The Big Adventure Commences

Time to dust off the travel gear! In addition to a new theme for the blog, I'm trying out a new way to post for this trip. No more schlepping my laptop from city to city; I'm typing this on a folding keyboard linked to my phone. If you can see this then it's working!

(Photo by Beth)

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Last night I took a red eye from Boston, after a couple of days spent visiting friends and taking care of some business. Since the trip from California to Europe is so long, I've taken Ralph's excellent suggestion for both this trip and the previous one, and stopped on the East Coast first. I'm still jet-lagged, but not as badly as I otherwise would be. (Mostly I'm just tired; my Fitbit says I got 4 hours 6 minutes of sleep on the plane.)
Tonight I'm hanging out at Beth's, doing laundry and charging every electronic thing I brought with me. The four USB ports in the hub I carry with me are no longer enough to charge everything at the same time, so a little planning is required.

We made a trip to the grocery store before dinner. I love the meat cases in German groceries: so many different kinds of ham and sausage to choose from!

Beth prefers the produce section :-D

The long trip home

The Munich airport was a mess. Three long lines and two shuttle rides = two hours to get to my gate.

First there was expected security line, where I got the full pat down. Next was the passport check, where the automated reader wouldn't read my passport, so I had to wait in the manual check line. Last and certainly not least was the Covid-document check line, which was a complete disaster. Multiple lines that didn't move at all for ages, then once they started moving not enough staff to man all of the lines, and passengers who hadn't read the instructions and were sent back to who knows where.

At my gate, the sole water fountain was out of order, so I had to spend 3.50€ on a plastic bottle of water. The flight back to California was long but uneventful, and I took this cool picture somewhere over Baffin Bay.

Last day

Karlstor on the second day of Pokémon Go Fest.

The Höfbräuhaus — really crowded and noisy

The Rathaus with the famous glockenspiel

After a stop in the pouring rain for a required pre-flight Covid test, I ended the day by taking Beth and some of her friends out for Thai food

City gates and Pokemon

Today was the first day of Pokémon Go Fest 2022 :-D

Karlstor

Sendlinger Tor

A "Party bike"

Had a lovely dinner with Beth at Restaurant Freisinger Hof

Deutsches Museum and wandering around town

Deutsches Museum: U-Boot U1

Deutsches Museum: Paul Hindemith's Trautonium

Viktualienmarkt maypole

I also got to visit Beth's school, and we ended the day with doner kebabs from the local shop.

Garmisch-Partenkirchen

I met up with my high school friend Kristy today. We went hiking in Garmisch-Partenkirchen (site of the 1936 Winter Olympics), then had a lovely dinner with her family and the Ukranian refugees they are housing.

Partnach Gorge trail

Partnach River

Tasty lunch (Käsespätzle and a rhubarb spritzer), terrible selfie

Bavarian Alps

The rest of the day

Surfers in the English Garden

Random statue of Chopin

The glockenspiel at the Rathaus