Munich Palaces
Monday 26 December 2016

We spent the last day of our trip in Munich today, visiting two remarkable palaces. After finishing our packing we took the  train to Munich and left our cases in a locker at the station, before catching a tram to Schloss Nymphenburg. This palace was the summer home of the Wittelsbachs and includes a carriage museum and formal gardens.

Schloss Nymphenburg 

English landscape garden

The main attraction inside the palace is the Great Hall which was painted between 1755 and 1757 with a fresco on the themes of peace and reconciliation. Another feature of the palace is the Gallery of Beauties, with 36 paintings of the most beautiful women of the time, commissioned by King Ludwig I.

We next visited the Carriage Museum which houses a remarkable collection of coaches and sleighs in the former stables. The most elaborate were those commissioned by King Ludwig II, the mad king who built Neuschwanstein.

Ludwig II in his dress sleigh

Ludwig II's dress sleigh

Ludwig II's dress coach

Detail from dress coach

We had a short walk in the grounds although the statues in the garden were all covered in wooden shelters for the winter.

Ducks and covered statues on the Grand Parterre

We returned to the station and had some lunch in the food court there before taking the U-bahn to visit our second palace, the Residenz. This is a palace of 130 rooms, including the Antiquarium, the Schatzkammer and the Cuvillies Theatre.

Residenz interior courtyard

The Antiquarium or Hall of Antiquities is the largest Renaissance hall north of the Alps. It was built by Duke Albrecht between 1568 and 1571 to house his collection of antiques and is painted with scenes of old Bavarian towns and allegories of Fame and the Virtues.

The Antiquarium 

We visited the ten rooms of the Schatzkammer or Treasury next and saw a huge variety of beautiful and precious items, including crowns, clocks, jewels and shrines.

Ruby crown

St George and the Dragon

Madame Pompadour's writing set

Cabinet of Miniatures

Detail from a Chinoiserie clock

After much confusion, we managed to find the entrance to the Cuvillies Theatre where we saw this amazing rococo theatre.

Curvillies Theatre

It was then time to retrieve our luggage from the station locker and catch a train to the airport. We had dinner at  Leysieffer Restaurant at the airport (freshly cooked spaghetti and prawns for me and roast pork with mashed potato for Ian) before going through security and passport control. Passport control here was one of the slowest  and most frustrating queues we have experienced!

The flight home was uneventful, with breaks in Dubai and Singapore. We were pleasantly impressed by the current passport and customs arrangements in Melbourne. A lot of the process is now automated and the queues moved quite quickly at least on this occasion.

So we have now achieved another of our dreams: to experience a European Christmas. We loved the Christmas markets, where the beautiful light shows came on at dusk around 4pm, and the atmosphere on Christmas Eve in particular, when there were lots of young families. The beauty of the candle-lit church on Christmas Eve was another highlight. We loved Venice in winter, quite a different city without the crowds of summer tourists, and the misty countryside outside the walls of Rothenburg. And we enjoyed returning to the apartment in Augsburg where we felt so much at home.

Thanks to Ian, my wonderful ‘tour director’ for his meticulous planning and his success in bringing our dream alive.

Christmas Day
Sunday 25 December 

Ian had planned a very special excursion for today, Christmas  Day. We left home at 7.45am to catch a train to Fussen in southern Bavaria near the Austrian border, arriving around 10am. We had seen patchy snow on the mountains ahead of the train and there were remnants at the edges of the road in Fussen but hardly enough to make the ‘white Christmas‘ we had been hoping for.

Fussen is the nearest town to two famous castles, Hohenschwangau and Neuschwanstein  (also known as the Fairytale Castle). We set out from Fussen to walk to Hohenschwangau,  a distance of around 4 to 5kms by road but longer via walking paths. The remains of a snowfall lined the edges of the paths we followed and there were frequent icy patches which we had to avoid. Although we had a hiking pole each we felt we were in constant danger of falling on the slippery rock paths as we climbed up the mountain above Fussen and later along the forest paths.

