Kloster Andechs

At work one of my mentors Jan recommended that Corey and I go for a walk just outside Munich along the lake Ammersee and up to Andechs Monastery.  So we did and boy was it worth it.

We left early in the morning on Saturday and arrived at the town Herrsching around 10.  It is a small village in the countryside alongside Ammersee, a large lake.  When we got there, we walked around trying to find the trail and we were walking through a small neighborhood when all of a sudden the road just dead ended and turned into the trail.  Our way to Andechs was through a forest along a stream and at one point I heard bells in the distance from the monastery.  We ascended until there was a clearing where we could see a large field and a small village and steps off to the side that led up to the monastery.  We stopped for a moment and took in the scenery and decided this was something you see in calendars and dream about visiting someday.

Kloster Andechs is a monastery of Benedictine monks that are known for their brewery.  They have been making beer there since 1455 and the profits they make they use for the church, for charity, and operations of the monastery.  Kloster Andechs is also perched on top of the ridge of a large hill that is believed to be holy and people from all over the world have come to make a pilgrimage up the mountain.

When we went up the steps toward the monastery, we were amazed at the beauty of the architecture and art of the church.  After looking around inside, we walked along the cobbled road down the hillside past buildings where the monks live, past the terrace, past the beer garden, and past the brewery.  Then we went back up toward the church and decided to eat on the terrace because that’s where most of the people were probably because of the amazing view.

We ordered food and beer.  I got a haxe, which is a huge pork leg kind of like what you imagine a caveman or a Viking holding.  With it I got potato salad and the beer they are most famous for, their doppelbock dunkel.  We went and sat down on the terrace and the view was absolutely amazing.  It looked out over rolling green hills with the forest and the mountains in the background.  The food was absolutely incredible too.  It was an amazing lunch.

All the beer comes in barrels here

The view that came with the meal

Puke station complete with handlebars

After that we walked around for a bit in the beautiful weather and then headed back toward Herrsching.  The way back was through fields strewn with flowers and open sky.  It was beautiful.  Once we got back to Herrsching, we stopped to get some ice cream and headed for the lake.  Along the edge of the lake were cafés with people out enjoying the weather.  We walked out on the large deck into the huge lake.  There were a lot of sailboats on the lake and in the distance we could see the snow-capped mountaintops of the Alps.  We soaked this in for quite a long time and then took the train back to Munich just in time for dinner.  We were both pretty wiped out from the walking.

I started off Sunday by going to an evangelical church called Freie Evangelische Gemeinde Muenchen-Nord which was just down the street.  Even though the sermon was completely in German I understood the most of it from picking up key words and the speaker was really good at articulating and giving examples.

Sunday was both Mother’s day and Janie’s birthday.  My internet was shut off in the middle of the night because our service ran out and since my roommate is moving out in a month, he wasn’t going to renew it.  So I went to Starbucks and had myself a mocha latte and Skyped with Janie for a couple hours which was awesome.  After that I called my mom for mother’s day and headed to bed.