Germany, Austria & Switzerland Road Trip

TMPE55 - Meggan Europe
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Jenn: hey everybody. Welcome back to the travel mug podcast. We're so happy you're here. We're happy you're listening to us. And this week, Meggan is gonna tell us all about her Europe travels. And I'm so excited because I actually haven't heard about them yet. You've kind of been keeping it a little bit secret from each other before we did these episodes.

Like we did mine last week. So. Yay. Yay. Yay. All right, Meggan, tell me about your grand European tour.

Meggan: Our European adventure. Yeah, like we did like so much and then preparing for the podcast kind of just like had me obviously rehashing it and how much we did. And I swear it almost made me just as like tired all over again because we have never had a trip before where every day we were just like a hundred percent exhausted.

I remember in Frankfurt, it was really hot. And we came back one morning at noon because it was getting warmer and warmer. And we laid down on the bed. It was like 12:00 PM. And I was asleep within 45 seconds. like, I was just, I was so exhausted from everything we did. So it was, it was a lot. And, you know, I think too, I wanna mention that.

Jenn is much more cultural than me. , she's much more high brow than I, because literally her trip involves like much more important things in terms of like museums and castles and stuff. So if you've tuned in for a cultural journey, you're really not gonna find it here. So I just wanted to lay that out there.

So yeah, I guess you'll see in a second, so. We really planned this trip, I guess like October, 2019, it went through, I know it went through

Jenn: long time

Meggan: it was a long time in the coming. And really there were a few iterations at one point it was gonna be three weeks. At one point we were gonna include like Slovenia and other places.

But honestly we're just happy to finally go. Much like you and Ryan, we did not sleep on the plane.

Jenn: Oh, the worst. Oh, the worst.

Meggan: Very worst. Maybe me for like 45 minutes. He definitely, probably didn't maybe 15 ish cat nap or something. So of course when you land, you're absolutely exhausted. We flew Condor, which not a lot of people. I've kind of, whenever I mention. A lot of people don't know that they fly out of Halifax and it is direct to Frankfurt. And these days, anything direct is like a dream.

Jenn: How was your experience with Condor? You had a good experience?

Meggan: Yeah, overall, it was good on the way there, there were literally no people on the plane.

So in advance you could pay for the exit row. I'm really glad we didn't. Cuz they just moved us there anyway. I'm like that one sucked if we had paid for this.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: And the service was good. The food was man. Peter gets like not air sickness, but he literally can't eat on planes and he forgot because it had been so long so he's like, I'll have the pasta and then part way through, he is like, oh yeah, air pressure at this height does do nothing.

Jenn: No.

Meggan: It didn't bother me, but it bothered him. But anyway, overall, it was, it was totally fine. They had movies, they had all that stuff, so it was fine. Mm-hmm and the price wasn't bad. Like I would definitely fly them again, plus it's it's direct to Frankfurt. So it gets you right into the heart of Europe, so that was really good. Sure. It was delayed an hour leaving, but again, with all the horror stories, that's not too bad . Um, And it took approximately seven hours kind of gate to gate. We got there customs wasn't bad at all. And we rented a car for 11 out of 13 days. Car rental agency, we used was Sixt

so S I X T, and we have used them in the past in Iceland with no issues. And I think we might have used them in Ireland. I'm not sure, but we've at least used them twice. No issues, either time. And this time we rented an Audi, which was fun. Uh, But it was very expensive. So the total cost of the rental was about 1300 ish euros.

I wanted a BMW and I didn't get it. So, that was a - that was a bust.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: And we did pay for the full insurance, which I don't have any regrets about. That's just always for peace of mind for me. But next time I have to say, in terms of a tip, I would go for the cheaper of course is always better, but cheaper, but smaller car because parking in Europe in a lot of places can be dicey and the smaller the vehicle for the smaller spaces is better. So again, I would definitely recommend a small car depending on the amount of people with you and the amount of luggage that you have.

Jenn: Right. For sure. That makes sense.

Meggan: And any of the accomodations I mentioned, we booked everything on booking.com. They have great cancellation policy. Airbnb I'm sure is an option. It just scares us a little bit because of some of the cancellations can be wonky. So we've just never had a personal issues with booking.com. So that's why we continue to use it. Yeah. In terms of trips. So

Jenn: yeah. Where did you go? First, obviously you landed in Frank Frankfurt and then what happened.

