Springfest in Munich, Germany

The day had finally come, for my big trip with my friends to Springfest in Germany. I was extremely excited, my bags were packed and I was ready. I woke up at 5:30, grabbed a bagel and packed a lunch for the day before meeting up with Krista, Gillian, KC, Julia, John, Kelsey, and Brian at the airport. We were staying in a hotel for the first night, and then camping out in tents in Munich for the festival the second. Gill, Krista and KC were supposed to be camping both nights, but we had made bets that they wouldn't last. While we were at the airport, Gill who has checked out of every hostel we've stayed in so far into hotels, asked if in the event of rain they got hotels for the people who were supposed to be camping outside. Oh, and

no, she's never been camping either, this is her first experience. There is no way they'd be making both nights! We all laughed. We landed in Germany and split up as they headed for the campsite and we went to tour Munich. We climbed to the top of Peterplatz tower, which was quite the feat with openings as narrow as my shoulders in some parts. We reached the top which had a 360 degree view of Munich, and the bells started ringing on the tower. With the weight of the bells, the building swayed more than any building ever should, which was frightening yet very cool. Later we went to the Milka factory store, which is a type of amazing chocolate in Germany. I felt like a kid in a candy store, literally. I bought a couple of large milk chocolate oreo bars for 55 cents each, which was so much cheaper than anywhere else. They didn't last long though, I should've bought more. We met up with Brian's friend

and headed to Hofbrauhaus, a beer garden that Halpins had talked about so much. I quickly learned why, it was so much fun. We sat outside, and had a pretzel and a large German beer for dinner, no regrets. We had a great time there with live German music, and I decided it was certainly a place I wanted to come back to someday. We headed back to the hotel after walking around the city for a while, and because there were only 4 beds and 5 people in our room, we made a "megabed", laying all the mattresses on the floor. We turned on the TV, quickly to realize it was all in German, but we tried to improvise and guess what they were saying. It was really cool to see the London Tube and Dublin Prison on TV, both places I'm familiar with! We woke up early to catch breakfast downstairs, which consisted of
everything from fruits, cheeses and breads to salami and cake. I wasn't complaining about any of it, and

ate everything I could fit in my stomach. We headed out to the German underground to get to the camping resort, and the language barrier overcame again. Apparently, the underground line that we needed was being serviced, and wasn't working, so we bounced from one form of transportation to another, not really sure if we were ever going to make it there. Then we got there, it was in the back of a trailer park--not quite what any of us had pictured. We got there, and they asked if we wanted to check in. They said it was mandatory to drink a beer before we would be allowed to check in. That's when we knew this would be an interesting experience. We had a couple of drinks with the people that were there, and met a couple of kids that knew Siena, and one that had grown up with Rob Poole, one of Siena's

basketball players. It really does seem like a small world sometimes, even here. We later headed into Springfest, and we had a long day ahead of us. Kelsey and Brian both fell asleep on the train, but we were awake laughing at them. We ran into the bathrooms, and Brian walked into the wrong one which we laughed really hard at. Springfest was rather large, with everything from amusement rides to gift shops to food and beer tents. It was lightly sprinkling when we got there, but that kept the crowds away and in the tents, so it wasn't all bad. We stayed until 9:15 and then headed back to the campground for dinner. On the way back, we were in the German Underground when we heard a loud "bang" noise, and the tunnel began to fill with smoke. Security ran along the line, and people rushed out as police came down and were

urging us to get out, which led to confusion until they told us in English. I tried to lookup what happened, but couldn't find anything anywhere. As we boarded the last train, we saw Gill, KC and Krista with all of their bags in hand. We were right, they were indeed checking into a hotel. Dinner was grilled schnitzel with grilled potatoes, and it was actually delicious. We hung around the campsite for a while, talking with all the other kids there, there was an open bar until midnight. The bus to the airport was leaving at 10:15, so we needed to leave the campsite by 9 to be there in time, so we were relatively well behaved. It was absolutely freezing in the tents, dropping down to around 30 degrees in the night. I kept checking to see if my feet had actually fallen off yet, but somehow they made it! I laughed as I woke up every hour ready to leave, trying to picture Gillian KC and Krista here. No wonder they checked out. We left on schedule the next morning after an interesting batch of eggs, littered with onions, sausage, and tomatoes with toast. We got to the airport, and we looked like a group of homeless people without showers. We joked about it, saying how we could never be homeless, as we brushed our teeth in the airport bathroom sink. As disgusting as I felt, I really didn't want to leave Germany, but the beach in Barcelona was my next stop, so I could think of worse.

Final German Notes:

1. I finally understand the obsession with Hofbrauhaus, it really is an awesome place to sit outside in the beer garden enjoying pretzels, large beers, and live German music.

2. The German "efficiency" stereotype doesn't seem to be too far off, from what I noticed they were rule followers, including most of the public transportation system based off a "trust" system for payment. Not in America or Dublin!

3. It would've been a cool experience to be with people who knew German or were familiar with the area, because I feel as if we missed so much just not knowing the language. This was an inspiration to learn another language, for sure.

4. I really do love Germany, and I WILL go back someday. It'd be really cool to go with Halpins.