Come follow the Sunshine: My first taste of Munich, Germany

As soon as we arrived at our hotel in Munich and dropped our bags off and headed out for a bike riding tour of the city with a company called Mikes Bikes, I highly recommend it if your heading to Munich for the first time. Our instructors Matt and Charlie were two of the funniest guys ive ever met. They are nuts. Or they pay out everyone else around them for being nuts.. either way. So we all hop on the cute blue and pink vintage style bikes and ride to this monumental church where we stop to hear the rules of Matt and Charlies games which they insist everyone plays with them. The first game is called Stranger Danger, when we are standing in a circle listening to Matt or Charlie give us some information on the area we are in they don’t like stranger’s sneaking into the group and listening for free. So if anyone notices a stranger moulding into the group they have to yell STRANGER DANGER then the whole group drops to the ground leaving the stranger awkwardly standing alone. Almost immediately after our instructions along comes this asian dude trying to scab some free info and someone yells STRANGER DANGER and we all drop to the ground, he continues to stand there and smile awkwardly so Matt tell’s everyone to lower your glasses and stare out over them at him. It’s so funny everyone did it and the asian dude slowly starts to back away confused and we are all pretty much in stitches after.
Then we played statues because there was a local festival on and we couldn’t get in to see the statues through the crowd like a normal tour would so instead of missing out he pulls a bunch of us (including Kyle and Me) to the front of the group to pretend to be the statues, he goes around whispering positions to us who are standing at the front of the group and when he yells action we have to snap into our statue, ACTION is called and Kyle rips off his shirt and holds it in the air in victory as his flag and i stand by his side looking up in admiration (lol right), Ebony gets down on the ground and is roaring like a lion and Nikki is riding Adam who is her horse. So effing funny, im laughing writing this but its probs one of those things you have to be there to find funny but my Contiki mates will appreciate this being included.
The third and last game we have to play throughout the ride is then explained. The Mullet Game. Matt and Charlie believe in doing their bit for fashion in Munich, and due to some unknown reason there are many Germans who didn’t gets the memo at the end of the 80’s that Mullets are NOT OKAY. So the game is simple, see a mullet while we are riding around? Throw your head back and in your loudest voice bellow MULLETTTTT!!! And your fellow riders will follow suit. I can honestly say i didn’t see one mullet but i certainly yelled it plenty of times throughout the ride. Best game ever. He did say xnay on the Mullet Game in the church but Tim couldn’t help himself and a few others followed suit.... the priest has a mullet, poor guy i wonder how many times that has happened to him and if he understands yet what’s going on.
Okay so inbetween all the Stranger Danger calls and Mullet yelling we did actually do some site seeing, first delightful surprise in store was a nudist park which at the time was only occupied by one santa looking fat dude basking his balls in the sun. We then continued to ride along this path that follows a stream, it was a pretty hot day so there were heaps of locals in their bathers taking a dip of just laying on the grass on the edge of the stream, if its hot when we return thats where ill be hangin'. At some point along this part of the ride Elanna one of the girls in our Contiki lost control of her bike and rode into the bushes and fell off, sorry Elanna but it really was a highlight of the bike ride (and Contiki in general) hahahaha.
Our next stop is at this HUGE beer garden, ill need to add pictures so you can understand what i mean by huge. There are stalls all along one edge selling 1 litre beer steins (Weisse – said “Vice” beer was my fav) and delicious traditional German foods. Everyone grabbed a litre of beer and some dinner, we had pork knuckle, Saur kraut and thick cut chips, it was easily the best bit of pork knuckle I’ve ever munched down on and the crackling was Soooooo GOOD! (Dad and Stink I know you are drooling) This beer garden would dead set be heaven on earth to most of the people at home I know.
After too much beer and a full belly we all manage to safely cycle back and return our bikes for a final goodbye song recited by Matt and Charlie, Fuck you gently I believe it was called?! You would know it. Funny song to finish the tour off in perfect Matt & Charlie style. Like i said before if your going to Munich hit these guys up for a bike tour on one of your first days, they know the city and anything you need to know about it like the back of their hands and will start your Munich visit with belly aching laughs and make your love the place immediately.

So now we are heading to Hofbrauhaus, the oldest beer hall in Germany. Its stinking hot in here like 30 plus degrees inside (its hotter than outside) and they make it like that so you drink more! More Litre steins are being drank, some of the dude’s from Contiki Drew and Mason managed to down 5 one litre steins (remember this is after a litre at the beer garden before) so shits getting real. I only had one stein and a pretzel and headed to bed about 11pm (yep I'm soft) but Kyle went out with Mason and some of the other guys till 4am, i have no idea what went on but i do know someone peed in the hotel hallway in the early hours of the morning and there were some very sore heads on the bus the next day!

In the morning we headed to Dachau concentration camp on our way out of Germany, if that wasn’t a sobering experience i don’t know what is. It was pretty full on to see one of the places of horror so many experienced and see first hand the barracks, gas chambers and other artifacts ive read about.

Sorry to end it on a sad note after all the fun stories in Munich & a bigger SORRY for the grammar mistakes, I've been writing this from a beer café and Kyle is on number 5 so I'm in a rush to finish before I'm carrying him home. (okay really I just wanna get on the beers now too)

You'll know when you see it.

This photo does NOT do the beer garden justice, imagine to the left and right of this are massive lawns full of table's of people drinking and eating and behind all that beer stands and food stalls.