September 4 - 10

Monday 

I have no idea what I did this day. Seems like I did nothing!

Tuesday - Hiking near Tegernsee

I think I started the day slightly late. I hate a plan to go towards Schliersee, then catch a bus towards Spitzingsee and then do a hiking. I was a little unorganised. I'd planned to leave at 11:30. Then I was slow, and said "oh I could leave at 12:15" because I'd barely gotten ready. Then I was slightly late for that one, so delayed it again to maybe 1pm. And then when I got on the train I found out that I'd need to wait 1hour for the bus when I got off the train. So I rearranged my plan so that I would instead go to Tegernsee, which is the most popular town, and then just hike somewhere spontaneously. So that's what I did! It turned out to be lovely.

I started in Tegernsee, just found a popular route walking up into the mountain. It was walking alongside a very nice river. Charming houses. Forest. Then I reached a hut where some cyclists were getting food. I stopped to have a look. I perused their menu and then said "ich spreche kein deutsche!" and then did my best to say what I wanted in german which is fairly fine because you just say the names. "ein weisbier und ein.... käser...." the guy before me had taken a slice of cheese cake. The lady said "käserkuchen!" yeah that's it! (I get confused with kuchen because it sounds like kitchen. Or "kuche" which I think is another thing? I suppose kuchen is cake. It was pretty good.

So I sat there in that mountain hut, built in 1780, renovated a little while later, rebuilt a little bit some other time. I admired the view across to other mountains. There were a few groups of people relaxed and enjoying the atmosphere. It feels like how life should be.

Later I took my plate and glass back "danke schon!" "bitte schon!" she said. I felt nice. People were friendly.

I kept walking. I'd planned to hike in a slight arc and back to Tegernsee. Then I decided to descend towards Hausham. Actually the road was a little boring since it was paved. But I found out that it was a very popular route for cyclists to ride up the hill, and so I will need to do it later! So it was a great discovery.

I've started to do a thing where I will take a photo of some plant I don't know the name of (any of them). Then later I can use google image search and it'll tell me what it is. This way I could learn what they all are, eventually. I think this might be a hazel tree? I don't know.

Wednesday - Buying a book

At 2pm I caught the subway over towards the university and to an English book shop there. I had a little browse. I had big desire to find some history books for the area written in English. I found "a village in the third reich" which I'd seen already in Dymocks in Adelaide but didn't buy: https://www.amazon.de/-/en/Julia-Boyd-ebook/dp/B09RMQRR9T . There were a few others I could have also bought. I went for this one because I sometimes hike in these mountain towns and I want to know more complexity to how everything in the area works; how it has historically all fit together.

I think that when I got home I probably read 100 pages on this; it was really engrossing. It's a good book!

After I bought the book I walked through the city for a while and there's some kind of event on all about cars. Germany is still quite good at car manufacture, so it seems that they love it. BMW, VW, Mercedes, Audi, Porsche, maybe others; they're all German.

Thursday - Bike ride from Lenggries to the Inn river valley

I caught a train south to Lenggries and then intended to ride my bike through the valleys and then down towards the main valley which contains the Inn river (the one that goes through Innsbruck, up towards Rosenheim, and then joined into the Salzach downstream from Salzburg, and then goes into the Danube).

It was a superbly excellent bike ride. The section along the lake is particularly good. After that there is a very steep downhill towards the valley where I hit 75km/h. After that I had maybe 30km to do up through this valley towards Kurfstein. I had a very strong head wind in this section and gave up early!

(weirdly these photos are in reverse chronological order....)

When I gave up, I was in Austria. I was riding really slowly into the headwind. My knees were hurting slightly and I could see that I wouldn't gain much by continuing to ride. I checked and I could catch a train to Kurfstein for around $12 and save an hour or two of riding, so I did. It was hot as well!