Meggan: And so from there we drove about 45 minutes in the Autobahn, which is terrifying. I'm just gonna say like terrifying, but also fun. Like we were in like the grandma lane, which I'm fine with. There's no shame in that. And then like we, but at times we were doing 130 or 140 and then Peter would be like, oh my God, you have to like, look at this person coming.

And in the far speedy lane, someone probably be going anywhere between 200 and 230 kilometers an hour. Like the roads are pristine. They would have to be. There's no potholes or anything because they don't have the frost and thaw issues that we have here. So their highways were perfect. And the Autobahn is an experience like it's, it's wild, but never in our entire trip. Did we see one accident? Not one. So people obviously have it down.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: Like they're good to go. Literally. And we drove about 45 minutes. We ended up in Heidelberg, Germany which is where we spent our first. Two nights now in past trips, we've only spent one night in our first place.

Jenn: Okay.

Meggan: But we also find we're still tired from that. So that's why we decided this time to do two and might do that going forward. Cuz it worked really well in terms of being able to regroup kind of. Our hotel was Hollander Hoff. It was right on the Neckar river and we had a river view. So the hotel itself was okay, but we knew that going into it.

It was really reasonably priced, which was great. And the, it was the location that we were after and it didn't disappoint. So we could see the river, it was walk out the door, were at the river. And there, we sort of walked the old European streets. We hiked up heaven's ladder, which. Why do we, why do we end up in these hike situations Jenn?

Jenn: I dunno. It's like, we love to torture ourselves.

Meggan: And I think that's exactly it. And I heard about this and if you went to the top, there was like a beer garden and stuff up there. And like, that was the original goal. And we got up partway and I'm talking absolutely up and we got up partway and then we stopped to get like some pictures.

And I said to Peter, like, I'm good here. If you wanna continue for a, a brew, have at it, but I shall not continue. Um, Anyway, but we got really great pictures from the city up there. So that was really all I wanted. Anyway, the beer I didn't really care about. And we did a river cruise on a whim. We had seen them going by, and we happened to walk up to a boat that was boarding and we're like, okay, we're here, let's go. So that's how we ended up on our boat cruise. And then we had some evening beverages in the lively, old town it's really happening there. Kind of seemed like a young crowd very charming city, very scenic, great way to start the trip. Definitely recommend Heidelberg. Ah, I know. So from there we traveled to Switzerland for three nights and we stayed in Lauterbrunnen.

There's a bunch of villages, really close by, Interlaken, et cetera. But we chose Lauterbrunnen because of the waterfall that's central in the town. I do wanna say, as a tip, when driving in Switzerland on their highways, you do need a vignette. It's like just a square sticker that you put in your window.

They don't have toll roads. So you paying for this vignette covers the tolls.

Jenn: I see.

Meggan: Yeah. And you can buy it at gas stations as you approach the Swiss border. So you just literally have to stop at a random gas station. Say, do you have vignette for Switzerland? And then they'll sell it to you.

Jenn: Right?

Meggan: It did cost around $60 Canadian cuz it's Switzerland and they like to charge you a lot of money. And at the border they checked to ensure that you had one they didn't care if you had your passport. But darn it. You better have that vignette. And on that note when passing between borders in the EU, it required nothing. So there was no passport check ever, no vaccine check, nothing. You just drove on through as if you were in the same country, but the languages on the signs changed.

Jenn: That is bizarre. That is not what I would've expected, especially. I mean, my only experience with driving across a border is. Canada to the US, and it's banana grams

Meggan: yes. Yes. Like it's nothing like it, there might be, and I'm only saying might be a sign that says welcome to Switzerland or welcome, but we didn't always even see those. There was just on our GPS, there was a dot.dot, and Peter's like, well, that's the border. I'm like, well, good to know.

Jenn: yeah

Meggan: but like literally there's no one. So it's, it's easy peasy. The EU. Brilliant. I loved it so much. In Lauterbrunnen, we stayed at hotel silver horn. It's not a big town. We did have an amazing view of the valley and the Staubach waterfall. It was perfect and I cried when I saw it. But of course it wasn't cheap to stay at that hotel in advance online, we had bought, as you knew that I was. Remember, I messaged you and I'm like, I don't dare to buy the travel pass cuz I don't think we'll go well.