All our efforts were worthwhile though for, as we climbed higher and neared Hohenschwangau, the ground was covered in quite deep snow and the lakes were frozen. There was a group of people playing a game of curling on one of the frozen lakes and there were other groups walking along the snowy tracks. This was what we had been hoping for!

Plenty of snow here!

View of Neuschwanstein on our walk

A close up shot of the castle

 We were quite tired by the time we reached the town, after walking 10kms in those difficult conditions. We were pleased to find that there was a bus back to Fussen!

It took us a while to find the Hotel Hirsch where we had a lunch booking, since my tour director had not provided a town map, and we had an interesting wander around the town. It turned out to be very close to the station and we enjoyed an excellent Christmas lunch. Ian ordered a veal schnitzel with potatoes fried with bacon pieces and I had ‘traditional roast pork’ with bread dumplings and red cabbage. This was followed by apple cream cheese strudel for Ian and ‘twice cooked’ chocolate cake with raspberries and icecream for me.

A homely restaurant for our Christmas dinner

Our main courses

And desserts

There were a lot of family groups in the dining room and it felt very homely, perfect for a Christmas lunch.

Sunset as we were leaving Fussen

We took the 3.05pm train back to Augsburg arriving around 5pm, only to find that the bomb emergency was not yet over and we could not leave the station. The Augsburg central city area had been involved in a planned evacuation for Christmas Day to enable a recently discovered World War 2 bomb to be defused. Residents were ordered to leave by 10am and the city area was cordoned off. Eventually around 7pm we were able to make our way home! The rest of the evening was spent packing for our return flight to Melbourne tomorrow evening.

Christmas  Eve
Saturday  24 December 

We started the day with a walk of around 9km partly along city streets but mainly through the Siebentisch Wald, in the northern area of the Augsburg city forest (Augsburg Stadtwald). This is a huge area of 2000 hectares in total, with walking, bike and riding trails and largely unspoilt forest. We saw a few lone joggers (mainly female so it must be considered a safe area), some dog walkers and several groups of walkers but for much of the time it was just us and the trees.

Old drinking fountain

We stopped for a rest on a seat on the edge of the Stempflesee, a small lake which seemed to be home to lots of ducks and one white swan.

We walked back a different way, along the outer wall of the zoo which extended into the park.

After a bit of a rest back home we set out for lunch at Drei Mohren (The Three Moors) restaurant. We had had a lovely meal there last year so Ian had made an online booking for 2pm – a late booking so we could have a rest after the morning walk and also because we intended to attend the 10pm Christmas Eve service and that would be an enjoyable way to spend a large part of the afternoon. Since 2pm was one of the times available on the website, we didn’t realise there would be a problem. However when we turned up at 2pm, we were greeted with great consternation and the news that the kitchen closed at 3pm! Luckily the service at Drei Mohren is smorgasbord so we decided to stay.

The buffet included an interesting range of starters,  main courses and desserts, and we worked our way through all three areas within the hour. The time limit was probably a good thing since it prevented us eating too much of the delicious dishes on offer! The highlight for both of us was a dessert: crème brulee von der Valrhona Schokolade – a smooth chocolate custard with a crust of burnt sugar.

After leaving the restaurant we walked into the town centre to visit the Augsburg Catholic cathedral. There was a rehearsal for the nativity play underway as we walked around the cathedral and lots of tourists admiring the artworks in the various chapels.

Statue in front of the cathedral

Chapel of Our Lady

The four Disciples sleeping

A glimpse of Madonna and Child

The cathedral grounds were extensive and included a large building which may have been a monastery.

From there we walked back towards home and called in at St Urich and St Afra’s on the way. This is a combined church which forms the Protestant cathedral. There was a service taking place in St Ulrich’s, including a nativity play performed by the children and watched by a large congregation.

After a break at home, we returned to St Ulrich’s for the Christmas Eve service at 10pm. The church was beautifully lit by twenty Christmas trees covered in golden lights and the main altar was also spectacularly lit. The service was two hours long, in German and Catholic, but an interesting experience – and certainly worth it for the beautiful décor and the wonderful organ music.