in Portugal 449 Words

The Portugal Adventure – Beautiful Bavaria: Munich

Another favorite re-post that followed last week’s post. This week we are in beautiful Bavaria.

McDonald’s we visited in Munich

Bavaria was more beautiful than I could have imagined. Breath-taking mountain views followed by sparkling lakes, all bigger and brighter than life. I thought I knew a lot about Germany after two years of high school German, but Bavaria surprised and delighted me. They have a history that is older than their centuries old palaces, and  new as the McDonald’s we found in Munich. Where beer was served and hamburgers were (at the time) about five dollars each.

Munich

Each day we had a meeting with all of the campers. We sang together, and it was my first experience of a multilingual singing time. I remember feeling that our hearts were being knitted together into one heart of praise. It was amazing. The Bible study each morning was translated via headphones. Afternoons we could join in various  activities. Several days we went sight seeing.

Munich

Munich was on our list. In addition to lunch at McDonald’s, we walked around downtown. There is nothing like visiting European cities to make you feel like a newcomer!

Downtown Munich

Much of Munich was damaged during World War II; they took 71 bombing hits over a six-year period. After the US occupation in 1945, Munich was carefully rebuilt on her pre-war street grid.

On the Marienplatz in downtown Munich, we stopped to gaze at The Rathaus (town hall) with the famous Glockenspiel, a clock with full-sized figures that displays two famous scenes from Munich’s history. It plays three times a day. The top half reenacts the marriage of Duke Wilhelm V, and the lower half is the dance of the coopers, which allegedly took place during 1517, a plague year in Munich. This is said to have affirmed their perseverance and support for the authority of the duke. We arrived just in time to watch and listen that day. Here‘s a YouTube video of the Glockenspiel. Turn your sound up!

Rathaus and Glockenspiel
The Glockenspiel at the Rathaus

We were a tired group when we arrived back at camp for supper; cold cuts with all kinds of delicious German breads for supper. In fact, everywhere we went in Europe, the bread was extraordinary; it was artisan bread, and you can’t make that in a factory.

Next post: Bad Tölz!

Singing for the German campers. One of the tall Americans, I am in the middle in the back row, and Harry is on the right. With the bigode (mustache). I have to say, I wasn’t much help in singing Portuguese at that point, but it was fun.

What part of the Glockenspiel did you like best?

14 thoughts on “The Portugal Adventure – Beautiful Bavaria: Munich”

    3. Ah. Well, the main reason I had to ask for clarification was that it was 1978 and only the geek squads had envisioned such a thing as a computer translating in such a manner. The business that used computers of any sort used the ones that filled an entire room and required a keypunch expert to save data.

      The way that the translations worked was bilingual dudes were in sound proof booths, each language having a translator and they translated sentence by sentence as the speaker spoke.

      That was a great question, though. It never crossed my mind that it would need to be ‘splained. Thank you, Professor.

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  7. I just love these entries! I think it is called “armchair traveling” – though I feel like I’m there reading your words! Thank you so much for sharing all these. So enjoyable.

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