Jenn: Yeah,

Meggan: I did. And we went and it was all good. So that kind of allowed us to take trains and buses and cable cars and not have to pay individually each time the pass was likely worth it. Although it didn't take you to the two highest peaks there, which was kind of a rip off they're like we'll get you most of the way there. And then you have to pay extra and to go to the top of Europe, the Jungfraujoch it's called, we had to still pay with the pass and it was like 50 or 75% off, like 200 Swiss Franks, more.

Which was probably $240 Canadian or something more. Be in the past anyway, we're just like, is that with the discount? He's like, yes, no. Oh my Christ,

Jenn: what?

Meggan: I know, anyway, it was brutal. But while we were there we did a, this was our like, Overload of fresh air. Like, I don't know if I've ever had this much fresh air in my life.

We did a lot of outdoor activities. We saw all the nearby surrounding villages cuz a lot of the cable cars and stuff went there. So Murren, Grindelwald, Wengen, took a lot of trains, cable cars and gondolas, which I really loved, like traveling that way.

Jenn: Mm-hmm

Meggan: It was just really peaceful and beautiful. And we ate a lot of cheap chocolate

Jenn: delicious.

Meggan: A lot. like everything else cost double or triple what you thought it was except giant chocolate bars were 50 cents. it was, it was such a weird conundrum. We're like, I guess we'll just eat chocolate. Oh, good.

Jenn: Okay.

Meggan: It's gotta be all the nutrients we need in there. It's a plant in the beginning. Okay. So yeah, Switzerland's very expensive. So we did eat a lot of meals or a few meals, I should say, from the grocery store, they had delicious tuna sandwiches. But I did get the Fondue that I was dreaming of. So it was worth it, but for two people for fondue and like a basket of bread, it was about $70 Canadian.

Jenn: Hmm.

Meggan: For a pot of cheese. Yeah,

Jenn: but as long as it was delicious cheese, then ,

Meggan: it was, I guess we're gonna have to just go with it.

And it was really good and it's an experience, yada, yada yada, it's fine. Yeah. So that was a lovely stay and it was exhausting and we did all the things. And then from there we headed to Austria and on the way we pass by the small country of Liechtenstein, and we stopped in for lunch because why not add another country,

Jenn: put another pin in your map, baby.

Meggan: That's exactly - oh my goodness we haven't pinned our map. Oh my goodness. We'll have to do that when I get off

Jenn: You gotta pin your map.

Meggan: When I get to record the podcast, we'll go pin the map. So of course Liechtenstein uses the Swiss Frank. And it was just as expensive as Switzerland. So, yeah. So we did go to Vaduz which is the capital of the country. It was very picture us very quaint again, well, worth it to stop into, I guess at that point was our third country on the way. So the next stop was Austria in Innsbruck where we stayed for three nights on the way there. Because you're traveling through mountains, there's a ton of tunnels, like a lot, a lot, which like, you know, I've heard of tunnel vision.

Well, it's a real thing. cause after a while we're both like, like we're so tired of tunnels and we went through the ninth longest road tunnel.

Jenn: Oh, wow.

Meggan: In the world. And so we're in it. And after a while we're talking and then I'm just like, have we been in this tunnel like a really long time? And Peter goes, well, I didn't wanna tell you, but the sign said it was 15 kilometers long.

I'm like in this tunnel tunnel. Anyway, it was, it was, it was just too long, frankly, too, too long.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: Another tip, you also need a vignette. We didn't even think of this before we left Canada, but once we realized about the Swiss vignette, we're like, wonder if other countries need that for the window? Austria did require a vignette but it was much more reasonably priced. It was like 10 euros for 10 days. They actually allow you to pick the amount of days. You'll need it for as compared to paying for an entire month. Whatever, so it wasn't bad. And our money of course did go much further in Austria and Germany than it did in Switzerland.

In Innsbruck, we stayed in Reidz apartments. It was super reasonable rate highly recommended. They also have laundry facilities there. About 10 minutes from the old town in terms of walking. And there was a grocery store and a literal bakery within like one to two minutes.

Jenn: Perfect.

Meggan: Oh yeah. The bakery made me happy.

