Handlebars

Saturday was a sunny day – yeah! That meant bike tour, something we were ALL looking forward to doing. I woke up with an nasty headache, but not bad enough to stop us from going.
I got a few things done in the morning around the house while Dave and Dillon headed down to climb the Peter’s church tower. They had a great time and had some amazing views of the city. The girls and I met up with them when it was time for the tour.
We went downtown to the Marienplatz and then over to Mike’s Bike Tours. They told us a bit about the Marienplatz area and then we headed down to our bikes. They were awesome! It was so great to be on bikes after not being on one all summer long. We are really hoping for a sunny day next week so that we can rent bikes and go out on our own.
We started off with the Hofbrauhaus. It is the biggest and oldest beer hall. It is a big tourist spot. It is also the place where Hitler made one of his first big political speeches and where some of the first violent attacks on Jews took place.
We then headed to the National Theater and The Residence. These are two beautiful places that we hope to return to and tour next week! The tour guide asked if anyone wanted to sing in the courtyard since the acoustics are incredible. We were so wishing that Linda Collyer were in our bike group so that she could showcase her voice!
Next, it was on to Odeonsplatz. In this plaza, there is the Feldherrnhalle – a beautiful covered hall with 3 arches, and a central staircase with lions and statues. It is designed to look like Loggia dei Lanzi in Florence, Italy and it definitely looks A LOT like it! Our guide told us all about the importance of this area, but since I did not write it down, I will quote a website that says basically the same thing:
The Felderrnhalle, located in the Odeonsplatz area of Munich, became the focal point of Hitler’s Beer hall Putsch on the 9th on November 1923 when Hitler and his followers were met by the Munch Police. Fourteen Party members were shot and killed on the east side of the building, making the first important early martyrs of the movement. A total of sixteen Party members were killed that day with the other two being at the War Ministry. The Feldherrnhalle also became the place where the sacred Blood Flag was born when SA member Andreas Bauriedl becoming mortally wounded, fell upon the flag staining it with his blood.
From that day forth, the Feldherrnhalle became the most important building in the birth place of the movement. Each year after Hitler took power, he and his early followers, proudly wearing their Blood Order Medals, marched the path of the original Putsch ending at the Feldherrnhalle for an elaborate ceremony honoring the dead. On the east side of the Feldherrnhalle, Hitler had erected a large bronze plaque designed by Paul Ludwig Troost with the names of the sixteen names of the fallen. From that day forth, when the citizens of Munich passed the Mahnmal, they were required to salute.
Our tour guide showed us the ally way behind the building that those who did not support Hitler could walk through so that they wouldn’t have to salute him. It was really cool and commemorated with golden cobblestones.
We were able to go inside the Theatinerkirche – a beautiful baroque church also found in the square. It was designed by an Italian and built to look like a church in Rome.
We rode past the Hofgarten, the renaissance court garden, where we heard a beautiful concert taking place. Next, we rode down Ludwig Strasse and saw the Saatskanzlei, the govenor’s buildings, and the Siegestor, the three-arched victory gate which is a monument to peace.
From there, we rode down to the English Garden. We were so close to our home! We actually rode the route that I had run the morning before. It is so gorgeous in there all we could talk about was renting bikes again so that we could bike through the garden some more. We rode past the Japanese teahouse and the cool waterfalls. We learned that this park is one of the largest city parks in the world - it is 20% larger than central park!
We stopped at the Chinese Tower for lunch – again so tempting to go home for a sec! The weather was perfect and we had a nice, relaxing lunch. We were the only people on our tour that did not get GIGANTIC beers, but we were not ashamed of our bottled water. Our tour guide came and talked with us and he is from Vancouver, BC, total northwesterner like us! It was fun to talk with him. There was a big band playing in the tower today, so we were able to enjoy some fun picnic/park music while we were eating.
We got to go see the Surfer’s Bridge in the park as well. It was pretty mesmerizing to watch them. I loved being able to watch surfers that close up. I guess they come from all over the world to try this place out.
As we rode on through, we noticed that paramedics and police officers were stopped at every bridge. They all had maps were looking down into the Isar river. Then, search and rescue helicopters started showing up as well. We never found out what it was, but it was kind of scary!
We stopped by the Friedensengle (Peace Angel Monument) and the Maximilianeum (Bavarian Parliment) and then by the Deustches museum and the Volksbad.
The tour was about 4 hours and we all walked away totally happy with it. It was such a fun way to spend a sunny Saturday. I was going to run some errands while Dave took the kids home, but my headache got to be absolutely horrible after about 30 minutes. So, I headed home and we send Dave and Dill out for dinner. They tried to get Doner Kabob’s, but had no luck. So, they went to Pizza Hut and got pizzas.
While they were in there, a guy was out front dancing around with two friends that had a camcorder. It looked like they were just college kids being goofy as he was dancing in front of a group of girls. He started taking his clothes off and that got the attention of the wait staff. All of a sudden, he ripped off his pants, which ended up being stripper pants. He was down to his boxers and the manager went out to stop him. By then, he had his shirt on and putting his pants on. They couldn’t tell if he was serious or not, but he had a little piggy bank and was asking the girls for money after his performance!!! Strange!
We had a TOTALLY fun dinner as a family tonight. I was pretty loopy on pain killers, and the kids were just in goofy moods. We just had one of those magical evenings as a family and I really enjoyed just being together. After dinner, we walked to the Haagen Daz right across from our apartment and had some ice cream together.
Fun day and fun night!

Our u-bahn stop. Much nicer than Paris (closer, cleaner, better access to the city).

Stairs leading up (and down) to the top of the church.

Some views from the top.

Happy family waiting for the bike tour.

Odeonsplatz

Inside Theatinerkirche


Dillon in the alley way where those who did not support Hitler walked

Maximilianeum (Bavarian Parliment)

The waterfall in the English Garden

Surfers at the Surfer’s Bridge

Friedensengle
 
Search and Rescue helicopter