Tim & Jo

Arrived in Munich really early on Sunday morning (6:20am...) every other sensible person was still asleep so after staggering past some homeless people packing up their newspapers and groups of punks cracking their first beer of the day we sat down in the only seats available, the waiting room. The night train from Dresden was pretty average, didn't really get any useful sleep and climbed off the train with cramps in pretty much every muscle. Next time we will pay for a couchette and at least get to lay down on something that is flat After sitting in the barren waiting room we shifted to Starbucks for a forgettable cup of coffee (at this stage places that make a real cup of coffee seem to be few and far between in all the countries we have been to... most of the 'cafes' make their 'espressos' and 'cappuccinos' with instant coffee from one of those coffee vending machines that we have in places like petrol stations :x )

We went to the Euraid office and managed to make reservations for all of our train rides throughout Europe. Now we have a big wad of train tickets that mean we won't be kicked out of a seat. We then whipped over to the train that was headed for Garmiche Patenkirchen which is the picture postcard alpine village that is at the foot of the Zugspitze (Germany's highest mountain) and is where the Winter Olympics were held in 1930.

After a wander around town looking for anywhere that had some sort of information that told us where to go for the ride to the top of the mountain (2962m) we managed to find the tourist office with the girl behind the counter dressed in traditional Bavarian costume (as were random people around town), she pointed us in the direction of the station for the funincular train up the mountain and let us know it was leaving in a few minutes. After paying the hefty ticket price of 47€ each (typical tourist towns ) we hopped aboard for the ride to the top.

The area was really beautiful with all the half timbered houses and barns for the cattle scattered all around the valley floor. The train heads through a tunnel for about 15mins and then drops you off at a transition point to climb aboard a cable car to the summit. It was at this point that we realised that everybody else was wearing hiking boots, trousers, jackets and hats etc... oh well its summer isn't it and whats wrong with wandering over snow and rocks in shorts, t shirt and jandels at 3000m? Did get a few strange looks and laughs though

Ordered something for lunch, we knew what the beer was, but the other part was a lucky turned out well though and enjoyed a soup with some still unknown dumpling kind of thing bobbing around in it, could well have been liver... and it tasted delicious

Hopped aboard another cable car that seemed to go down vertically for the ride back down, this cable car went right down to the valley floor so was a longer ride than the one onto the summit. Arrived back in Garmich Patenkirchen just in time to grab the train back to Munich.

Today (Monday) we got up and hopped aboard another train, this time heading to Dachau... yip heading for the concentration camp. Arrived in the town and caught a bus that we were 50% certain was the right one, it was, and we arrived at the camp itself. Wandered around the camp, looked at the barracks that the prisoners were supposed to live in. Saw the crematoria, this building is disturbing in how calculated the design was, imagine a long building with four 'ovens' in the middle section. Now on one end there is the 'waiting room' were prisoners were placed to wait for their 'shower'. A door opens across to the 'shower' room, there are fake shower heads so that prisoners didn't panic and refuse to enter. There are flaps so poison gas pellets could be added from outside, also there is a big ventilator duct that blows warm air in, it makes the gas get produced faster... Now another door opens to another bare room, this is where bodies from the 'shower' room were to be shifted to before the next group were ushered into the showers, and also where the bodies would wait until the backlog could be cleared in the central room the crematoria itself. On the other side of the crematoria was another room which was used to hold the backlog of bodies from the firing range, and other killings around the camp. How any human being could inflict such calculated, cold blooded killing on others is impossible to comprehend. Dachau was the 'model' camp which all others were based upon. SS members who had trained at Dachau were placed in positions of authority at as many other camps as possible to spread the 'Dachau Spirit', a hatred of the prisoners with no mercy or remorse. Almost unbelievable. The weather was suitably fitting for being in such a chilling place, the temperature has swung from being in the high 20's to about 8 degrees and drizzling rain with it.

Heading for Salzburg tomorrow, can't wait to get back into the mountains just there for the day before moving on to Innsbruck for a couple of nights. Hopefully there will be less Americans that have just graduated from 'college' and tell each other about how they are having the 'oh my gosh, the time of my life' at 3 in the morning while climbing into bed in a room with 38 other people trying to sleep. Some of the hostels we have been at are full of these people that spend 4 nights in a city, when we ask them what they have been up to we find out that we have already seen all that they have, and we've only been there for the afternoon. At least we find out where the most tourist packed beer halls are and we know which to avoid .

Munich was a bit of a let down on what we've read about it, pretty much its full of tourists from everywhere who are here to drink beer, the thing is thats all thats here, true there are some old buildings and a big park, but the old buildings aren't as nice as those we've seen in Dresden and the Tiergarten in Berlin was a beautiful park...

Tschuss from Munich

Left Berlin on Friday morning, the weather here is super hot. The train down to Dresden was completely full (only worked out after wards that was the Friday of a long weekend...) Managed to get seats on the train, there were others that spent the whole trip walking up and down the train trying to find a seat

Arrived at Dresden Neustadt Bahnhof and wandered outside to blazing sun. After a few technical difficulties, ie Einbahnstrasse means one-way street and isn't the street name... we managed to find our way to the hostel. Dropped our bags and headed back towards town with a map this time. Dropped past the station for a beer to accompany our map reading and decided to head for the altstadt (old town). Wandered down through a street market and crossed Augustusbrucke (a bridge) and entered the altstadt.

