Wai's Travels!: Linderhof

Friday, November 13, 2015

2015 - Eastern Europe Summary

Duration: 18 days (arrived on the morning of Saturday September 12, 2015 and left in the morning on Tuesday September 30, 2015)
Cost: Flight from Toronto to Munich and Prague to Toronto ($1,108.42 CAD), 3 trains ($214.15 for three people), overnight train (67 € I think for private room just three of us) Hotels (819 € + $1,519.45 CAD for two), $342.83 for car rentals, roughly 17 € per meal in Germany and Austria, 4,000 Forint per meal in Hungary, 300 Kč per meal in Czech Republic and local transportation and admission.

Highlights (in no particular order):

BMW Museum in Munich, this museum has given me a greater appreciation for the brand and makes me almost want to get a BMW for my next vehicle. I believe that even if you aren't interested in what BMW makes, you will like the layout, flow, and collection that is housed in the BMW Museum. In my opinion, it is a must see while in Munich.

BMW Museum

Dachau Concentration Camp in Munich, make sure to sign up for the guided tour and jump back to a time where things were different in Germany and learn about what happened here and how things were back then. The guided tour lasted roughly 2.5 hours and well worth the small cost of it.

Dachau

Salt Mine in Salzburg, while I didn't know what to expect nor did I actually know this was part of the plan (I didn't really look at our plan well), this was a surprise and the two slides plus the train out were excellent and worth the day trip here.

Salt mine slide #1

Salt mine slide #2

Linderhof / Neuschwanstein in Munich, while there were cool looking palaces in the other countries that we visited, these two really stand out the most in my mind (outside of the metal bird in Schönbrunn palace). Take a day trip and visit the two to travel back to a time where palaces were built with grand ideas and locations in mind and just wander and enjoy your surroundings. I feel that overall, Linderhof is my preferred palace of the two, but odds are, you will visit both given their proximity to one another. If you visit them, I would suggest Neuschwanstein first since it seems to be the busier one, but in my opinion, Linderhof is more enjoyable.

Neuschwanstein

Linderhof

Lowlights (in no particular order):

Kutna Hora, expectations were too high for me for this one. It is a small room, so much sure to visit the town nearby otherwise you spend a lot of time just to see this location. Make sure to go early because it gets pretty busy by 10:00am.

Kutna Hora

Must try food places:

Humboldt in Salzburg, was quite the surprise restaurant for me. It was the only place that we visited where I enjoyed all of the entrees that we got and unfortunately Humboldt was never topped for me for the rest of the trip.

Humboldt

Wratschko in Vienna, is a restaurant recommended by Anthony Bourdain and I would suggest it as well. Just note that the service was lacking for us but in my opinion, the food makes up for it.

Wratschko

Szazeves Etterem in Budapest, is a restaurant recommended by Allison's brother and worth visiting. Come on a Friday and be entertained by the live music there. Good food, good service, recommended.

Szazeves Etterem

What would I change?

Vienna could have been shortened to 3 days for us versus 3.5 days that we spent there. Budapest could have also been shortened to 2 days versus 3 days. Otherwise, I think the trip worked out well and everything worked out for us even though we were quite worried about the migrant crisis at the time which turned out to be a non-issue by the time we arrived.

I know that this is a common path that tours take and I can see why since it is very convenient to get from place to place. I do feel that we started on a high note and ended on a softer note which made me feel a bit bored by the end. Not so much due to planning, but the variety of things to see disappears after awhile and I think that happens to me a lot during longer trips. Not to fault the countries that we visited.

In hindsight, it may have been better to reverse the order of the cities, but that meant that we would hit Munich during Oktoberfest which is something that we didn't care to visit due to the additional cost.

Until next trip!

Friday, November 6, 2015

2015 - Eastern Europe Summary (Munich)

Duration: 4 days (Arrived on Saturday September 12, 2015 at around 10:00am and left on Wednesday September 16, 2015 at around 4:00pm)
Cost: Hotel Freisinger Hof (564 € for 4 nights), automatic transmission car rental ($234.43 CAD for 3 days), average meal was roughly 17 € a person for us, and admissions to sights and transportation.

Highlights (in no particular order):

BMW Museum. Honestly, I think because I didn't know what to expect, this wowed me a lot more than I thought it would. It was very interesting to see the history behind BMW, all the types of things that they made, how they came to be and the lineage behind a lot of their products (whether it is engines, car, boats, etc). This museum gave me a greater appreciation for BMW and makes me wonder if other automotive companies have something like this.

Dachau Concentration Camp. Again, not knowing what to expect, this was an eye opener for me. This is a place that has a deep history behind it and I felt that having a tour guide made a world of a difference compared to if I was wandering around and just reading what signs are available. Having a tour guide that happens to be a history major helped as well. If you go, I definitely recommend going for the guided tour which is available in English (just check to see the times).

Linderhof / Neuschwanstein. Being from Canada, I can only draw on Casa Loma as a comparison and there is no comparison at all to what I saw here. Linderhof and Neuschwanstein show what can be built in a time where money was less of an object. Not to say that we don't still have things like this being built, but to this level, I don't think so. It is well worth a stop to visit, and odds are, if you do one, you will end up doing the other and doing Neuschwanstein first is my suggestion.

Lowlights (in no particular order):

Nothing comes to mind. I think the open air market was a bit disappointing, but at the end of the day, it isn't a paid sight, odds are, you will just stumble upon it.

Must try food places:

No restaurants that we visited really stand out in my mind that I would say you must visit. Go with the intention of having lots of sausage, pretzels, and beer and you should be okay.

What would I change?

I think we planned this portion of the trip pretty well. I would initially say that it would be preferred if we stayed closer to the city centre, but since we were driving two days and commuting two days, it wasn't a big deal in the end. I feel that we probably could have spent more time here in Munich, but that is because I didn't feel like we ran out of things to see and do.