Residenz, fabulous meal, shopping, and concert/dinner in a REALLY LONG entry

WEDNESDAY
We awoke to heat warnings for the day. Ugh. After another great breakfast, we decided to check out the Reidenz München. We talked to the hotel person, who told us that it’s usually easy to enter the Residenz even though our information said that we had to make a reservation. Being the ever-vigilant planner, I decided that we should go there today and double- check the arrangements.

We started our walk at 11:00, taking a different route to our destination than on previous days. Bob’s eye was caught by some stuffed animals in a store window, so we went into what was a HUGE toy store, complete with stuffed animals, games, legos, etc. My man-child happily walked around the store for a while, and then we moved on.

I saw some cute baby clothes in another shop, so we bought a little something for Kelsey’s baby boy. We got to the Residenz area and were sweating up a storm, so we sat in the shade on a comfy sofa and had some beer and water.

 

We had no problem entering the palace with my eticket. There were 2 tours, one shorter and one longer, both self-guided. We chose the shorter tour, which ended up taking almost 3 hours — god knows how long the “long” tour was!

There were many rooms from many different periods. Part of the place is known for its rococo decor and part for its intricate floors. There were many rooms full of porcelain and silver.

The hall of mirrors

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After the tour of the Residenz, we went back to the hotel and took a little nap before our culinary adventure that evening.  Our London friends had recommended a restaurant in Munich, so off we went to find it, which was a little bit of a problem since the restaurant was in a hip hotel that didn't have much signage.  After asking a few people on the street, we finally arrived on time for a 5 course meal with wine pairings.  It was a wonderful meal in a garden setting.   

https://www.shanesrestaurant.de/en/

Foccacia type bread

Sorbet cleanser

Appetizer with various interesting vegetables and herbs

Fish dish

Beef dish

Beautiful dessert

There was an amazing candy spring as part of the dessert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMuEClvShgA

THURSDAY
Since creating a new post makes entries out of order, I am including Thursday as part of this entry.
We spent a part of the day shopping and having lunch, and then we traveled back to the Residenz Museum for a concert.  You would think that since we had been there the day before, we would easily locate the concert venue.  However, you would be wrong!  The Residenz has multiple concert spaces, and on that particular evening, there was an opera being performed at the larger place.

The opera house

 We spent a lot of time trying to find this chapel where our concert was to happen.  Because I am the person who always gives myself plenty of time to get somewhere new, we found the chapel in plenty of time to get a seat and use the facilities. Whew.

The chapel

The chapel was lovely but WARM.  The concert included Vivaldi pieces played by a violinist, cellist,
and violist, all of whom were excellent musicians.

The only named musician -- the other two were "house" musicians.

After the concert, we were actually walked to the restaurant for the dinner that was included with our ticket.

Zodiac light right over our table

The exterior of the restaurant

After dinner, we walked through the Residenzplatz to get back to our subway station.

Bed after 11:00pm.

Walking around.

We awoke after 8:00 this morning and had breakfast before getting ready for the day. The selection of coffees and food was great! After breakfast, we headed to the Hauptbahnhof to buy a 3-day group pass. Then we walked the Kaufinger Strasse. This is quite a shopping street; I shopped while Bob watched some demolition.

https://youtu.be/MOZV6xmOLlA

I had my head turned by shoes....

https://youtu.be/B---889tPAo

Because it was so sunny, I ended up buying a hat.We arrived at the famous Marienplatz, home to the Glockenspiel.

It was a sunny, warm day, so we had a beer in the shade just off Marienplatz.

We then continued our walk, stopping to buy some cheese and two handmade wooden hearts. Lunch
came next in the Victualmarkt: currywurst and more beer.

By this time, it was really hot, and we experienced a wave of tiredness, so we took the subway back to our hotel and took a lovely nap -- I always book a hotel with air conditioning! 

After our nap, I chose a dinner spot that had wine rather than beer. It was about 10 minutes away. We had pasta and wine with a delicious dessert.

The place was quite charming as well. We walked back and are now sitting in the lobby/lounge having another glass of wine. So civilized.

On to Munich!

Tom picked us up before 9:00, and we had our last bites of lovely, fresh Hannover bread. Tom got us to the airport by 11:00, and of course there was no line since we were early.  The last time we did this, we were late, and somehow Bob lost his passport in the rush. But all was well this time.👏👏👏

The flight was uneventful, and we easily found the Lufthansa bus that would take us to the train station.

 Our trip from the station to the hotel was not quite so easy. We discovered later that the bus drop-off was on the opposite side of where the hotel was, so we walked many steps before we finally found it.

The hotel was lovely, and we rested for a bit before embarking on the search for dinner.

I had read Rick Steves’ recommendations, so we set off for Augustine Keller Biergarten.

The walk was easy except for the bike path right next to the sidewalk. While we were walking under the train tracks, bikes were whizzing by — super- close!


We were seated right away and ordered massive beers to start.

 

Bob was impressed by our server’s strength — carrying multiple steins of beer and food with seeming ease. We ordered traditional food: pig’s knuckle and duck with suckling pig.

