A lot of catching up to do..

Alright everyone, I guess I have been a little lazy.. And I mean really lazy because its been a while since a post.  Since my last post I have hit up Munich, Sevilla, and then Valencia for three straight weekends on the trot and have a ton of stories to share.

First and foremost: Munchen, Germany.  After navigating the bus to madrid, the hour long metro from the bus station to the airport, then hopping on my plane I finally landed in Germany at 10, about 10 minutes behind schedule.  I checked Savannah's flight and I went to the other terminal to meet up with her.  From the airport we took a train to the central station in Munich which was very close to our hostel.  After wandering around the city for a while and getting Burger King where I ordered a number 2 and ended up just getting 2 small fries, where I was too embarrassed to try and communicate again without a language in common, we found the Euro Youth Hostel.  Right when we got in there it was a party.  The receptionist was already drunk with the other one basically passed out by the window.  Embarrassing moment #1, and I will have to give it to Andy for starting this and I am totally going to steal it when it happens.  In Europe, it is a common practice when someone is married to put their ring on their Right ring finger, not their left like in America.  Now Sav had a ring in that exact place so when we checked in the receptionist assumed we were married and some minor confusion ensued...  Needless to say we did clarify that we were not married and proceeded to the bar which is open until 330am on Thursday or Friday morning.  The atmosphere at the Hostel Bar was a lot of fun, everyone was drinking and just having a great time with the bartenders doing their fair share to add to the ambiance by flinging bottle caps off drinks and giving out free jagerbombs and shots for us.  Friday we decided to head on to Neuschwanstein Castle just a couple of hours away in Fussen in Bavaria.  We jumped on the train and then bus to get up to the town, and then took a carriage up to the castle itself, which was pretty incredible.  Apparently the king at the time went on a castle building spree and almost bankrupted the country.  Then some ministers decided to take him and a psychiatrist (because this guy was nuts) and he "died of unknown reasons" one day later in a lake with no witnesses.  Anyhoo, the castle was legit, with some awesome rooms like the throne room and the room of the cave, which was basically was a cave just randomly put in the castle.  The views were spectacular because the castle was basically build on top of a mountain, and was the 3rd of 4 planned castles.  Unfortunately, our dear king died before it was completed, so there are pieces still missing like the actual throne.  Later that night, we hit up a local beerhouse for some tradition German food and beer.  The atmosphere was once again super friendly, loud, and a lot of fun.  There is no seating, or reservations, you just show up and sit down at a large table with whoever else happens to be there.  Luckily for us, we sat across from 4 Chinese tourists from Hong Kong out to get their taste of German culture aka BEER.  I ordered just the house sampler and ended up getting a little bit of some potato goo stuff, quite a bit of duck, even more beef, and even more pork knuckle all in a dark beer based gravy and to drink, a large pint of strong German beer.  The meal was absolutely delicious and I can see why the Germans are very husky (including their women) and loud just from the meal and atmosphere of the beerhouse.  Moving on the our Asian companions.  Each one ordered one beer, which is about the equivalent of 5 beers in the US for alcohol content because its bigger than normal and a lot stronger than normal.  Throughout the meal the grew more more open and even starting talking to us in broken english, punctuated by more and more frequent "CHEERS".  By the end of their beer the guy was basically staring at an incredibly interesting knot in the wood table and the three girls were using each other as supports even though they were sitting down and one of them looked so red in the face I thought she had spent the entire day in a tanning bed.  Saturday was our trip to Dachua and then into the city center.  Dachau was the concentration camp all the others were based off of and had a very informative museum and some of the camp had been recreated or preserved in memory of those that suffered there.  It was very depressing but I would still recommend that everyone try to see it sometime.  After Dachau, we wanted a little pickup so we went to wander around the city center and poke our heads into a couple shops and experience Munich and its culture.  Unfortunately it was freezing so we didn't want to wander around outside for very long and only stayed in the city center for about a couple of hours after stopping at a huge church right in the middle.  Finally, we headed to a upscale german restuarant where we enjoyed pork knuckle and some sausage. After, we headed to Hofbrahaus, not sure if I spelled that right or not, but its basically the most infamous drinking den in the world.  Its this huge building the size of a hotel dedicated to beer.  Basically German heaven and it was awesome.  The beerhouse we went to the night before was no comparison with the size and scope of Hofbrahaus.  The beers came in 1.5L, which is absolutely gigantic and was the best beer I've ever had, both dark and light.  To go with it, I bought the biggest pretzel I've ever seen that is way better any bar beer nuts in the US.  In the end, the trip was a great success.

Check out Facebook for pics =)

Soon to come, Sevilla and Valencia