Festival of Fifty – Chapter 6: Europe

This is the influencer boulevard of trees at Marina Bay Sands...

And so we arrive at the final chapter of the Festival of Fifty 

This one takes us to Europe: a week in the Dolomites followed by a Croatian coastal voyage aboard Club Med 2. The travelling party is small but well tested. There's Mal, who by now requires no introduction, and joining us are Richard, one of our university friends, and his wife Ali, who I've known even longer, having first met her at age 15.

The story of how Richard and Ali ended up on this trip deserves a brief detour. Mal and Richard, in a remarkable display of life admin coordination, happened to be booked in for colonoscopies on the same day last year. In the post-anaesthetic haze that followed...that brief window of pharmaceutical goodwill where everything seems like a fine idea...Mal made a very persuasive case for an expensive European holiday. Richard agreed. After all, if not now, then when. Points flights were available. It was a sign. He then went home and, still riding the same wave of chemically-induced joy, booked himself a Wimbledon hospitality package for afterwards, because if you're going to have a big day, you may as well commit.

So here we are.

The plan is simple enough. A week based in the Dolomites exploring mountain trails, cycling paths, alpine villages and whatever local delicacies we can justify after a day of exercise. After that, Richard and Ali will head for London and Centre Court, while Mal and I swap hiking boots for deck shoes and board Club Med 2 to sail our way down the Croatian coast.

But before there are mountains or yachts, there is the small matter of getting there.

The journey begins with a flight to Singapore and a layover long enough that sitting in the airport felt like an unacceptable waste of time. The trade-off was humidity and sweat, which we accepted. Changi, in collaboration with Singapore Airlines, offers free city tours for transiting passengers — there are criteria to meet, and when we plugged in our details, exactly one option came up: the Singapore River and Marina Bay Sands. So that was that.

The tour was perfectly fine. It chewed up the hours adequately. And when we were dropped back at the terminal, we were very glad to be back in the air conditioning. Up to the lounge for a shower, some food, and the grim task of staying awake for another four hours until our flight to Munich finally boarded — sometime well past midnight.

We made it through immigration this time with no instructions from the immigration officer like "your eyes open big ok" at the automatic passport booths

The group size was  33

The bus was air-conditioned

Clarke Quay, our first stop

If I was paying attention I would know why I took this photo

Sir Stamford Raffles, the English guy who basically founded modern Singapore. And our guide TC, who was enthusiastic and friendly, but overly shared personal stories

Boat Quay

Original landing spot of Raffles

Oldest building in Singapore, ex parliament house, currently a theatre

The old Supreme Court

"pit" test

LV anyone?

Travel party

STAY AWAKE!

Let It Snow

 

Lake Königssee

What do Australians with no snow and ice driving do when it snows? They drive for 2 hours on the wrong side of the road just to visit a lake. We briefly discussed alternative plans should the rail strike go ahead, but there wasn't much we could do until they announced the strike, and we were assured that 48 hours notice would be given by the rail workers union, so why not go on a road trip! We had a family vote the night before on the destination. Charming Bavarian villages was voted out almost immediately. It was a close one between Lake Königssee and Neuschwanstein Castle and the former won.

The change of pace was actually nice. The change in mode of transport was also nice. We were able to play our own music on a spotify family jam on the drive. The drive to Lake Königssee was scenic. German roads were in excellent condition and it was well signed. I won't bore you with the details of our Lake visit as it was mostly just enjoying nature and playing with snow. However, the restaurant where we took refuge from the cold served up the best German meal as voted by the children!

Fingers crossed for tomorrow that we can actually make it to Frankfurt for our flight home!

Checking out our hire car and jostling for seating position

Driving out of the city

Turning off into more rural areas

Those buildings are boat houses!

You can't see it but the water was very clear

The humble looking restaurant

Warm and cozy

with a pretty view

I may have become a beer drinker, especially as it was cheaper than coke here!

The servings were huge. Turkey, hash brown, and mushrooms

A better version of the roast pork that we had at Hofbräuhaus

Schloss & SS

 

Schloss Nymphenburg

Today we questioned the wisdom of leaving behind sunny Spain for miserable Munich. It was frigidly cold, and it was rainy. To make matters worse, our seemingly "safe" choice of being closer to our departing airport of Frankfurt may not be so "safe" after all. Rumours were rife of impending rail strikes from Jan 8 and that the farmers were also going to strike on the same day, taking to the roads on their tractors. Double whammy! Take me back to 18 degrees and blue skies! Out came our layers as we continued to tackle the sights of Munich. 

