Sleepy Bavarian Alps

On Sunday we got up just before 4am in order to catch the flybussen (airport bus) from Bryggen to the airport at 4:45am. Our Lufthansa flight departed Bergen at 7am, arriving at Frankfurt around 9am, then we had another flight to Munich, then caught the airport train to the Ostbanhauf and then another train to Berchtesgaden - finally arriving at our destination at 5pm! A long day of travelling. It was a miserable day in Berchtesgaden - very cold with unrelenting rain. After checking into the hotel (nice large room with two balconies) we went for a walk into town to find some supplies - after wandering around for about an hour in the cold rain we finally found a kebab shop that was open that we could at least buy some drinks from! Otherwise the city centre was a ghost town - with a few other tourist looking in the shop windows... Thats when we realised that we weren't in the cities anymore, this really is just a small alpine town. We had dinner at a small pizzeria - (which included 4 glasses of wine and half a pizza take-away in a box) came to 30 euro with tip - much more reasonable that Norway!!

We slept like logs that night and didn't get up til 9:30am this morning (our first proper sleep in!) - with the sound of the constant rain helping us to sleep all night... We looked around the city centre in the morning (now things we open)! We were booked in to do a historical eagle's nest tour at 1pm, but when we got there we were told that the road to the eagles nest was closed due to heavy snow fall on the mountain. Therefore we did a shortened version of the tour, to Obersalzberg, the documentation centre and the nazi bunker system. We saw plenty of snow down at this level of the mountain - so fully believed that the road further up could have been quite dangerous. The tour was very interesting, giving a very good background to the importance of the area to Hitler and the Nazis. Berchtesgaden was actually the second seating place of Hitler's parliament and the only place where Hitler owned a home. He received many of his important guests (including foreign dignitaries) at this home and conducted many of his important meetings and briefings with his closest staff here. The bunker system below his home and the surrounding buildings were meant to provide a last shelter for Hitler and his followers (with food and supplies to last at least 6 months) however at the end Hitler decided not to flee from Berlin to Berchtesgaden, thinking that this decision was less "cowardly".

Enjoyed a nice bottle of red in the evening (in a vain attempt to warm up a little) before going to a nice Bavarian pub for dinner.

Hoping the weather clears up a little tomorrow, so that we can actually see all the surrounding mountains!!

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