City Sights

Today began as most days have begun for me in Munich... way too early and with not enough sleep. I got up at 5:30 in the morning after only 4 hours of sleep so that I could work out and shower before a seven o'clock meeting. I've been working out in the hotel's gym for the last couple of days to help offset all of the drinking and eating that I've been doing while here. It's not a very big gym but they have a treadmill and a weight machine that I have been using.

Half awake, I drug myself down to the gym only to discover that it wasn't open yet. I was kind of upset because I really felt like I needed to work out. I inquired at the front desk and was able to convince him without any trouble at all (none really) to let me use the gym unsupervised. They usually have an attendant in the "wellness center", but I believe that it's mostly to supervise the pool and spa areas.

I finished my workout leaving just enough time to shower, shave, iron my shirt and then head back downstairs for my 7 o'clock meeting. Instead of being greeted by a room full of customers, I found only my director in a half-setup room with a puzzled look on his face. It took us a couple of minutes to figure out that the meeting was actually scheduled for 7:30 and not 7:00. You can imagine that we were both a little frustrated with the marketing guy that failed to relay this information to us considering how precious a commodity half-an-hour of sleep is on a trip like this.

When the meeting did finally start, it was actually really productive. In fact, I would say that this morning's meeting with half a dozen of our customers was the highlight of the work portion of my trip so far. We got a lot of good feedback. We have another meeting just like it tomorrow morning that I'm hoping will be equally productive.

With the meeting behind me, I was actually free to roam the city until my shift in the lab started at noon. I set sail through the streets of Munich piloting a pair of Adidas running shoes. My goal for the morning's walk was to make it to the English Gardens on the other side of the city. I really didn't have any specific directions but at I had a general bearing.


My journey began by beating a familiar path to Marien-plaza in the heart of downtown. I had stopped through the area on Saturday night and was awed by some of the architecture of the buildings downtown. Unfortunately it was dark out on Saturday night, so I vowed to come back during daylight to get pictures. And so I did :)


Now, you will probably ask of each of these buildings that I took pictures of, "What is that place? Did you go inside?". The answer on every single occasion is, "I have no idea, and 'No'". The architecture is impressive from the outside, but I've found that I'm not really drawn to the insides of buildings. I prefer to be out walking through the city streets. In my opinion, indoor activities like Museums and historical tours are best saved for rainy days.

It didn't take me long to find my way to the Engligh gardens. The 'garden' is an oasis of lush greenery and flowing rivers in the desert of concrete and stone of downtown Munich. It reminds me of Central Park in New York. Of course, I've never been to Central Park in New York, so it reminds me only in concept :) There were a number of jogging and bike paths that criss-crossed through the park and I was about to embark on one of them when I discovered that my camera was running low on batteries.

I hate not being able to take pictures of really cool places. It has already happened to me several times on this trip where I didn't have my camera available and couldn't take pictures of something that I really wanted to. I decided that rather than take my chances with the low batteries that I should delay the walk through the park until I could find some replacements. When I conceived this idea, I imagined only walking a block or two farther before discovering some convenience store or gas station in which to buy batteries.

Funny thing about Munich... I haven't seen a gas station or convenience store since I've gotten here. There are plenty of cars so I know that there must be gas stations, but they do a damned good job of hiding them. There are plenty of corner stores here, but I just so happened to walk nearly a mile before happening upon a corner with a corner store on it. Fortunately the mile that I walked followed the perimeter of the gardens and I just ended up entering the gardens in different location and walking back through the gardens instead of "there and back" like I had originally planned.


I had a nice leisurely walk through the gardens which was a nice change from the frenetic pace that I was keeping through the city streets. I only had 2 and a half hours to kill and I wanted to make sure that I got as much in as possible in that time. But, once I got to the gardens, I had arrived at the something that I wanted to "get in", and so I took it down a notch or two to enjoy it.

There was nothing really spectacular about the gardens in an exhibitionist sense of the word. There were no ornate flower arrangements or bushes trimmed to look like animals. It was just nature. There were trees and shrubbery and a quaint little river that ran through it. It was peaceful. It was relaxing. It was everything that I hoped that it would be and exactly what I needed.


I didn't really have plans after the gardens. I just knew that I needed to start working my way back to the hotel and that I had more time to kill than I had imagined. So, I peeked at a city map and headed in the direction of something else that looked interesting... two larges rivers which paralleled each other and plenty of bridges that ran over them. There was plenty more architecture to see along the way, and it ended up being just as cool as I had imagined walking alongside and then criss-crossing over these two rivers. (Dad: for bonus points, can you name this river?)


After my river adventure it was starting to get late and I was worried about making it back to the hotel in time for my shift in the lab. So, I walked a couple of blocks to the nearest Taxi station and caught a cab. It was the first time that I had ridden in a Taxi since coming to Munich and I have to admit that it scared me a little bit. You don't get a sense for how much narrower the lanes of traffic are here until you attempt to squeeze in between two lanes of cars with 6 inches of space on either side of you at 45 miles per hour (of course the driver was driving in kilometers per hour, but I'm not quick enough to do the calculation).

All in all, I would say that I made pretty good use of my 3 hours off of work today. I got to see a lot of the city, a little bit of nature and got plenty of exercise from walking around. I would guess that I walked at least 6 (if not more) miles through the city today.