Utilising Munich's well connected public transport, we made our way to Nymphenburg Palace. It was a crash course for us on the House of Wittelsbach, the ruling family of Bavaria, of which we knew nothing about. King Ludwig II was born here, the king who was responsible for Neuschwanstein Castle (important because this was what inspired the Disney castle!), also known as Mad King Ludwig. The palace was built as a summer residence and we could see how all this would be more pleasant with sun...

This particular Hilton had a sitting area set aside for diamond members

Different country, different royal family to school up on!

Consensus was that the above portrait would be what a female Malcolm would look like

This was where Ludwig II was born. Also known as Mad King Ludwig

Do we look miserable?!

The next stop was a more sobering one, the second of Jonah's museum request, the NS-Dokumentationszentrum. It is a museum which focuses on the history and consequences of the National Socialist regime and the role of Munich in the Hitler Regime. The museum was housed in a building built on the site of the original "Brown House", the home of the Nazi Party centre of operations. The museum did a great job highlighting how the historical, social and economical factors made the rise of Hitler possible. We spent hours here and by the time we finished, the brain was definitely drained. We were also starving.

On our way back, we had to change modes of transport and we headed into the first warm, recognisable place that we knew would provide food quickly. Big Rosti was calling me. A burger with hash brown and cranberry sauce?! I'm sold. Apparently McShrimp was also a thing, although I probably wouldn't recommend it!

Spell that!

I could not resist this

Regular McNuggets on the left, McShrimp on the right!

Beer Anyone?

 

When in Munich...

It was a bright and early start. 0620 pick up for our flight to Munich. This was the last of our flights where we had to stick to a 23 kg limit per bag and we scraped through with some fancy redistribution efforts. Security was busy but the lines flowed quickly. Other than some turbulence, our flight to Munich was uneventful. Luggage did take a while to come out.

We took the S-bahn direct from the airport to a station directly under our hotel. We chose the hotel primarily because of this, as well as the fact that there was a car rental company (Sixt) located on site. From the hotel, it was also only a very short and easy S-bahn ride to München Hbf where our train bound for Frankfurt at the end of our stay would depart from. Luckily for us, the hotel also happened to be a Hilton. Hurray!

For those family of 5s out there, it is a rare time to rejoice for there is a travel ticket here made for 5! The group ticket allows for up to 5 adult travellers. We bought a day ticket to cover our airport train as well as for our sightseeing for the rest of the day.

The plane to take us from Barcelona to Munich

Taking the S-bahn from the airport

Lots of space

Our Hilton room

Jonah had made a request to visit two museums (yes a child who loves museums!) and so we obliged. We decided to tackle one today and one tomorrow to spare our neurons too much activity.  First up was the Deutsches Museum, the museum for science and technology. It was very large and reasonably crowded as Jan 6 was a public holiday. The museum had great content which was vast and diverse but the experience was more akin to reading an encyclopaedia rather than fun and interactive but I survived! It was somewhat of a role reversal where the parent wanted to quit and the child to persist! It did help with my step count for the day which was important because the calories expended would need to be significant to account for the calories to be consumed.

We hopped on a bus towards Marienplatz, the main square in the old town of Munich. What better thing to do as tourist in the cold and rain then to have dinner at Hofbräuhaus. Yes it was touristy and yes you could probably get better food elsewhere but it was convenient, warm, and fun. How could you not be happy listening to the tuba belt out the bass notes on the oom pah pah tunes? The group next to us wearing their Lederhosen outfit completed the ambience. Plus the shared seating meant we got to converse with interesting table mates! First a family from the Ukraine, who tried so hard to communicate with us, then a couple from Sweden who had driven 15 hours with their 2 huskies Kaiser and Freya. The food itself was hearty, delicious and we completed our photo ops with 1L mugs of beer. Tick!

The picture they used to lure me in...the sneaky bastards!

Jonah seemed to know the significance of the various models in display but I had lost interest by then...

I stopped to take a rest at the "bridge" section, to watch a 6 minute snippet on home lol. All types of bridges you could possibly imagine was on display

The free seating area of Hofbräuhaus

Ok ok so I cheated. This was 1L of Radler, beer mixed with sprite or better known as a shandy

We were so happy to see the pretzel woman you'd think we'd not had bread before. There was much regret not ALSO purchasing the cheese pretzel

Sugar donut - Bavarian style

Looks a little gross but was tasty!

Part of the old town in the evening