The young man next to us, who had had a few beers, asked us why we were in Munich. When we said vacation, he said Munich was ugly, and there were much prettier places to visit. He and his friends were training — electrician apprenticeship. We spoke in broken English with him and his colleagues, enough to figure out that they were his bosses and were teasing him. And then I got lost coming back from the bathroom after being personally escorted there by our server (I also had to pay the bill!).

On our walk back, a young man spoke to us because he heard us speaking American English. He was training with Bosch and had studied engineering at Purdue!

Back at the hotel, we had a nightcap and then went to our room. Sleep at about 9:30.

Sunday Funday.

We spent a quiet day with our German “son” and family. It was a lovely day, so we spent much of the time outside, having breakfast and dinner in the front garden. We just kept moving the table into the shade. Yannik and Niklas worked on their Legos Hogwarts, and Yannik played the piano.

He then went swimming with a friend while we had lunch. Bob had told Niklas he would “play”:soccer with him, so off they went — the yard is too small now for games. I went back to the hotel and took an afternoon nap and then returned for coffee and cake.

Martina and I had a nice chat while Tom was napping, and she read a chapter of Harry Potter to Niklas — so charming.

More grilling ensued, and we had chicken and “happy pig.” Bed at 9:00.

Weekend in Hannover

We checked out of our hotel and headed for the airport, a 10- minute walk away. My  carry-on bag was pulled aside so that they could check my plastic bag of toiletries—whatever. We got to departures and only had to wait 5 minutes for the gate to be announced. British Airways in Heathrow has this annoying policy of putting up your actual gate only 45 minutes  before the flight, and then it’s a mad dash to the gate, which can be a 10-minute walk away.

So anyway, we got onto the plane with relative ease. Another annoying British Air policy: not even a cup of coffee is free! I had managed to get us coffee in the terminal, which we finished on the plane. And then, of course, I had to use the bathroom. I went to the back of the plane and saw the green light on but couldn’t see a bathroom door. It turns out that the fold-down seat for a crew member is ON THE BATHROOM DOOR!! Oh, and the seats don’t recline. Crazy.

We arrived on time in Hannover, but there was a big line waiting to go through customs control that stretched onto the ramp from the plane to the terminal. And then we got into the line behind 3 teenage boys who were unaccompanied and Middle Eastern. After 15 minutes of watching them have issues, the control guy finally moved them aside and let us go through. Tom picked us up and took us to his home,  where food, fun, and children ensued. We had grilled wurst and vegetables for our meal — delicious. Tom’s parents came for a visit, and we had kaffee und kuchen outside. After they left, we enjoyed another light meal and then went to our hotel. Bed by 9:30.

And the week whizzed by...

So here it is Friday night, and no posts from Wednesday and Thursday. Hmmmm. Things happened...

Wednesday was a quiet day. Frank came for dinner, and he’ll take of a few plants and package deliveries. We’ll miss his Tan Dun concert, but that’s not unusual since the Mendelssohn Club often performs when we’re away in June.

Thursday was a packing and traveling day. The weather was terrible with storms crossing the area multiple times. We drove down to the airport early because the Blue Route was more of a mess than usual. We had a celebratory drink and got on the plane later than expected.

Then we had to wait out another storm before we could take off.

We arrived in the UK at 8:30am on Friday. After walking many steps and taking a bus from Terminal 3 to Terminal 5, we finally got through passport control, which was A BREEZE!! They have installed facial recognition machines so that all you do is put your passport in a slot, the machine takes a picture of you, and facial recognition kicks in to identify you. Instead of an hour, it took 5 minutes.

We walked many more steps to our hotel, which is attached to Terminal 5, but we had to wait for an hour for a room to open up. So back into the airport we went and refreshed our Oyster cards and then sat at a coffee shop, enjoying  a latte and an Americano. When we got back to the hotel, a room was available. I slept for about 3 1/2 hours and then took a shower.  Bob slept a bit longer while I checked out dinner possibilities.

We finally decided on an English pub near the airport and took a short bus ride to get there. The gentleman seated at the bar was quite helpful — we discovered later that he was the owner, but not until after he had worked for British Air for 30 years. We had some delicious pub food.

  

After dinner, we took the bus back and had a leisurely drink at one of the bars in the hotel so that I could catch up on this blog.

Taco Tuesday — but we never get tacos...

So today I went with Bob to Henning’s for old people Tuesday (5% discount). It was crowded with — old people! After returning, I discovered that the edited version of the Mamma Mia flash mob was on the district website!

https://youtu.be/yZNYs_wazr0

 We didn’t go out for dinner since we have too many leftovers, but mid-afternoon I got a phone call from the school, which I picked up and then immediately ended the call. I don’t work there anymore, right? But I checked my email and then saw that I had a voice message: Action News was going to show part of the above video that evening, and a clip would be on their website. I anxiously sat through the first hour of the news — no clip. We half-watched through the second hour and were rewarded with the clip right before the 6:00 news. And they aired it at 11:00pm and 2:00am! My niece says I’m now a local celebrity!