Munich on Saturday

An early start in Manchester to catch our flight. Manchester airport is vast and not easily sign posted for getting around, finding immigration etc. Finally did it after a few stop and starts and ended up in the food hall chatting to a nice couple going to Spain for Christmas. Our flight was full and amazingly left early and so we arrived in Munich about 10am local time to a lovely sunny, but cold day.

We had flown over heaps of cloud on the way towards sun rise with the North Star in the sky above…very pretty. We didn’t bother buying food on board and then the fun began with a 2 hour 20 minute journey through Munich airport. Everything was slow and lots of long queues. It actually was faster to fly to Munich than get through immigration, get our bags, and find the S Bahn to meet Sean and Michaela. There were only 4 people on the immigration gates for hundreds of people after a very long walk. In the end that was a

distraction as our bags took probably an hour to come through after immigration - and there were still heaps of people waiting after us. We couldn’t easily locate the S Bahn as there was a Christmas market in front of the signs pointing us to the trains. So a few rides up and down escalators and we finally got on the train, letting Sean and Michaela know our arrival time.

It was so great to see them since our last time together, in Sydney, in May. They looked terrific and took us to Fred’s apartment where we

are staying for a few weeks. Fred from ARRI has kindly lent us his apartment to use while he is in Portugal. Michaela had arranged for the heating to be put on and had purchased some staples and a few treats so we were well set up for our stay.

We then set out to see the sights of some of Munich. It was not easy to work our where we were, but Sean and Michaela were pointing out lots of buildings, places etc. as we walked around, seeing Christmas markets and all the people out strolling on a nice sunny Saturday afternoon. We saw amazing churches, maypoles, plazas, statues - some covered for winter. It was fun seeing Sean and Michaela so comfortable in their new city. We had a visit to a homewares/kitchen shop seeing thousands of items including champagne sabres! Lunch was a German sausage in a bun and an obligatory glass of gluhwein may have also been enjoyed!! I was fascinated with all the signs and attempted to work out what they were saying. Some words are sooo long!

The shops were very interesting and one that caught our eye was the ‘Next Level Cinnamon Rolls’ shop ‘Cinnamood’ …can’t wait to go back…the queue was long.

We walked around Marienplatz and saw different areas of Christmas markets…people everywhere. Then we headed for the new station Sendlinger Tor and caught the train to Sean and Michaela’s flat.

They have created a lovely warm home in the newly renovated flat, have a cute Christmas tree and we hada lovely meal of spaghetti and pasta. Nice to have a good catch up and then an early night for Mike and I as we had been up since 4am! Bed for us, jama jama.