waning, while the chicken consumption has been on the rise. See below for evidence in sheer numbers!

It was the first "smoke free" fest, with the tents banning smoking inside in accordance with local laws about smoking inside buildings-the tents are really that big that they actually do qualify.

Oktoberfest 2010 informational tidbits:

• Area: 0.42 km² (103.78 acres)
• Seats in the festival halls: approx. 100,000
• Visitors: 6.4 million
• Beer: appr. 7,100,000 litres (151,200 litres non-alcoholic)
• Wine: 89,259 liters
• Sparkling wine: 37,733 litres
• Coffee and tea: 245,335 litres
• Water and lemonade: 1,028,522 ½ litres
• Chicken: 505,901 units 
• Pork sausages: 119,302 pairs
• Fish: 40,850 kg
• Pork knuckles (haxen): 69,293 units
• Oxen: 119 units
• Expenditure of electricity: 2.96 million kWh (as much as 14% of Munich's daily requirements or as much as a four person family will need in 52 years and 4 months)
• Expenditure of gas: about 198,489 m³
• Expenditure of water: about 107,489 m³ (as much as 27% of Munich's daily requirements )
• Waste: 678 t (2004)
• Toilets: about 980 seats, more than 878 meters of urinals and 17 for disabled persons
• Phone booths: 83, also for international credit cards
• Lost property: about 4000 items, among them 200 mobile phones, wedding rings, and even crutches.

 Some of the funnier things collected at last year's lost and found included:

• 1450 articles of clothing
• 90 cameras
• 770 ID cards
• 420 wallets
• 366 keys 
• 330 bags
• 320 pairs of glasses
• 90 pieces of jewelry/watches
• 37 children lost (this figure is up from 18 in 2009)

Most unusual things lost at the 2010 fest have to be:

• Leather whip
• Set of dentures 
• A hearing aid
• A live rabbit
• A tuba

Huh?  After living here and going to the Oktoberfest...the weird ones are not the whip or tuba...

Beetle Beauty

I think I'm in love...We were walking home through the neighborhood on a sunny Saturday and walked by this beauty parked on the street.  Seriously swoon-worthy! 

I have a few other blog posts in the hopper, but thought that since I had posted last about cars that I would follow up with this dreamy ride.

If I had a million dollars and the choice of any car to buy, I would have to say that this would be in my top 5...look at the color, so cheery.  And since I have a million fake dollars I'm spending here, maybe a mechanic to go with it would have to be put on retainer since I think these cars need tinkering. 

But, I am still in love...hey, did you see the back view?

Mein Carsharing

In this post I told you about the Call a Bike program that Deutsche Bahn has here in Munich.  Well, look what I saw on street today:

Looks like Deutsche Bahn has gotten into the 4 wheel, motorized variety of vehicle sharing too!  Emblazoned with their Flinkster logo, the car I saw was compact and new.  Here is a pdf  of the info that DB has put together.  If you already have a Bahncard, it appears as if you get a better deal up front on the one time fee and a 25 euro voucher to boot. I also noticed that they have targeted the Uni students, have a refer-a-friend compensation and also have an Android app.....pretty smart, DB!

Carsharing had started to become more common in the US before we moved to Germany.  I lived in Atlanta, where having the availability to a car was important.  The carsharing concept was one that always made sense to me...and in Atlanta, you could rent a convertible Mini for the day!

Although this one is a Skoda, it still is pretty cute...and I do find it interesting when an English word makes it's way into the German vernacular..."mein Carsharing"...nice marriage of the two languages.  Although we won't need to do any carsharing, as a part of our ex-pat life here includes a car, I do know a lot of others that have no availability to a one.  I can see a trip to Ikea or a quick day trip out of town made much easier with the availability of a car short term!

 **UPDATE**
A day or two after I posted, I was walking in my neighborhood and saw this....

A Flinkster Fiat c500!!!  Swoon........

A little Italian roadtrip

This year in Bavaria in the month of June we were granted three long weekends so we decided to make the most out of two of them and take some road trips to neighboring countries Italy and France.  One of the coolest things about living in Munich is the close proximity to many other places...we are pretty much dab in the middle of Europe here, with the borders of France, Italy, Switzerland, Austria and Croatia (to name a few off of the top of my head) just a hop in the car away.

For the first long weekend we decided to drive down into Sud-Tirol through mountain roads, taking the long and slower route to our destination of Padua.  Below is a picture of a section of the Brenner Pass-an elevated highway through the mountains-sorry the picture is a little rough, but at the speeds they drive over here a shot was hard to capture!

So, off to Italy we go.  First to Trento where we booked a room in an old palace and had a little wine and a few snacks to relax before dinner.

You have to love Italy...they always bring you snacks when you have a little wine or cocktail.  Drinking is mostly done paired with eating, so they always provide you with a lovely little nibble.  I adore the presentation in the little silver serving dishes perched over doilies...very refined, no?

We had left a very cloudy day behind in Munich, and woke to this beautiful view from our hotel room's little patio.  Some serious majestic view...

After a quick trip into Trento, we were on our way headed south...but a few pics of Trento and the gorgeous frescoes that decorate the buildings.....

From Trento, we put the GPS on "alternate route" and wound our way toward Padua via two-lane mountainous roads.  Since we weren't in any hurry to get anywhere, this was perfect and provided us gorgeous views of the scenery.

In Padua we walked the city and lounged at cafes.  We visited the Cappella degli Scrovegni, a small chapel built by a son of a Usury-a man who lent money with exorbitant interest payments attached-to pay for his sins and to, he hoped, free his father from purgatory which is where all Usuries went to repent their sins on Earth.

There was some interesting art surrounding the chapel, but we couldn't take photos inside.  Here is the Wikipedia page so you can get a look at it (or a full sized reproduction in Japan, which is a little weird-but it gives you an idea).

Padua is the home of the oldest Universities in Europe, dating back 800 years or more.  It tends to be overshadowed by the other Italian cities that are close...Venice and Florence.  But, it is worth the trip to see it on its own.

We had a few sunny days here and decided to hop over to Venice for one of the afternoons.  The train ride from Padua cost us 3 euros one way and took about 25 minutes.  So easy and affordable!  This was a big decision for us...we have not been back to Venice since the very first time the Hub and I traveled there while we were dating.  I always say that this was the trip where we found out that we could really be together...traveling is an important step in a relationship, and during that trip he woo-ed me with a hotel on the grand canal.  It was a perfect trip, with a huge harvest moon that illuminated the corridors and waterways.  It was, in a word, perfect.  I had been reluctant to return-I didn't want to break the spell that Venice had cast over us...but we had a sunshiney day and we decided to take the trip. 

What a different (and equally lovely) city that met us!  The first time we went in October...warm days, cool nights.  This time, we felt the direct heat of the sun and saw the throngs of tourists that we had escaped  on our first and not during prime time visit.  Bustling, busy and thriving...what a nice compliment to our first encounter without overshadowing it....

How can you not gush about Venice?  We caught a late train back to Padua and were headed back to Munich the next day...but not before I found my favorite velvet espadrilles and snatched up this lovely rose colored pair!

Arrivederci, Italy....we'll be back soon!