High time that I try to revive my poor blog. I'm not sure if anyone is reading this anymore, and I can't say I blame you if you stopped, but I can maybe harass some people into looking... or, uni is probably getting a bit boring and work-heavy now, so blog browsing is always a good form of procrastination! :)
Anyway, life has been busy. It always is! I guess I should start where I left off, but, quite frankly, I can't be bothered. So I will go back and fill in the gaps later. (hopefully!) And I'll start by filling you in on what I've been up to recently.
So, with week of holidays left between Easter and Semesteranfang, Yani and I decided to head for the mountains in the hope of a day of skiing, and also to see the sight that all good Aussie (and, evidently Japanese) tourists must see: Neuschwanstein. So we organised everything, I packed my mini trick skis, boots, suit, thermals, and about half of what I have over here, and we headed down to Munich with Mitfahrgelegenheit. The drive was, thankfully, fairly uneventful, though perhaps worth noting that the driver had installed his own DVD player in the car. A sort of flip out contraption which wasn't like the official ones in BMWs and Mercs because his one, he said proudly, didn't shut down at 30km/hr. No no, His still worked at 160 on the Autobahn. But we didn't have to worry, he continued, because he "hardly ever" watched it while he was driving. I replied with words to the effect of 'I should bloody hope not' and got a slightly confused look back, showing he actually wasn't joking. I was a little scared, then, but we made it safe and sound. Thankfully the other guy who was hitchhiking with us chose really bad movies which the driver had already seen, so I guess the temptation to watch was pretty low!
Regardless, Yani and I made it to Munich, and it was amazing. From a cold, wet, bleary day in Berlin to a 25° sunny afternoon was quite a change. Unfortunately, we realised that we hadn't actually brought many tshirts with us, but we made do. Munich was beautiful. There were flowers everywhere (even on the lions), the sun was shining, and the whole city was littered with alternating Asparagus (and strawberry) stands and Vegetable Peeler selling stands. It was quite something! On the first day we went to Neuschwanstein, and, though slightly underestimating the amount of travel time there and back, we had a great time. The second day we did a free tour of Munich, which was great (as the free tours always seem to be!) and spent the afternoon sitting by the Eisenbach river in the English gardens, reading, eating giant pretzels, and finally getting a bit of sun! Friday was originally planned as a trip to the Zugspitze, or other, closer ski-resort area, but after some more research into how we could get there (given that nowhere else in Germany has snow), we decided it was too hard and expensive for a grand total of what would be maybe 2 hours on the slopes. So we decided to go to Salzburg instead.
Salzburg was a gorgeous city. All the trees and flowers were in bloom and it just felt a really friendly place to be. Again, this opinion is probably massively biased by the fact it was about 25°... but I still enjoyed every minute of it! We looked around for a walking tour to do, but couldn't find any that a) looked good, or b) were less than 18 Euros, and after a number of growingly less subtle hints from Yani, I agreed to go on an afternoon Sound of Music tour. I must be the only person to go on that tour having only seen the movie once. At age 18. But, despite the fact that I may not have been overjoyed at the chance to see 'the gazebo', I still had a really good time. We were in a little minivan, so there were only 6 of us all up, and we "hiked" through the mountains from the comfort of our leather seats and airconditioning! It's truly beautiful scenery there, and some breathtaking views! And there was a bit of a tour of Salzburg included too, so I didn't miss out on seeing Mozart's birthplace, where he lived till he was 17, ... and also got where his mother was born and... do you sence a theme here? Anyway, Yani and I had a great time!
Saturday was a nice walk around Salzburg through the markets, - very, very nice markets, and then a slightly scary ride in a bright orange big minivan home. It would have been cool, if it had had airconditioning, a motor that wasn't so loud I couldn't hear my ipod on full volume, or, possibly most importantly, suspension... But again, we made it back in one piece, if slightly rattled! Then we had Sunday to sleep and unpack, (and go for a long walk through Park Sanssouci, but more about that later) and uni started on monday! The courses I'm doing seem really interesting, if a lot of work in some, unfortunately! But we'll see how it goes!
http://picasaweb.google.com/nickyringland/MunichAndSalzburg
