Immer in Bewegung

The title of this post “Immer in Bewegung” roughly means “always on the move” and it sums up pretty well my activities over the past week. On Tuesday I hopped on a train and headed 45 minutes out to the nearby city of Augsburg. Augsburg is a great city filled with history and offers a bit more of a relaxed pace than Munich. It played an important role in the past as a meeting place of the Imperial Diet and was also the home of Bertolt Brecht. My chief interest in going there was to visit its incredible medieval cathedral, which contains the oldest stained glass windows in all of Europe. Although badly damaged by Allied bombs during the war, the windows and much of the artwork survived. The attached Diocesan museum had incredible artifacts, including the cathedral’s original 11th century wooden doors. While wandering around the city, I haphazardly entered an evangelical church and encountered a group of American Lutheran pilgrims from Indiana and Illinois. It turned out the church and convent was where Martin Luther had been imprisoned for a short while in 1518. There’s history at every turn in Germany!

On Thursday, I took the S-Bahn out to the town of Tutzing to hike the Ilkahöhe. One of the benefits of staying in one place for an extended period of time (as opposed to standard on-the-move tourism) is that I’ve been able to see many places not commonly visited by regular tourists on a schedule. The Ilkahöhe is one such example. The trail is about 7 miles roundtrip and leads up to a mountain overlooking the Starnberger See and a chain of the Alps. It’s an extremely peaceful place with cows grazing, families biking, and older couples taking a stroll. There was a small pretty parish church and a convenient beer garden there as well. I sat on the lookout vista of the Ilkahöhe and spent several hours reading.

On Friday afternoon, I grabbed a Flixbus down to Innsbruck. Although it was pretty rainy, I spent the evening exploring around the old town and the nearby University district. I stayed the night at a great local hostel that also serves as a work training center for disabled individuals. The next morning, on the recommendation of the Rick Steves tour book, I took the bus about a half hour to a small town called Hall in Tirol. It was very pretty and had an interesting coin minting museum and a beautiful basilica. I enjoyed eating a delicious Wurst at the ongoing farmer’s market and watching daily life in a regular Austrian village. I went back to Innsbruck and spent a few more hours exploring, visiting the Golden Roof museum and the St. Jakob Dom before going to an English Mass at the Jesuitkirche. After three weeks of only attending German liturgies, it felt a bit weird hearing it in English again.

On Sunday I needed to relax a bit, so I stuck around Munich and visited the Egyptian Art Museum and the Deutsches Museum. After a nice Currywurst lunch, I headed down to the Isar and spent the rest of the day lounging, reading, and swimming at the river.

Classes are going great! I’m getting a lot more comfortable with my vocabulary and speaking abilities.