Tsang's RISE Trip

Last big trip - Berlin, Munich, Heidelberg

Vehniah and I kicked off my last trip on Friday evening (she was continuing hers starting from Cologne on Thurs)

We arrived, starving, in Berlin HBF at around 7:30pm and after walking up and down the streets looking for the shewdter strasse hidden behind the trees, we managed to settle into our sweet ikea inspired hostel and proceeded to find some chow. I suggested we go get some traditional German food, and found a nice little restaurant around the corner that served sharmas called Babel. after a delicious meal of meat carved off a large rotating drum, we dropped off all unnesseary items, grabbed our cameras and headed out to explore the town, figuring it would be a better idea to walk around first to see everything before heading out in the morning since we were only in Berlin for a short time......that was before we took the first picture.








We took a ton of night shots in the empty streets, feeling like we owned the place. Night time is the best time to explore the city cuz there are NO tourists and you can do the silly things at the places you want to do, but was too embarassed to do in front of other people. Places like Checkpoint Charlie, Brandenburg Gate, the war memorial, the chancellery, alexanderplatz, the reichstag, and seigessaule amongst many other sites were explored at a casual pace and not another soul in site. Also the stretch between the seigessaule and the gate was being set up for some extreme sports festival so it was rather assuring to have people in and around. I'm not going to lie and philsophize about all the things and importance of the sites, I'm just impressed by nice architecture and also fascinated about anything cold war related or wwII related.

After a stroll through the city and back to the hostel (we refused to take public transport since it was so nice to walk around and also, note to self: don't let Vehniah navigate) we managed to get home for a respectible 3am bedtime. The next morning, after a quick breakfast from Lidl supermarket, we headed out to the East Side Gallery to check out reconstructed parts of the Berlin wall that had artists recreate or add new pieces to the wall. Unfortunately, some of the nicer works that I enjoyed were marred by the grafhetti that seems to be prevalent everywhere I look in Germany which was a shame. I suppose it is nicer than gun violence and violent crime, but still.... it really makes quite a difference.

We continued scoping out the city during the day and finally night time rolled around and we headed to the HBF to catch our train. Lo and behold, we were just in time for the open air concert starring none other than the SCORPIONS and headlined by NENA. The power riffs of the song that sounds like "rock you like a hurricane" but not and one of their unmemorable new songs that I've heard on the radio before were followed by a wicked cover of Dust in the Wind. they had an orchestra backup for much of the concert which reminded me of Metallica's S&M album.

Soon it was time to catch the train and no time to wait for Nena to headline the show. To my surprise, the overnight train to Munich was one of the nicest sleeper trains I had ever seen. Instead of stuffing 6 people into a single compartment coffin styles, they had now sectioned off 2 bunks per section with two seats sitting across from each other that slide out forming the bottom bunk and the top bed folding out of the wall. It was really clean and nice inside. However, I was sure the thin drapes that separated each compartment did little to suppress the snoring. oh well, sucks to be everybody else.


9 hrs and many kilometers later, we arrived in Munich at around 7am. We checked into the pretty busy Wombat Hostel which was quite bumping and I had just stepped into the bathroom to clean up for about 5 minutes before returning to find some guy chatting it up with Vehniah or Vehniah, chatting up some guy. The guy let it "slip" that he was from South Africa and just about to tell some story about his days from the Savannah, when I stepped in with the "oh really? I lived in Lagos, you know, Lagos, Nigeria" line leading to a lot of backpedaling about African wilderness exploits. Game killed. hahaha sucker.

Anyways, we proceeded directly to Fussen to see Schloss Neuchwanstein, the beautiful fairy tale castle, and also the other castle that was orange and started with an H (Howgoenu or something like that). Following the Asian crowds up the street to the castle, we broke ahead and started the picture shooting. Realizing there was more to enter without the entrance fee, we explored around. We found the path to the sky bridge over a large waterfall and a beautiful view of the castle. However, it was still obstructed so we found a path that ended up being a hike up the neighbouring hill and got an unobstructed view of the castle with no guard barriers. We descended and followed another path that continued along the waterfall and resultant tributary.


Fussen began to pour shortly after we arrived back at the pickup site. Fortunately, there was lots of cover and we made it to the train relatively dry and prayed that it would not follow us back into Munich.

The great weather man in the sky hates us. The rain followed, but we both had rain jackets so it wasn't much of a problem. We found a Wombat recommended local restaurant which served VERY good bavarian food and enjoyed a nice slow meal to wait out the rain. As night fell, we got pumped up to take some photos and headed out to Schloss Nymphenburger where it was unlit and we happened to come across a play/opera. It was happening on the 2nd floor, so we couldn't really see much, only what we could catch through the windows on the second floor from the outside and what we could hear from the open windows. It started to pour and we decided to get the hell out of there. The rain was relentless and it ended up being a relatively uneventful night. The photos are here, but I don't like them.



The following day (because both Dacau and the Benz museum in Stuggart are closed on Mondays), we headed out to Olympic stadium followed by some shopping and then we decided to check out the Deutches Museum. This museum was massive with interactive displays. Too bad most of it was in German and the parts that had english I believe were not in the same level of detail as their German counterparts. We did not make it through the entire museum by closing time, but with the rain, and cloud cover, we really didn't care much. We had dinner at Pasta e Basta which was amazing and amazingly CHEAP leading to a second dinner following our first order. The waiter was a little confused, but went along with it since we were still eating. By that time, it was dark and we headed back to the hostel where we met Jane from Australia. Jane asked me what I was up to tonight to which I replied "oh you know, we like wandering around the city at night when there is nobody else around and do some night photography" Only after I had left, did I realize how crazy we sounded. Here I was, with no apparent camera gear, heading out to do Night photography....honestly, doesn't really add up.

A couple dismal shots later of the "Chinese" tower in the English garden which looks like a bird house (seriously, it was disappointment after disappointment) we went home for an early night so we could leave for Heidelberg.


Heidelberg was amazing. Even though it was raining, it was significantly warmer and the place we stayed was quite close to the city so we did not have to take a bus anywhere unlike the last time I was here. I did the best I could remember to show Vehniah around the city, going to the old brewary where my tour had dinner, and then followed up to the castle for a walk about, down back through the city visiting the library and student jail. We headed up the philosopher's way and waited for the sun to go down before snapping some sweet night shots of the castle. So enjoy them, we sat and waited through rain spurts for them.


We got up bright and early at 5am. I sent off Vehniah back to Canada in Frankfurt Flughafen Stn and continued my way back to Dortmund.

Dortmund was a busy busy place for me as I had to pack up, have my room inspected, try and find the tax refund centre (which doesn't exist anymore) and go back to school to return my keys. I've organized a ride to the airport and am excited at the prospect of going home. I'll see many of you faithful readers (hahaha...I really believe they exist) soon.

posted by ktsang @ 7:40 PM