13th, 14th & 15th - Bavarian Forrest

We woke up to a tent and car covered in snow and decided, we needed to head North looking to Germany looking for some nice weather. We drove through the beautiful snow covered Austrian alps before ending up winding our way through the German country side to our new campsite next to the Bavarian forest.

We spent the day wandering the small towns of Viehtach. Before driving through the forest to a quaint little town where we decided it was well time to buy some winter survival kit. What timing this turned out to be considering today's midday temp was 1.

We woke to the sound of snow on the tent and headed for a beautiful drive through the snow covered pine forests to the town of Arnbruck, famous for its glass production. We finally found pommes and mayo at a little street stand, yum yum yum… We also walked around an amazing Christmas shop, each section colour coded to a different theme. We finished the afternoon off with come amazing German cakes.

16th & 17th - Munich

After leaving the snow covered Bavarian forests behind, we headed for a hotel in Munich. We walked the streets of Munich before making sure to be in front of the Glockenspiel cuckoo-clock for 5 o'clock to watch it do its thing, with the little men parading around and dancing. We then headed for a beer hall recommended by some Munich locals well sort of (thanks Ralph & Chels), to have pretzels, beer and a massive pork knuckle.

The following day we did a tour of Dachau Concentration Camp. The Dachau camp was the first concentration camp to be built by Hitler & the Nazi's for their political rivals. From its beginnings in 1933 it became the model for the future concentration camps to be built. It was not an extermination camp, despite having a gas chamber; as it bordered the main SS camp and the soldiers were scared of what any expelled poison might do to themselves or their families. Despite this over 25% of the inmates died and that didn't include the thousands of Russians that entered the camp and were never seen again. The camp also had an area designated for traitorous SS guards. It was also amazing that all the prisoners had their classification on their uniform, eg. political opponent, common criminal, Jew, gypsy, homosexual, beggars, prostitutes, jehovahs witness and religious clergy. There were also many mass graves around the site as despite having all the furnaces running 24/7 it could not keep up with demand. Quite an emotionally moving day. So to drown our, well actually others sorrows, a few of us went out after the tour to a different beer hall, Hexbauer, enjoyed some more local cuisine (definitely cuisine right up Chris's alley) and some fine examples of local ales.