I said to Peter got up early as he always does. And I'm like, I have this like European dream that you go to the bakery and choose some fresh croissants and we'll have those with our breakfast. So we did, and you got like chocolate croissants or whatever. And I was like, this is, this is perfect.

Jenn: That's a good life. That's a good,

Meggan: I know I love some fresh baked goods.

Jenn: Me too.

Meggan: Groceries were incredibly cheap. Like I'm talking like a block of cheese and I know the listeners can't hear me, but I'm gonna say like a regular Canadian block of cheese.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: It was like a $1.50

Jenn: I know. It's crazy. Like Scotland was like that too. Cheese was incredibly cheap and I ate a lot of cheese.

Meggan: right. One should eat the cheap cheese while they can eat the cheap cheese. Yeah. The dairy farmers of Canada are screwing us here. in Europe cheese is where it's at.

Jenn: So good.

Meggan: Um, And to save money, we did buy the cheap groceries and had breakfast both days in our apartment.

So some highlights of Innsbruck which was a, probably our favorite spot.

Jenn: Okay.

Meggan: Oddly. I think it was just unexpected. How lovely it was. The old town, every city pretty much in Europe has an old town. So we did a lot of exploring grabbed coffee there. People watched, walked around, saw a few sites, which I had put on Instagram in terms of like this gold roof that was really famous, but like, Didn't mean much to me, I guess, but like we got pictures of all the things, but it was the sight seeing, I guess that meant the most for me.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: The top of Innsbruck we went to, which was a cable car onto the mountain and we got incredible views of Innsbruck, how we came home without COVID 19 is beyond me. the amount of cable cars we were shoved into, like faces to the glass.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: I can't even tell you and mask wearing there. Bless their heart. It's about 2%.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: And so there was one point in the cable car, actually, top of Innsbruck, one going up. And I went, said to Peter out of the side of my mouth, if we don't come outta here with COVID, we're never getting COVID ,

Jenn: it's a damn miracle.

Meggan: It is. I tell you either we've had it and didn't know it, or we're just like superhuman. I don't know what it is yet. We visited all the green spaces in Innsbruck. They have a lot of like parks and stuff. That was lovely. Probably one of my highlights, although it has nothing to do with Innsbruck is that we drove to Italy for lunch. I know that sounds bougie. And it's gonna be like how I introduce myself to people going forward.

like tell us a fun fact about yourself. Well, I drove to Italy for lunch. Now I have to credit Peter because I'm a chicken. And I was like, well, the car is safely parked. We don't need to go to Italy. Like. He's like it's 48 minutes away. He's like, tell me a time when you are gonna get to go to Italy for lunch again.

I know we'll go to Italy someday, but just for lunch. And I'm like, okay. So we got in the car and we drove on these like super windy roads, like. After so many twists and turns, I almost started laughing cuz it felt like a video game or something. like, I, it was the most turns I've ever gone around.

Anyway, we ended up in a small border town of Bonnero um, and we had the best lasagna and tiramisu of my whole life. I think about it a lot actually. In Innsbruck as well, we went to a bar called M and M cocktail bar. It was owned by a wonderful married couple Michael and his husband, his husband was the bartender.

I can't remember his name, cuz it was like not a typical name. Start with an M of course

Jenn: I was like, did it start with an M?

Meggan: It did, but it's not a typical name. So I can't remember it, which was, which is awful, but he was like a master of drinks. I can't recommend this place enough. Like I told Peter I'm like, I can't imagine we'll be an Innsbruck again, but if so, like I need to go there because I had, and again, you know, I'm not a big drinker.

We're not really huge drinkers anyway, , the menu was probably 25 pages long.

Jenn: Oh my gosh.

Meggan: It was only drinks. There was no food. I've never seen a bar menu that huge. So then I got panicky. You know how you like? Oh my goodness.

Jenn: Oh, I couldn't choose. I'd have a hard time choosing.

Meggan: I dunno what to pick and didn't know it was gonna be 25 pages. So I'm just like, oh, I'll have the cherry vanilla, pina colada I like those flavors. So we sat at the bars. We always do. Cause we love to chat with people. They bring the drinks over a they're huge B best drink of my whole life. best. Drink of my life. It tasted like a yogurt smoothie. oh my God. It was the best thing I ever had.

