Munich…we were staying right near the train station - our shortest commute from station to 'home' we've had! Amazing.

This was our first dorm experience, a 6 bed mixed dorm - we were both a bit unsure what to expect really. The hostel is massive so you don't really get a good 'community' feel which is a shame. Also, there aren't any kitchen facilities (which we were banking on to save some cash and be a bit healthier)…however it does have a bar.

It was here that we stumbled across a couple of Canadians (Steve & Sam - buddies travelling together) and an American (Eric - lone wolf from Chicago with amazing teeth!), got chatting, drank a few beers and then all headed out to a beer garden for a late dinner - mainly sausages and sauerkraut washed down with a litre (yes a whole litre!) of beer - when in Bavaria and all that! It's amazing that a relatively unassuming man in lederhosen can carry 5 full litre steins when we could just about lift one of our own.

First night in the dorm was uneventful - no horrendous snoring or noisy people…although one guy stumbled in as quietly as possible about 4.30am. Quite comfortable really! We'd decided to go to Dachau Concentration Camp with our fellow Canadian travellers, meeting at 9.30 in reception. We had been told though that if it got to 9.30 and they weren't there, then we should probably just head off ourselves…which is exactly what we did. Off on the train to Dachau - which is a surprisingly nice little town/city in itself - it's crazy to think that such horrors occurred in the camp which is basically a part of the city. A sobering experience but definitely one that should be experienced. It's free entrance so we invested in an audio guide each - well worth it. The memorial site is huge and where possible they've reconstructed parts of it. Most of the SS buildings are all off limits as the Bavarian riot police have taken them over as offices etc, but you get to walk through the main prisoner camp and crematoriums… We managed to spend 3 hours wandering around reading everything…when we got to the end though, we realised that we'd done most of the tour backwards - including the museum - oops!

Funnily though, as we were walking around, we bumped into Sam (friendly Canadian) - turns out they had finished their breakfast at about 9.32 and came up to meet us….oh, we were probably a little too efficient there (taking a leaf out of the German's book…did we mention that our train into Munich arrived about 10 minutes early?!). Anyhow, we agreed to head off and grab some lunch once we'd all finished up with our respective tours. We took a little longer than expected and couldn't find them so headed back to the bus stop to head back into town - luck would have it they were still hanging around with a couple of Romanian girls we think they had 'eyes for'! Anyway, we showed up and that kind of put paid to that little venture - sorry guys!

We found a nice little café for lunch - salads all round (almost) and planned our next move. The boys were doing a walking beer tour later that evening so Sam wanted to head back for a nap (that's usually a James trick!!), so we went up to the palace with Steve and had a wander around the gardens and stopped for some amazing cakes! We were all just kind of stood looking at them and the lady behind the counter was a bit like "are you staying to eat or do you want to take them away?"…our response was "we just want a slice of cake"!. Mmmmmm, it might have been ravaged by wasps, but it was delicious!

James and I decided to decline the walking beer tour and settle for an evening of catching up on blog writing (finally managed to connect the laptop to the public wifi), gentle beer drinking and Chinese food….yep, perfect day all round really. Tomorrow we're going to head out to the sites of Munich with a few recommendations. Both of us are beginning to feel the effects of travelling around so quickly, Nepal can't come quick enough - we'll actually be in one place for more than a few nights - amazing!!

So, we're trying to get into the habit of writing a bit of our blog each day so that we don't forget important points - hence why it's all written in present tense...

Today we were up early and out exploring - Nymphenburg Palace, Olympic park, English Gardens. Lots of walking planned….

8 hours later and we've just finished! Had a lovely time walking through the gardens of the Palace (sticking with our 'free theme' and not paying to go into the actual building) - so beautiful! Spent a good few hours walking around the 'sights'. Then we headed off in the direction of the Olympic park - we didn't realise quite how much of a walk it was! We were both getting a bit peckish as well…in our search for somewhere to eat we crossed over a massive motorway about 3 times, each filled with a little disappointment! Eventually, we found a little place just outside the park to eat. Full on pizza and pasta, we went on. It's amazing how well kept the whole thing is, the Olympics were held here in 1972; the village is now residential housing and most, if not all of the arenas are still used. We were hoping to get into the main arena, but it wasn't free, so we had a quick peek in and moved on. The swimming arena was awesome - and still in use! We can't imagine London's being used as much - it's basically like the local gym/swimming pool!

We opted to get the metro from here down to the English Gardens - apparently they are bigger than Central Park (in NY). An interesting fact; in Germany they have 2 types of gardens - English and French - French gardens are neat and manicured (like the palace that we went to), but English ones are 'wild'. They were ok - a great place to come and chill out when the weather is nice, and there is somewhere you can surf (although we didn't actually see it) - but to be honest, after 5 hours of walking we were both pretty shattered and parked out! Again, we opted to walk back towards 'home' instead of public transport and had hoped to pass a 'famous' beer garden, but with some map miscommunication, we didn't find it. So we found the next best thing and stopped - after 8 hours of walking, we were both a bit in need of a sit down and re-hydrating!

Although we haven't seen half as much as Munich has to offer, we've still had a great time. Soaking up hostel atmosphere and visiting a few of the must see sights. It's good to leave bits to do if we come back again!

Tomorrow - Stuttgart and the beginning of our journey back to England. In 3 weeks' time we will be in Nepal and both of us cannot wait!!