Fortuna Dusseldorf Football Riot!

So on Sunday I experienced my first football riot. Well I guess I didn't actually experience it. Luckily I just happened to not be on the street that Maclaughlin's is on at the time that the police attacked the football fans.

The reason for the riot was because Fortuna the Dusseldorf football (soccer) team won their game which means they get to move up to the division 2 Bundesliege (sp?). So fans were super excited and a little crazy.

This first video is from April when Dusseldorf played Berlin. It's not the riot from Sunday, but it's an interesting video. It shows you just how crazy the fans/police are. It is kind of a long video and it has alot of German in it, but if you are bored and have some time to kill it is kind of weird to watch. The video opens up and ends right where I used to live with the Meisels. Their house is fairly close to the arena. So here's the video:




There was a video that showed the police attacking the people on Sunday but someone removed it. I do have some pictures I can show you though!

Here are the streets early in the day while everyone was inside watching the game.

Mark and I were at a brewery outside of the Alt Stadt when the game was going. As soon as it ended and Fortuna had one this man came running out of the brewery waving this flag. He is in the middle of the street in this picture blocking traffic.

Here is the same overly happy man daring the taxi to come forward.

This is outside of another brewery. No crazyness, jsut happy fans enjoying their favorite beer.

As it started getting later more and more police started showing up. They are the ones on the right hand side with the white helmets on.

More Police

...and even more. At this point Mark and I were in a pub that had all of the windows open because of the nice weather. Lucky for us we got some of the backlash of the police's pepper spray. That was pleasant.

The streets filled with tons of people.

People started throwing and busting up tables and chairs from restaurants in the streets. Then of course they decided that these things must be burned.

Police on the way to stop the fire.

Munich pictures!

At dinner at the Hofbrauhaus with our litre beers.
The town of Neuschwangau where the palace was located.

A lake by the palace. That is Austria in the distance.

A castle by Neuschwanstein, I forgot it's name though... Hohengau I think.

The backside of Neuschwanstein. I think they were doing some renovation...

The view from below the bridge we went on.

Neuschwanstein again!

The English Beer Garden

Mmm giant pretzel with a giant beer! That's my alcohol free beer in the background!

The restaurant we had dinner at. I had Swedish style meatballs with Spaetzle. It was sooo good, even though Mark had to help me finish it!

The brewery tour group at the restaurant.

A couple of the Swiss boys and I at the Hofbrauhaus.

Brewery tour group again.

Munich take 2

So the week before last was Mark's birthday and we went to Munich. We had been planning on doing this for a while. We flew there which was alot nicer than taking a 6 hour train ride! We arrived in Munich around noon and went to a nice outdoor restaurant in a busy plaza. I had Spatzle which is a Bavarian/Black Forest specialty noodle. It was basically like macoroni and cheese but much more amazing. That night we went to dinner at the Hofbrauhaus and the food was just as good.
The next day we went on a tour to see Neuschwanstein. This is the castle or Kind Ludwig II that alot of fairytale castles have been based off of. The Disney castle for example was based on this palace. It was a really neat tour. It was about a 2 hour train ride total ( we had to switch a bunch) there an back. We had to go with another tour group inside the palace because they give their own tours. It lasted only about 30 minutes. You weren't allowed to take pictures inside which kind of sucked, but I have a bunch of pictures from the outside I will post in my next blog.

We got back into Munich at about 7:30 or so and of course were ready for more Bavarian style food. We went to a restaurant called the Augustiner which had been recommended to me by a few people. The food was ok. Most Bavarian food is pork so that's what I got. Pork with potato dumplings. The dumplings had a really weird texture to them, I think I prefer mashed or baked potatoes better.

The next day was Saturday. We decided to get an early start and explore Munich while the weather was nice. We walked around and around and went inside just about every tourist gift shop we could find. Neither of us bought anything. After that we went to the English Gardens and stopped at both of the beer gardens we found to sample what they had. The big beer garden (the one I have pictures of) was great! They had giant pretzels and tons of tables. I had an alcohol free beer here which was actually pretty good. I also had a Radler which is the same thing as a shandie I think, 1/2 lemonade 1/2 beer. I didn't want to drink too much beer too early because we were going on a Brewery tour later that night.

We started the brewery tour at the town square. It was the same tour that I had gone on with my mom and dad when they were here only we had a different tour guide this time around. Mark and I ended up having a great time. There were a few couples from the states, a family from the states, a bunch of Swiss, some guys on 2 week leave from Iraq ( American soldiers), and 2 men in their mid to late 70's. It turned out to be a super fun group. We closed down the Hofbrauhaus which was our last stop and our guide took us to a bar that was to stay open until 5 in the morning. I didn't stay out until 5 in the morning.

All in all Munich was a great trip. I think so far it is definitely my favorite place in Germany. It was nice going there this time of year and seeing it much more lively. When I had gone with my parents it had been in February so it was still pretty cold. This time of year there were beer gardens and people all over the place. There were so many people there this time when I went. I can not imagine how crazy it must be during Oktoberfest when they have millions of visitors.