Hauptbahnhof - Central Station

Getting from Munich’s airport to the city is an incredibly frustrating experience. Especially if you’re an idiot like me. Having got off the plane and collected my bag, I was happy to find an integrated station with a regular, direct train service into the Hauptbahnhof, a mere five-minute walk from the hostel I’d booked. The queue at the manned ticket desk was huge, while the self-service machines were relatively deserted. Naturally I chose to go with the mechanised option, chuckling to myself and murmuring something like chumps walking past the people in the snaking line. Twenty minutes later, after prodding every conceivable combination of buttons, all the while glancing at the other queue to note where I would have been had I joined it in the first place, I was about to admit defeat. Until suddenly, it happened! I actually did just admit defeat. And no, the machine wasn’t all in German, nor did it have an out-of-order sign plastered across its screen. As dense as I know I can be, it wasn’t my fault. Probably. All I remember is being able to select the journey I wanted, FLUGHAFEN to HAUPTBAHNHOF and the exact time (that had to be continually bumped to the next one as each departure time passed), but that there was no ’Buy Now’ or similar option anywhere. I could even print out a detailed list of all the times and prices for the entire day! But no option to physically purchase a ticket. So seething inside with my head hung low, I shuffled over to the old and thick people’s line for a further ten minutes of foot-tapping and anger. If Hitler had to deal with such shit-useless technology every time he flew into the city, then it definitely makes sense that Munich was the birthplace of Nazism. Spending thirty minutes trying to buy a train ticket had transformed me, a reasonably sane and placid person, into an angry and irritable twat, so the effect on a genuine mental is almost guaranteed to result in awful haircuts and genocide. Anyway, to end this on a slightly lame Bavarian tourism plug, the city’s magic beer quickly placated me. It’s a really fascinating place to visit regardless - historically, architecturally and various other assorted ally-ending words, but ignoring all that, their drink is so pure, you can easily double your regular intake and still not get hung-over. As I say, magic beer. It’ll cost you though. With our current piss-poor exchange rate, for two pints you’ll be lucky to see much change from a tenner. Or a baritone for that matter. But lame jokes that don’t even work are officially legal tender in Germany, so stuff your S-Suitcases f-full of ‘em. Unless you don’t have a stutter, in which case just fuck off.