Munich Day 3 - Auer Dult, Residenz Palace, Treasury and Cuvilles Theater

10/25/2012

We walked to Auer Dult this morning, which was a brisk ½ hour walk from our hotel. The Auer Dult is a giant market that occurs only 3 times per year. We were lucky that out of the 3 weeks they scheduled them, we were there for one of the weeks. The other weeks are staggered throughout the year.

While it was very cute and some of the stalls were adorably decorated, they sold the weirdest things. I guess this is the stuff you sell to actual residents of Munich? There were kitchen utensils, cooking pots and porcelain, antiques, various cleaning materials for house and car, lots of cookie cutters and clothes. And it was not cheap. Cookie cutters were around 2 euros each, and there were hats there going for 80 euros! Angel really wanted a butter keks cookie cutter set. They had two different ones—one for 9.50 euro, the other for 4.90 euro.

The very first aisle we went down had silicone chocolate molds and Angel got so excited. They were 7 euro for the first (first three for 20 euro), then 6.5 euro for each after that. Angel begged to buy some; you should have seen how happy she was afterwards! Ah, the little things…

We walked to Residenz Palace afterwards. On the way, we found a Tengelmann supermarket—the second we’ve seen in Munich. The general conclusion we’ve come to about Munich is that they don’t cook much. Seriously, I wouldn’t either with how expensive raw ingredients are. It’s way cheaper just to eat out. One bunch of green onions is 1 euro! There is absolutely no way to make your own desserts here; the ingredients come in small packages and are also expensive. Alternatively, one loaf of cake is only 1.29 euro here! While the same loaf (chocolate enrobed with marzipan cake) is more than $5 in the States.

Angel bought a Ritter Sport coconut chocolate bar for 0.99 euro and Dad bought a Lindt white chocolate with almond bar for 1.99 euro. We also bought a bag of traditional German waffle cookies, with various layers of chocolate and coffee flavors. It was pretty good, but much like the cookies you’d buy in one of those Costco tins.

We ate lunch in the Residenz Palace courtyard, of the sandwiches Angel made this morning. She’s pretty awesome at it; they were delicious! Stuffed full of various cheeses, hams, prosciutto…

OMG this is the best thing ever!!! Sweet desiccated coconut with moist chocolate cake. YUM!

Residenz Palace Courtyard

We ambled into the Residenz around 1pm, which we realized later was a huge mistake. Based on the castles we’ve seen in Munich, we thought it would take only half an hour and we’d have ample time left to see the Treasury and the Cuvilles Theater (also located in the Residenz, but requires separate entrance ticket checks). The last entry for all three is 4pm, and they close at 5pm. But Residenz is huge; I think you need at least a day to do the whole palace justice. The audio guides give very thorough, very long explanations.

Fake facade as they undergo remodeling... what else is new?!

It is unfortunate that more than half the buildings of the Residenz were bombed during World War II; Munich is the birthplace of Hitler’s Nazi movement. After the war, many of the buildings were rebuilt, but not to its former glory. Many of the lavish details were left out in the rebuilding, which is a shame. The parts that survived are so intricate, it rivals Versailles in royal glory.

The ceilings are intricately carved, and the furniture count as some of the best collections in Europe. Many pieces were made by French master craftsmen, and while their legacies were lost in other countries, they were well-preserved here. The rooms are beautifully appointed… and that’s about all the audio guide we were able to listen to before we realized we’d miss the Treasury and Cuvilles if we lingered any longer. We rushed through the rest of the palace… there were many rooms with tapestries. The staircases were preserved from the original building, and the audio guide said imagine back then, when trumpeters would line each side of the staircase and foreign dignitaries would arrive through these very stairs. As the staircase is really the first part of the inside of the palace these diplomats would see, it had to be very grand to show your power.

The palace was built in the mid-1300s. And each subsequent royal family of the Wittelsbach added on to it, as this was their principal residence.  

Dad in between King Ludwig II (Left) and King Maximillian II, Ludwig's father (Right)

We rushed across the hall to the Treasury and realized that the audio guide did not work, so we left. The audio guide worker told us that she needed to reprogram the guide for us for the Treasury. It was around 3:20pm at this point, so we rushed to the Cuvilles Theater to see that first. They hold concerts here on Thursday and Saturday nights, for 28 euros per person. It is a small theater, but it was for the Wittelsbachs’ private use and designed by the famous French architect, Jean Cuvilles. It was very ornate and gilded.

We went back to the Treasury, this time with the proper audio guide. The worker was nice enough to walk us to the ticket entrance and explain to her coworker that we needed to be readmitted, as the guides didn’t work for us the first time ‘round.

The Treasury houses all the Wittelsbachs’ treasures from 1000 AD onwards. There are gorgeous crowns from the 1300s, medieval jewelry, treasure chests, gold plates with rubies and emerald insets, scepters, swords, brooches… it’s a magnificent display of history. Both Angel and dad saw the same stuff (bear pointed a handgun and a frog shape treasure).  It seems that they have the same taste J

Downtown Munich

We walked down Kaufingerstrasse to shop a bit and went to Galerie Kaufhof for the basement level gourmet grocery, where Angel insisted she needed more Lindt dark chocolate pistachio mousse. They were giving away free samples of chocolate enrobed marzipan, in flavors of pistachio, espresso, orange, pineapple, and original. Angel really liked the pistachio, but the pineapple tasted just like marzipan and the espresso was too bitter.

A block down was yet another Galerie Kaufhof department store, this time it is connected with the U-bahn/S-bahn. There is a huge shopping mall underground from Karlsplatz to Bayerstrasse. This branch is slightly more expensive for some things (the beer we bought at the first Galerie was 0.89/bottle, here it was 1.19 euro/bottle). But they sell pork knuckle, which the first did not sell. We bought one for dinner, and Mom bought her Hofbrau beer.

Good God that looks delish! Pork knuckle roasting at Haxnbauer restaurant

We rushed back to the hotel to eat it, as hot is better. There was another Tengelmann underground, not 500 feet away from the Galerie Kaufman grocery store. It was a huge grocery store but alas, we did not have time to shop at our leisure as the pork knuckle was waiting for us. It was slightly drier than Salzburg’s, and the skin was really crunchy. It hurt my teeth. It tasted kind of bland, and the meat was not as juicy. Angel commented that the German pork is cooked brown, but the Salzburg and Vienna ones were still a lovely red color… so maybe a different way of cooking? At times, I thought I was eating liver instead.

Angel: my Lindt cost the same at the Tengelmann grocery store as it does in the Galerie Kaufman. I bought a strawberry rhubarb white chocolate bar for 0.48 on sale, and it didn’t taste very good so it was a good thing I didn’t buy the more expensive, bigger bar.

It’s funny, I thought Germany was known for its ice wines but I could not find any in the grocery markets for the life of me. Instead, they sell Austrian ice wines for double the price Austria sells it for.

As we walked down Kaufingerstrasse, we saw a lot of people standing and looking up at the Rathaus church clock (the medieval-looking church). It was nearing 5 o’clock, so we thought there might be something like A Small World going on once the clock struck 12. And it did! They had bells ringing and music playing as the wooden statues danced around. The awesome part was the knights on horses with lances and they “charged” at each other. One knight was victorious and the other fell. That was pretty awesome. I swear, I totally feel like Disney must have come here when he was planning Disneyland!