Saturday afternoon in Munich

The morning consisted of sleep.  It felt good to get 12 hours of sleep with no deadlines to wake up too.

I knew I wanted to go to the English Gardens, but why take the direct route?  I took the SBahn to Marionplatz and decided to make my way north and see what I'd find.
I first happened upon a fountain and  seating area just northwest of Marionplatz.  It may very well have a name, but I didn't see one.  It had really cool metal artwork in the fountain in the shape of a mushroom patch.  You can't see it, but around the edges is a cascade of rocks, with small outlets for water -- so in effect there are 100 waterfalls surrounding the fountain.  It was really cool and covered with folks reading books, staring at the water, and enjoying the moment.

On the way out I noticed a bunch of people standing around a small eleveated table.  Further investigation revealed a really cool mini-map of downtown Munich -- probably created by some poor artist 150 years ago.

I proceeded north, keeping an eye on the map.  Along the way, just south of the southern most entrance to the English Gardens I happened upon a deserted square, with an epic statue of Maximilian.  I wanted a photo with this great character but no one was around, so I took a seat at the base of the statue.  About 2 minutes later, an older woman was walking by, and I walked up to her and just said "photo?" and motioned with the phone.  She struggled with it for a minute, but then said in clear english, "I don't think it took."  So much for Bavarians not knowing any English.  We quickly resolved this, despite a heavy German accent, and I got these gems.

It looks like on three sides people just live in apartment buildings around this thing.  What an epic view.  Despite tyranny, slavery, and oppression of the poor -- dictators really know how to build sweet monuments.  As a side note ----- see the smaller rectangular stones I'm standing on?  These things are everrrryywhere. Every sidewalk and pedestrian walkway is made of these things.  I have no idea where they come from but whoever makes them must be a billionaire.  Many of the roads are these guys too.  It must be some sort of local stone.  The downfall is that it makes cars about 10x louder for both the passengers and the people living on the road.  It looks nice though.  Oh, they are also incredibly uncomfortable to stand on if you aren't wearing hiking boots.

I continued my journey north and east, to the Englisher Gartens.  The English Gardens is like the Arb in Ann Arbor; except times 100.  And yes, I actually mean 100.  Its also comparable to Central Park in Manhattan, but it's bigger.  I have no idea what the history is, but its really really beautiful and totally free.
All of the pictures from today are available in my gallery here http://picasaweb.google.com/JohnMichael.Fischer/FirstTripToTheEnglischerGartens#

The English Gardens has a south extension that connects the park to the UBahn and lies along a slender corridor on the east side of the Isar.  I found a nice pond (with big fish!! I want to fish!), and got some folks to take another photo :)

Oh... and they have horse cops too.

Finally, I leave with you several panoramas.... I had them computer stitched so they aren't perfect, but hopefully you get a much wider field of view than my crappy cameraphone provides otherwise.  Enjoy :).

The highlight is the panorama of the Bayerischer Landtag, or the Bavarian Parliament.  Beautiful!!! 

If you want any of the originals, which scale to much much higher resolution, just email me.