Home again!

The next morning dawned… well, neither bright nor early. In fact, it dawned a good hour after our alarm went off. Granted, this isn’t saying much in Germany in late December, but still. We pried ourselves out of bed and prepared for our flight out.

Then the cockups began. Nothing major, but a series of small ones starting with breakfast. The hotel, which was otherwise very good and very reasonable, had a breakfast buffet which we recalled being a bit on the pricy side, but not too bad. To put things into perspective: you can get a perfectly reasonable and tasty breakfast at any Imbiss (lunch counter) or Bäkerei (bakery) for about five euros. The hotel in München charged fifteen euros for the two of us, so about seven fifty. The one here was fifteen euros as well, but we had a train and a plane to catch, so we opted for the buffet.

It was a delicious buffet, but then we went to pay and realized this one was fifteen euros per person- not total. Good food, but still a bit much to spend on coffee, croissants, hard boiled eggs, cold cuts, etc. Whatever, we knew we were going to be on a plane all day, so a proper meal was in order and we weren’t rushed. Call it a win.

Then we tuckered off to the train, made a few wrong turns in the labyrinthine station, and found the local train to the airport and the trouble really began. First there were not ticket machines on the platform, so I watched the bags and Amy ran off to find one. Naturally, the escalator to the platform with the machines one went one way, so she had to find the machines, find the stairs down at the other end of the platform and come down to tell me that the machine hadn’t taken her credit card.

OK, no big deal, this was why we had extra time. I had a card that we’d bought our tickets to München on, so I knew that one worked and I ran off to find the machines, leaving Amy with the bags. Except I’m paranoid when I travel, so I lugged my backpack along, with my messenger bag slung over it. Up the escalator, find the ticket machines, and… it didn’t work. Tried another one- same thing. I clicked through the screen to find the accepted payment methods (thank god I speak German!) and found that they take a) charge cards (which I didn’t have); b) Deutsche Bahn cards (which I also didn’t have) and c) cash (which I also didn’t have). So off I went to find a Geldautomat (ATM).

I found that, got the smallest amount I could (20 euros), contemplated asking at the info booth next to the Geldautomat about using credit cards on the ticketing machines, discarded that idea, and rant back to the machine. No luck- it wouldn’t take my money. The damn machine cut off at 10 euro bills, and accepted nothing larger.

So, if the ATM only gives out 20s and greater, and the ticket machine only takes 10s and smaller, then there must be a change machine somewhere, right? Wrong. I ran back to the info desk to find it empty. No bell, no button, nothing. And no jacket slung over a chair or coffee cup indicating they’d be back. I ran upstairs to the main level to find… something.

Since this wasn’t an international station, there was no change office, and whle there were plenty of Geldautomate, there were no staffed banks. Then, there! A Bäkerei! They always have cheap stuff! I bought a pretzel (I’m a sucker for good pretzels), got my 19.20 in change, and ran back downstairs, found the ticket machine, bought our tickets, ran to the other end of the platform, took the stairs down, and ran to Amy. Our train pulled up, we got on, and the train pulled out. Made it!

Naturally, they never checked out tickets, and the pretzel was the worst pretzel I’ve ever eaten in Germany, but it was worth a bit of sweat.

And that’s really about all. We found our outgoing airline (Lufthansa, running a flight for United), breezed through security, and got on the plane. We had a two-hour stopover in Heathrow London where we had to go through security again (since now we were going to America, and that meant heightened security because terrorists were totally going to blow up any plane going to America. They took our duty-free sodas, the bastards!), and found a pub for fish and chips and a pint of Hobgoblin. Then some browsing in the duty-free shops (nice whiskey selection in one and I got to compare a bunch of tablets in another) then back on the plane to SFO.

I’d loaned my car to my brother for the duration of the trip, so now we had a pickup waiting for us- best idea ever! He ran us home, first Amy, then I dropped my brother and drove myself the last 20 minutes of our ten-day, 17,000 mile trip.