And then for food there, we kind of had like an Italian theme. So we had like pizza, like three times, and then we had some really great Asian fusion as well. And another thing to say is sort of like nearly everything closes in Austria on Sundays, which was also another reason to go to Italy because they have like a lot of like high end outlets and stuff there.

We didn't really buy anything, but we went to them, but there's lots more open in Italy on Sundays than in Austria. Did you in Scotland? Was it like that?

Jenn: The small towns were, so when we were like in Portree on the Isle of Skye, a lot of stuff was closed on Sundays, especially restaurants. But like the big cities stuff was open, but yeah, definitely the smaller towns, it was hard.

Meggan: I felt like Nova Scotia before sun Sunday shopping. I was like, this feels very strange. Like restaurants were, but like grocery stores were closed. The M and M bar was closed. Like bars were closed.

Jenn: The bars were closed. Interesting.

Meggan: They're serious. Yeah, Sundays are serious businesses. Next, when we left Innsbruck we headed to Hallstatt Austria for two nights.

On the way we did visit a few historic sites such as the Eagles nest and the Berghof which took us back. Into Germany, actually, we wouldn't have known it driving, but that's, we went back into Germany who knew we didn't, unless the dot.dot on the thing hadn't showed us. So these are sites from world war II that were significant to Hitler, which will contrast like another spot we visited later.

But I think we kinda wanted to see all of it. Do you know what I mean? Like we wanted to take in the history from all sides. Yeah. It was interesting. I mean, the pictures are funny because we didn't know what to do with our faces because

Jenn: yeah.

Meggan: it's like where he had his, like, where he spent a third of his time as the Berghof and it's just a retaining wall. And we're there and we're like, I don't, I can't smile for this picture, but like, what do I do with my face? I do. Yeah. Anyway. Yeah, it was weird and it felt somber and it was strange and it was really foggy and it was, it was eerie. So yeah. It was a, it was an interesting visit.

So once we got to Hallstatt, this town. Oh my gosh. Talk about in Instagramable. It's is the town that is the like inspiration for the movie frozen. I've never seen it, well, this town Hallstatt is the inspiration for that.

Jenn: Great.

Meggan: It's not a food Haven. Very weird. Most restaurants had a low rating for food. Like it was not a place where you're like, we're gonna have some great dining experiences here, cuz no

Jenn: interesting.

Meggan: Just no it was really all about the town and its beauty here. And it's suffering, unfortunately though I do wanna say from over tourism, we've talked about this before. But because it is so picturesque people flock there.

So they've actually limit now how long tour buses can stay.

Jenn: Interesting.

Meggan: So if during the day there are only day trippers tour buses can only stay X amount of time and then they need to leave. And you can't even take your vehicle into the main town center.

Jenn: Okay.

Meggan: So you have to park in a parking garage and catch a shuttle. And we, we only figured this out after driving back and forth a few times, and then Peter's like, I don't know what to do. Cuz we were supposed, the GPS was telling us to turn into this little lane. Right. And the ladies there saying, sorry, you can't. Well, what are we supposed to do? So eventually he pulls up to her, I wind down the window. I'm like, we're staying in there. Like, could you let us in? Yeah. And she's like, you have to go park in P one and catch a shuttle. I'm like, there's some good information to have.

Jenn: Well, geez. Like somebody should, well, good thing. We're putting this information out there. People.

Meggan: I know. I know it was, it was very bizarre. I mean, it wasn't complicated once we knew. Right.

Jenn: But you need to know that in advance.

Meggan: The knowing was the important part. And it's really weird too, because only 800 people total live in this small town. And every year over a million people visit.

Jenn: Whoa, whoa.

Meggan: It's it's crazy. Crazy. Crazy. So during the day it's overwhelmed with people.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: And then at night it's a ghost town. Only people that are left are the few people that live there. And the few people, it seem like that are staying overnight. It's a very weird dichotomy.

Jenn: That is very strange. Do you, it is, do you think peop like, is it just because it's very Instagramable?

Meggan: Yes.

Jenn: Like is what's driving the tourism.

Meggan: Yes, it is. It is because people want the shot and the word has spread. And if you go to YouTube and you put in Hallstatt, I there's like hundreds and hundreds of videos that come up about it. And it's all about sort of the picturesque part of it. Cause if you're a day tripper, you're not really doing a lot of the things that you can do there.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: You're literally just coming, snapping some pictures and then getting on your tour bus, which is, which is kind of a shame. But if you are staying there, a couple of the things that I would recommend is a. It's right on this a beautiful lake. I think it's called Hallstätter See. It's like the lake that we were on and we rented a small electric boat.

