Day 5

Day 5

The morning of day five, we began as we had the previous day; by having breakfast in the cute little café on the ground floor of our hotel in Baden-Baden. It was included with our hotel charge so that was an extra plus. After this, we packed up, did a few last minute shopping stops (namely for a specific bottle of wine that Jessie insisted we bring home, she also got carded for it by a woman that spoke about three words of Englich) and got on the road to München. The Stuttgart airport was amazing, to say the least. A small, industrial city like Stuttgart had an airport that rivaled O’Hare or any other large airport in the states. We did encounter a nice little storm on the drive, complete with hail and all.

Mrs. Green had always wanted to visit a concentration camp; I had my reservations about it all. I had a hard enough time with the military cemetery; I was not sure how I would deal with a camp. We decided to stop in Dachau, which is a northwestern suburb of München. Lunch was brief, at a Burger King just off the exit. For everyone’s knowledge, fast food in Europe is very different. First off, you do not have a billion menu choices; secondly, all the combo meals already come large size so no need to “biggie size, king size, etc”. We parked at the Dachau lot; in case anyone needs a nice club to join, there is a tennis club right next door. It was very unassuming from the outside, a visitor’s center, some trails, etc. Then, we walk up to the front gate, which has a wrought iron gate which reads “ARBEIT MACHT FREI”; translate it for yourself. You walk through the gate and you are just in utter and complete shock; those words may even not be enough. There were many buildings of banners and information, education, etc. I was silent for about 99% of the time, as was Jessie. I still cannot put it into words; the military cemetery was pride and sadness for our boys that never made it home. The feeling at the camp was more of just pure void; lack of being able to comprehend the magnitude of what we were experiencing.

After Dachau, we were ready to bring the spirits back up as that was a rough one for us both. We were heading to downtown München to check into our hotel and start raising hell. We got all checked in and our hotel was quite beautiful. We are about one block from the “Old Town” in a semi red light district, but nothing too bad at all. We decided towards Hofbrauhaus as this was a MUST for me, and oddly enough, I think for Jessie also. We stopped by a Saturn store, akin to BestBuy in the states; needed a three prong adapter for the computer and of course our kit only had two prong ones. Samsonite may get a letter about this, come on, join the 21^st century. We walked past the Glockenspiel and took pictures as this was a site that Jessie had to at least see. Arrived at the Hofbrauhaus and found a table just a few rows from the oompah band. A couple of compatriots came up and asked “Hey, is anyone sitting there?” to which I respond “Anyone who asks me like that is surely welcome”. Thus we met two new friends, a middle aged couple from South Dakota, Jason and Dawn. They were over here for business, Jason works for a subsidiary of Siemens Ag. We had an amazing time with them. Also met two Canadians, we were definitely the loud North Americans but it was fantastic. I felt very knowledgeable as Jason and Dawn knew a relatively small amount of history about München. We raised our glasses, MADE DAMN SURE we looked in everyone’s eyes as we toasted (less seven years of bad sex!!). It was a wonderful evening had by all.

As we walk out of Hofbrauhaus there were 2 hefeweizen glasses randomly sitting on the side walk. I picked them up, emptied them and stuck them in our souvenir bag. I hailed a cab and we headed for the hotel bar. We sat at the bar for a drink, then off to bed.

Mr. & Mrs. Green

PS My camera died at Dachau :(