On June 20, Jim’s nephew Jonathan Steen arrived at our place in Munich after driving the short distance from Simbach Austria with his wife Jolene and son Jolin. Jolene has very strong connections with Seminar Schloss Bogenhofen as she attended a year of high school there and learned to speak German fluently. She subsequently took her four boys there in 2019 as she wanted them to learn German also. Their stay was cut short by the pandemic of early 2020 but their eldest son Elden had been smitten by an Austrian girl and they were married on August 1 of 2021 in Austria. We flew to Munich for a four day weekend and attended the wedding in spite of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. We are very close to this family and have welcomed them to our homes in Boston, London, Sevilla, Madrid, New Orleans, Denver and now Munich. They also recently hosted our youngest son Geoffrey and family at their home in Elizabeth Colorado.
Americans in Simbach Austria for the wedding.Newlyweds Elden and Evelyn Steen, August 1 2021.
That was all background. Since Jon and family had a rented car we decided to do a few day trips out of Munich while they were here. One of the day trips was to Garmisch-Partenkirchen which is on Germany’s southern border with Austria. It used to be two separate market towns which were forced to be combined into one by Adolph Hitler on January 1 1935. The 1936 Winter Olympics were held here. Nearby is Germany’s highest mountain, Zugspitze, at 2,962 metres (9,718 ft).
We took a 90 year old cog railway train to Zugspitzplatt at 2,600 meters.Halfway stop where some hikers disembark and hike to the top. There is a 4.5 km tunnel between here and the final stop.This is as far as the railway goes. We spent a couple of hours here exploring and having lunch.The highest church in Germany. The Church of the visitation of Mary.It was in the 80’s when we boarded the train, 50’s up here.Jolene and Sandy wore the jackets which happened to be in their car.The glacier here is melting fast.We are now on the cablecar headed for the top. That is some type of research institute hanging onto the side of the mountain.That is where we just came from on the cable car.The summit, even colder here.That is the real summit.We elected NOT to climb over ice and up the rocks to the summit. See how it drops off at the left.That beautiful lake at the bottom seems to be a recurring theme of our pictures. The air quality was quite poor this day. On a clear day one can see over 400 mountain peaks plus Germany, Switzerland, Italy and Austria.We took a different cablecar down this side of the mountain. Cables visible here.Back to the lake again. We disembarked from the cablecar and were met by 90 degree heat.Downtown Garmisch-Partenkirchen, quite cute.This is what you get in Germany if you ask for an iced coffee. Coffee with ice cream in it. Not too bad on a very hot day actually. Jim ordered his a coffee with ice in it which is the more traditional iced coffee but kind of boring.A quick church visit before heading home.We finished the day by picking up Elden, far right, at the train station and going to this Ethiopian restaurant recommended by our hosts here in Munich. Jim was born in Ethiopia and Jonathon lived there for a few years when he was young and everyone loves Ethiopian food. Jolin and Elden are twins if you are wondering.
One more blog on our day trip to Dachau up next, plus we are returning to Garmisch to spend time with Ruby and Will who we met in Japan. They have a home in Garmisch and we will be spending time with them there and also in Munich.
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