This place is amazing, the buildings are so decorative, Germany must have so many stone people! Headed back towards the hostel after planning what to do the next day over a currywurste and another beer at one of the Imbiss at the market.

(Germany has heaps of these street stalls called Imbiss which serve various sorts of wurste (sausage) and always have beer available. It isn't unusual to see people having a beer mid morning )

Saturday we had all day to spend in Dresden, we left our packs in a locker at the Neustadt Bahnhof and walked back to the altstadt. We bought a day pass to the museums and checked them out. Saw a whole bunch of paintings by the old masters and also Dresdens crown jewels. Also went into a museum that had heaps of swords, suits of armour and old guns made out of ivory and stuff. Amazing how decorative all these things are...

About lunch time heard huge claps of thunder and it started pouring, cool thunder storm soaked absolutely everything except for us 'cause we'd put our newly aquired umbrellas in our daypack even so we did shelter for a while in the Dom (cathedral) This the cathedral that was almost entirely obliterated by the allies during the second world war and has now been completely rebuilt (as has a lot of the altstadt)

Guten Abend

We arrived in Berlin last night, Andreas meet us at the airport and that meant we got back to our hostel without any problems Managed to get a hostel for tonight as well. (only discovered we'd booked our Berlin hostel for June instead of May yesterday morning...). Went and had a beer on the Oranienburger Strasse when we arrived which was really good, the beer tastes so good here

Bought our gear over to our new hostel this morning and then hired a couple of bikes to whip round town quickly. Theres cycle lanes everywhere and on the busy streets the cycle lane is a lane of different coloured cobbles on the footpath, feels really safe riding round.

Went for a ride over to the Hauptbahnhof (Main train station) and validated our Eurail tickets and reserved tickets for all our night train connections. First station we went too the Frau behind the counter didn't speak a word of English and wasn't too interested in helping us, so we left At the main station they had a designated English counter which was a whole lot easier... and the guy actually wanted to help us

Had lunch in the Tiergarten which was beautiful and so peaceful compared to the streets, then we came back to the hostel and had a snooze for a couple of hours, was much easier making the beds in the light as well (had quite a battle putting a duvet into a duvet cover in the pitch black last night, whilst trying not to wake up the others in the room)

Just got back from visiting the Reichstag, and climbing up the glass dome. From there you can look down into the area where the German parliament sits, also get a really great view over the city up there. We were lucky 'cause the sun was just setting as we were arriving at the top.

Off to Dresden tomorrow, the train leaves every two hours so we shouldn't have to spend too long wandering around with full packs and nowhere to leave them.

P.S. Did you know that Berlin has over 50 McDonalds outlets? No we didn't either until a massive sign let us in on the secret

Tschuss

We've been in the UK a few days now, the body clock seems to have swung around and not tired in they middle of the day now Just got back to Nottingham after having the day in London.

We've been up to Sherwood Forest to visit Robin Hood, and into the Derbyshire countryside. We went up to the dams that provide all the water for the midlands, really beautiful rolling green hills with tiny villages scattered everywhere.

Not sure what it is about the grass and trees here but everything seems to be such a vivid green, and everything is green London was really good, got bank account sorted and picked up my suit, fits really well. Anyway better go, being antisocial sitting here typing out the back We'll put some photos up of London in the next day or two. See ya

We're sitting in the departure lounge at Hong Kong airport at the moment, this place is absolutely massive. The eggs at burger king are a funny colour of yellow, they tasted pretty good though

Went and saw the 'Symphony of Lights' at the Victoria Harbour waterfront last night, was amazing, so many buildings with crazy flashing, twirling, spinning lights in all different colours. There must be a power bill to match the size of some of those buildings.

Wandered around after the light show trying to find the night market, finally hoped on the subway and asked which station to get off at. Jo got herself a pair of 'Gucci' sunnys, $10NZD hmmm. I got a pair of binoculars for the same price after bringing the price down from $20NZD. Went and had a beer at probably the most interesting establishment we could find, was an alley way with a sagging tarp for a roof, decrepit tables and a crazy bar man always yelling and laughing at his cook. Ended up getting given two 640ml Tiger bottles for $5NZD total. Sat there having a drink watching the antics of the barman with other customers and the rats running up and down the alley. Good times

Any way, off to wander round a bit 'cause not looking forward to sitting down for the next 13 hours Talk to you all from the UK

Arrived safe and well to Hong Kong, man 11.5 hours is a long time to be sitting still... After checking with STA before we left and confirming that there would be someone there to pick us up, we wandered into a arrivals hall with a voucher that know body wanted, whats more they didn't even know who it was that the voucher was for. Finally found a company that accepted the voucher and ended up at the hotel around midnight, after landing at 8:40, and being through customs by 9:30. Oh well its all good

Went for a walk today from our hotel along Nathan Road to Tsim Sha Tsui. Along the way was fitted for a suit that I'm picking up in London, got lots of strange looks 'cause it wasn't exactly the main tourist drag. Probably the main thing apart from the heat and humidity that stands out here is the smells, these crazy chinese medicine shops with dried fish and other potions spread over the footpath have a pretty unique odour

Crossed Victoria Harbour on the Star Ferry and then wandered round until we banged into a sign that said Peak Tram, followed the haphazard signposts from there until we arrived at the terminus from the completely different direction than everyone else.

Heading out to watch the light show across the harbour later on tonight and will then check out Temple Street Night Market.

Aufwiedersehen