You didn't need a license. Um, And we went out onto the lake for an hour in this wee little boat. It was so much fun. It was 27 euros. There's no motorized vehicles on it.

Jenn: Right.

Meggan: So it's not like Halifax Harbor, where you have to like dodge SeaDoos. . It did it wasn't like that. So it was very relaxing and very lovely.

We also visited the world's oldest salt mine for a tour. That was really fun. Sounds not fun, but we did have a good time. It was around 55 euros for both of us. Please go, right when it opens, we've talked about this before on the podcast, but go early. Because during the school year you will be overwhelmed with small children.

Jenn: Oh, Love a tour school tour group.

Meggan: Oh yeah. And when we came out, after our tour was over, there was probably 250 to 300 kids milling about I'm like I had just gotten here now. I would be like, no,

Jenn: no goodbye.

Meggan: No, it was, it was a lot. We also of course walked the streets. It is so beautiful and quaint and unique at literally every turn the streets are so narrow.

I wouldn't wanna drive a car there anyway. So thank gosh, we got the shuttle in. It is an Instagrammable and picturesque for a reason. It truly is. Yeah. And we did eat and had a drink like at Lakeside restaurants that were there. And we honestly just sat and enjoyed the view a lot. It is one of the most picturesque places on earth I've ever seen.

So I get it. It's just a shame if that makes sense.

Jenn: Oh, for sure. Yeah.

Meggan: So we really loved Austria. We'll definitely go back for more exploring. There's so many other places there to see.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: So our second to last stop was actually Dachau Germany, which is the contrast to the Eagles nest and the Berghof.

We just felt it was important to sort of witness like the history for ourselves.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: It was a really hot day didn't feel at all. Like I could complain. Really not my place. But it was very somber while we were there. I'm so glad we went. But it wasn't an easy place to visit. Mm-hmm it's free, obviously.

You have the opportunity to go through the museum. They have tons of like plaques and, and information to read. And there's some artifacts like letters and stuff like that. You are able to visit the barracks so where people had to sleep see where the roll call happened. And you could read about the roll call and I guess it's stuff we never think about, but roll call was one of the most distressing parts of their day. sometimes of course they're malnourished and they're sick and they're whatever. And sometimes they were, regardless of the weather had to stand there one plus hours during roll call. And even if someone had unfortunately perished, they had to drag the bodies of the perished people to roll call because if not everyone was accounted for, they would be there longer.

Right. And like to walk through that courtyard. It, I don't know. It was just, it was really hard. And then of course, we were able to see the gas chambers too, and it was all really heavy. So you can do a guided tour. or you can walk it on your own and we chose to walk it on our own because well, a, I don't love guided tours, but B I knew there would come a point where I would just need to leave.

Like it would just be too much. And it did get to that point after the gas chambers, there's only a little bit more to see anyway, but we're both kind of like, we gotta go

Jenn: mm-hmm

Meggan: like, it was, it was just too heavy, but I'm so happy. We went in terms of like witnessing it with our own eyes and hopefully nothing like that obviously ever happens again.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: But Dachau itself, it is a cute town. Our hotel was Dah-Inn it's a cafe and a hotel. A room is great. We had street parking. We went to a really great bavarian restaurant for supper and we had schnitzel. Yes, I had schnitzel. I don't regret it. I'm sorry. It was probably the best thing I've, I've eaten in a very long time.

Jenn: Totally.

Meggan: And then we've been visited the palace there it's gardens. And we had a few cocktails in the old town, I guess we kind of just wanted to experience more of the town because earlier in the day was so heavy and we were just wanted to, we wanted to do something lighter. So we were able to enjoy the town a little bit.

Jenn: Yeah. I don't like hear much about the town. So it's really nice that you, you got to enjoy it.

Meggan: Yeah. And I imagine living there and that being all your town is known for. That must be hard as well. So yeah, I wanted to make sure we sort of like spent money other places and sort of did other things to like support the rest of it as well, because I'm sure there's probably a lot of day trippers there as well, because we could literally see up from the palace gardens, we could see Munich.

