Now in Munich

We're now in Munich, having enjoyed four nights in Leipzig. Our first impression of Leipzig train station was that it was absolutely massive. It was renovated in 1997 and now includes a decent sized shopping centre too. One guidebook claimed that the area of the station is greater than the area of Leipzig's old town!

On our first full day there we went to Dresden and then on to Königstein Fortress which is to the south of Dresden. The fortress is immense. The countryside has lots of rocky outcrops and the fortress is situated on top of one of them and built into the rock. We hired audioguides and absolutely nothing was missed out in the extensive tour, with multiple options to hear even greater detail. I think we would have been there all day if we'd listened to everything! There was practically an entire village within the fortress walls and the views were stunning. We spent the evening in Dresden, wandering round and admiring the architecture. We also enjoyed some typical German food: potato and sausage soup, followed by 'Dresden lump'. Very nice!

The following day was Sunday and we eventually found Leipzig English Church, which was, in many little ways, very like St Ebbe's. After the service we went for brunch with about half a dozen others and pigged out on sausages, rolls, fruit and so on. We walked it off in the afternoon by climbing 472 steps up the monument to the Battle of the Nations that took place nearby against Napoleon.

Monday saw the reason for us staying in Leipzig: a trip to Colditz Castle. We caught a bus from Leipzig out to Colditz and then spent most of the day there. There was an English tour and various exhibitions and displays which were fascinating. Talking to people at church on Sunday, the general view seemed to be bemusement that anyone would choose to come on holiday to Leipzig at all and then when we mentioned Colditz, most of them hadn't heard of it!

We've also visited a couple of museums in Leipzig - one in the former Stasi headquarters about state control in East Germany and another about the history of East Germany and the fall of communism, which were both interesting and free!

We've also enjoyed eating pork knuckles, potato dumplings and bockwurst, and Benjamin has enjoyed the sauerkraut!

We have uploaded some photos & videos - mostly videos though as we only seem to be able to upload one file at a time; uploading videos frees up more space on our camera for more photos.