Google said that I'd need to change train about 500 times! When I got to Kurfstein (on the border of Austria and Germany) I quickly found the next train. It said "Munich" on it, and so at first I thought Google was wrong! This train would just go all the way to Munich! Then when it started going the screens changed to say it would go to Grafing which is slightly East of Munich, and then I'd have to change trains and it would be awkward, and I'd get home in the dark. When we got to Rosenheim we stopped for a while. While stopped I could see a train next to us Marked as going to Holzkirchen which is to the south. I did a quick check on my phone of the routes. I could see that if I got on that train then I could catch a train from there that would head North and arrive at a station just 1km from where I was staying. I had about 3 minutes to make up this decision before the trains would leave, and I figured out this would be best! So I grabbed my bike and moved over there.

So I got onto that train heading to Holzkirchen. Then the train didn't leave!!! The driver was a bit panicked. I spoke to this German guy who explained that there was some operation in the main train station in Munich where there was no power there so no trains could get there, and some trains were affected too. He said there were some fireworks somewhere also, soon, and so all these people would probably miss it!

It was funny to me that I'd gotten off that perfectly good train to save a bit of time here and then I was actually delayed by an hour! Eventually we were all asked to get off the train because it was definitely not able to leave. I checked my routes and decided to take the train going my original direction, but an hour later. So that's what I did. I caught that train that reached Munich Ost (that's german for "east") and then I rode through the dark back to home. I was exhausted at the end! Good day.

Friday

I think that I was feeling a little tired today, because the day before ended later than I'd expected. I spent the day reading the book I'd bought on Wednesday!

Saturday - Parkrun! Standard. I think I spent the rest of the day reading the book I'd bought.

Sunday 

I'd signed up for a "hiking buddies Munich" hike. The night before I was really struggling to sleep. I went to sleep at 10pm. Then I woke up at midnight to the sound of fireworks. Then I couldn't get to sleep until after 3am. My alarm was set for 5am. I was thinking that I would have to say I wouldn't go, but then I might have received a bad review!

In the end I woke up at 5am. I put my alarm on snooze. I saw that 2/5 already might not make it to the hike, so I thought I should make an effort. I got up and made some podridge. The train left the city station at 6:32am, so I should meet the others slightly before them. According to my plan I should leave at 5:44 to make it to central station by a little past 6. I was a little slow and I had some time buffer, so I skipped the 5:44 train and left just after then. When I got to the U-bahn station about 5:50 it said the next train would be in 15 minutes! Oh no. That would mean maybe I would miss it. I frantically searched for an alternative route. A few options. I chose the one where I would catch a bus going north to "Laim" then catch a U train to central station getting to the Hauptbahnhof at 6:24. That would give me 8 minutes before the train would leave.

I message on the page to say my expected arrival and that they should wait on the train for me rather than the platform; I didn't want to stress them. I got there, to the Hauptbahnhof, and actually had about 4 minutes before the train left. I got on the train and searched for them. Couldn't find them! Moved to the front carriage. Couldn't see them either. The train left. I said I missed them, but will switch carriage at the first station (I was in the front carriage, they must have been in the rear one). I found them. Hurray!

Just two others on the hike, Ania from Poland and Nitin from India. They were both really nice! I was also very sleep deprived and so in a pretty good state of mind.

We caught the train from Munich Hauptbahnhof to Garmisch-Patternkirchen. I'd never been down there so far; they'd been doing work on the train line until a week ago. Then we got on a bus and went to Birchlbach which is in Austria. Then we started our hiking.

The hiking was so great today! Ania and Nitin were really fun to hike with.

When we got back to the village we had to catch the bus back to Garmisch-Patternkirchen and then get onto the train. The bus was kind of late though! We were thinking we'd miss the train because we were 1-5 minutes late at least. But the train waited! We got on that train and all went home happy.

my current theme of trying to figure out what things are. I'm calling this one "common ragweed"

I think I will call this one a "bog myrtle" https://wildflowerfinder.org.uk/Flowers/B/BogMyrtle/BogMyrtle.htm it seems like you could make beer with it.