So it's very, very close. Well, a lot of people probably go there, but stay in Munich. So. It was good to stay there and experience that as well. Yeah. And then finally, from Dachau what we did is we headed for the airport to return our rental car and then we opted to get a taxi into Frankfurt, which is where we spent our last two days, great apartment overlooking the Main river, which is a tributary of the Rhine.

I'm really not even sure we saw the Rhine. like we saw a bunch of rivers and things, but I'm not sure any of them were the Rhines. So we literally have to go back. Cause I don't think we've seen it yet. See so yeah. Oh, wait, one sneaky thing is we got to the apartment where we staying early, so probably noon.

And we went to check in and she's like, yeah, it's ready. She's like, but if you wanna check in early it's 30 euros.

Jenn: Mm-hmm .

Meggan: Oh, I don't think so. Sally, you're not getting me there. So they just stored our luggage and we needed a late checkout. I could understand paying for a late checkout.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: So we didn't spend the money on the check-in. They let us in at two instead of three anyway. Right. And then we paid for a late checkout the last day. I'm like, that's worth it, but to not let us check in early, if the room's just sitting there, I was like, that's icky.

Jenn: I know I've had that happen to you before in Miami. And we paid it. But I was like, this is ridiculous. Like it is sitting there. Nothing's going to happen in the next two hours.

Meggan: Yeah. It's lame. It's very lame. Anyway, don't recommend places doing that. And we were there during a lovely heat wave. So, and I didn't have summer clothes with me. I had t-shirts and stuff, but like, by the end, I'm like, I'm so sick of everything in this suitcase I wanna throw it in this river. So anything we did was the morning or evening because literally temperatures in the afternoon were just scorching. But some of the highlights of Frankfurt were Main towers. You pay like eight euros, a person it's like 54 flights up and you go and you can get really great panoramic views of the city.

There's a footbridge that crosses the Main river has tons of locks on it, almost the whole bridges locks. And you get really great views of, of both angles of the city. We went to old town, which is known as Romberberg and there's a beautiful cathedral there. That had been destroyed as well during world war II, but they rebuilt it in its old style.

So it still looks like the old town, even though it was destroyed. We watched some Rick Steves before we left and he recommended going to Kleinmarkthalle which is a food market. And the food looked incredible. The whole place was just like the best looking food I've ever seen in my whole life. So whether it's ready to eat. Purchase. It was awesome. And then we sold around the pedestrian walking street. So there was no cars allowed on, it had really high end shopping. I did not indulge, but there was a lot of potential ,

Jenn: especially when you're sick of your wardrobe. And you're like, I just need something new.

Meggan: I wanted to take that suitcase and just burn it in the street. I'm like, I so sick of it and I overpacked, but I almost wore all of it. So I was like, did I over pack? I don't know.

Jenn: Maybe you didn't over pack.

Meggan: I know. I know. So Frankfurt is where epic journey ended. There's a lot more detail I could go into of course, but these are kind of the highlights. And overall, I just wanna say like, I'm so in love with Europe, like where can you be in one country and just choose another one for lunch?

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: Like we did it twice. And the ease of traveling, especially in the EU is incredible. And we truly had like an amazing trip with no real hiccups. And I feel fortunate, especially after two years of planning that it actually worked out. Cause there are things, of course you can't plan for like traffic or vehicle issues or whatever. And we didn't have any of that. So like, I just feel so fortunate.

Jenn: Yeah. It's funny. Cuz we had breakfast together, you know the week that we both left. Right? Yeah. And you were just like, I don't, I don't believe this is happening. I don't believe that I'm going. I mean, I think I felt the same way to an extent, but this was like your third time planning this trip.

Meggan: Yeah. It felt surreal. And like on the plane getting ready to take off, I'm like, I can't believe this is happening, but yeah, like it was perfect. I'll ensure to post lots of pics over the duration of this episode. So stay tune through our social media. And thanks so much to everybody for letting both of us indulge on our you know, our big trips because to start a travel podcast during the pandemic is one thing.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: But then for us to finally actually go on trips and be able to actually talk about traveling is a big deal.

Jenn: It is. And it's, it's, , it's really nice. It's just like really, really nice. But I know I have, I have some questions, so.

Meggan: All right.

Jenn: First of all, how did you handle the currency money situation when you were switching countries a lot.?

Meggan: So everything was pretty much the Euro.

Jenn: Right.

Meggan: The only thing that wasn't was Switzerland and that was Swiss Frank's and we didn't get any.

Jenn: Okay.

Meggan: So we used card the whole time. And then when we needed to pay for parking, when we first got there, we went to Interlaken for a little bit.

Jenn: Yeah.

Meggan: And there was a nice lady behind. And she just told us we could use euros. When I put in a 20 Euro, I actually got change back, which was beneficial for later when we needed a little bit of Swiss Franks.

Jenn: Right.

Meggan: So yeah, like we didn't have to switch. We just had euros the whole time and it worked except Switzerland. And of course, One day in Switzerland, the grocery store the visa machine was down. So they only would be taking cash. The one time. But anyway, they let us use Euro bills. We just couldn't use change. So that even worked out. So, yeah, like, I mean, if you wanna get some Swiss, Franks for ease, but we just used card in the whole country.

Jenn: Did you take euros with you?

Meggan: Yeah, we did. I think we took 500 and then while we were there, we got. Maybe like a hundred or 200, just to sort of finish off the trip with. And so yeah, we did take some, you don't need them though. I mean, almost everywhere took card, but I do like foreign countries having a bit of cash.

Jenn: I do too. I, I like having a bit of cash in, in, in canada too.

Meggan: Yeah,

Jenn: because you could have a situation like

we just had where like literally Interac goes down across like the country. Right. And never know. And you never. So it is nice to have some cash. Yeah. Second question was like, how many nights did you stay? Was it mostly like two nights in most places or two and one nights or...?

Meggan: Everything was two or three.

Jenn: Okay.

Meggan: The only place we did one was Dachau

Jenn: right.

Meggan: Everywhere else was two and three nights, which is very different for us because we actually talked about that. In Iceland, like our first six or seven nights were one nighters. I don't even know why or how, but I guess it was just so much to, to see. Yeah. As there was here, but I think we just planned maybe even a little bit differently then. So it was easier on Peter in particular because he did all the driving. And at the end of the day, when we got our receipt, he drove 1,818 kilometers.

Jenn: Wow.

Meggan: So, and a lot of the driving days were between three and four hours, which isn't a lot here. But when you get somewhere where you have to be really cognizant of what's going on around you, and if it involves the Autobahn you just have to be really careful. There were times where we actually just got off the main highway when we had times and we drove through the countryside, which was a nice switch as well. So yeah, like. I don't know. I think those those extra nights were, were a good and you plus you get to experience the place. It's not like, you know, you stop at an airport for two hours. You can't say you were there. Well, yeah, one night's a little too short, but if you, but if you have to, you have to, and we I'm sure we will again.

Jenn: Yeah, I think so. For me in Scotland, we did like two nights, two nights. Four nights, two nights, four nights. And I found the two nights very fast. Yeah. And I think,

Meggan: cause it's really one day

Jenn: it's really one day, like it's really not enough. And I, that was my first time doing that sort of trip where you were moving lot around a lot more. And I think in the future I'll be a lot more. I'm glad we didn't have any one nighters, because I feel like that would've just been like, oh my God, we just got here and now we're leaving. Yeah. I think in the future, I'll be a lot more cognizant of wanting to stay somewhere a little bit longer.

Meggan: Yeah. It's just the luxury of time. That's the thing as well. Like, and like what's there. So yeah, I think, you know, three nights in Lauterbrunnen in the beginning didn't seem like a lot, but once we've gone to all the places, when the third day came and we were leaving that day, we're like, you know what? This was just enough, but it really sometimes is hard to predict before you go.

Jenn: It is it definitely. Yeah. Oh, so great to hear about your trip. And I loved seeing photos that you did share earlier on our social media. And I can't wait to see even more photos because so beautiful. And I want to go myself now. So

Meggan: indeed, indeed. Well, you should.

Jenn: I know I will. I'll get there. Thanks everyone. If you enjoyed today's episode, you could leave us a review on apple podcast. For Spotify FiveStars please. We like five stars only. Yeah. I mean, if you, if you wanna give us a one, I guess that's you do you, but thank you. check out our website, beautifully updated travel mug, podcast.com maybe help us with the show by buying us a coffee, the links in the show notes.

And we will talk to you very soon. Bye everybody.