At some point during our first six months in Munich, the Snook casually mentioned that we should go ride on Falkor. I was like, “Wait, what?!” He’d somehow learned about the existence of Bavaria Filmstadt, the local movie studio facility, and that it had a tour where you could literally sit on Falkor the luckdragon from The Neverending Story. I was all in on that idea.

Bavaria Filmstadt has been around under various names for over 100 years. Alfred Hitchcock made his first film there, and the many notable productions filmed in part there include The Great Escape, The Sound of Music, Cabaret, Downfall, and Das Boot. And of course, relevant to my own personal interests – a little 1971 movie called Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory…

The film studios are south of the Munich city center along the Isar, and not that far from where we live. We picked a nice autumn day and had a nice slow 45min pootle along the river on our bicycles.

Here’s the entrance to the studios. We had pre-booked tickets for the 90min tour. The website mentioned English tours once a day, but we discovered when we got there that they weren’t happening anymore because demand had dropped during Covid. Thankfully they had an app that provided some English commentary so we wouldn’t be completely lost.

The entranceway has some fun exhibits set up, like this scale model of the U-96 from Das Boot. There were also a couple food trucks, so we grabbed a quick lunch before the tour kicked off. Then we were ushered onto a little train which drove us around past some of the studios and offices. Our first stop was a “4D Motion Ride” called Mogli’s Dschungel Abenteur. It’s one of those things where you’re watching a very disorienting 3D movie while the seating moves up and down and water occasionally sprays in your face. It was… not my favourite part of the day.

Then the actual studio tour began. Our group weaved our way through different film sets and props from the movies over the years. I got the impression that the layout depends greatly on what’s been filming there recently. This was part of the backdrop for the upcoming filmed version of The Magic Flute that had filmed six months earlier.

From there we shuffled straight into the White House! This hallway had apparently featured in the upcoming Kung Fury 2 featuring none other than…

President Schwarzenegger himself. 😂

They had a large exhibit of set pieces from the Jim Button German films, including Emma the Locomotive. I haven’t read these books but they’re by Michael Ende, author of The Neverending Story. 

I believe this was Nepomuk the Dragon.

We were were shuffling between rooms when I glanced upwards and stopped dead in my tracks. The Southern Oracle!

At one point we shuffled down a hallway with lots of photos from past productions. At the end of it was a small exhibit of items from The Neverending Story, including a mural of the Auryn.

Morla, the Ancient One! Just looking at that face, I could hear that wheezing voice in my mind.

The Rockbiter! I like that they included a joyous representation of him, rather than the sad “They look like big, strong hands, don’t they?” version that makes me want to cry.

I didn’t spot any props from Willy Wonka but I did see it represented in a photo on the wall.

They had a major exhibit from Das Boot, including this scale (I think?) model of the turret from the submarine.

Another scale model of the sub. They had exhibits outside showing how the crew filmed shots from the movie as well as the 2018 TV series. We then joined the queue shuffling into the long building behind…

…which turned out to be the actual set of the submarine!

It was a pretty tight fit!

Would it surprise you to learn that he was actually quoting lines from The Hunt for Red October the whole time? “One ping only, please,” I heard him growl. ❤️

Note: the sub is pretty small, and there are places where you have to climb through low bulkhead doors like behind the Snook here!

Another studio had sets from the recent sci-fi film Stowaway.

The Snook was very excited by this exhibit of sets from Asterix and Obelix vs. Caesar. We walked through the mock Gaulish village…

…and found Obelix’s quarry where he works on the menhirs (standing stones)!

They also had the set used for Caesar’s dungeon…

…including a pool filled with (thankfully fake) crocodiles!

Another outdoor set was a Viking village from the Vicky the Viking film.

The tour also had a couple interactive areas where I didn’t take photos. One was the classroom set from the German film trilogy Fack ju Göhe (which translate to, I kid you not, “F**k you Goethe” in English!). There a couple volunteers sat at desks and recited lines which were then edited into a scene from the movie. Another was about special effects and had a few of us (including me and the Snook) in a mock train carriage while a guy scrolled scenery out the window. (Apparently you could download these clips when you left, but we didn’t bother.)

The gift shop also had some fun Neverending Story merch, including a box full of Auryns and some very cute little Falkors!

Our final stop was to visit the luckdragon himself. They had him set up in a small building near the entrance to the studios, and to my shock not many of the tourists there that day seemed very excited to visit him.

A couple stuck their heads in as we were geeking out and taking photos of each other riding Falkor. The guy nicely offered to take one of the two of us, then grudgingly admitted he’d never seen the movie! 😱

Look at that face! Can’t you just hear his voice? I felt like a kid again.

I forgot to mention – we were there a couple days before Halloween and they were prepping for a special event. The whole tour was being made over with a haunted house theme for a “Spookytour,” and we saw lots of creepy props and zombie cast members getting ready. The Snook didn’t want to particularly do that, but I couldn’t resist saying “Spookytour” over and over. And wow, special Halloween Dunkin’ Donuts!

And then we headed home, enjoying a very autumnal ride through the Bavarian forest.

We crossed a high rail bridge and you can see that the trees were really changing colour.

And a final view of the Isar before we got home…

It’s been a really long time since I updated you on my cycling! I didn’t rack up quite as many kilometers this summer as I’d hoped, mostly because we were travelling whenever we could and the weather was pretty rainy. I’m not far off the pace that I need for my yearlong 1000km goal, but I doubt I’ll get there given that it’s getting cold and we have more travel planned.

I thought I’d share a few of the more notable long rides I’ve done. One back in May was to Messestadt Riem.

My destination was about 15km across Munich. I found a route on Komoot and headed off, with the Snook following on the train. One landmark on the way there was St. Michael’s church in Berg am Laim. I was sweaty so I didn’t go inside, but it was very pretty. For the route, I avoided the main roads and mostly went through residential areas and parks.

Messestadt Riem (literally “Convention City Riem”) is one of Munich’s newest suburbs and was built on the grounds of an old airport. It has a big convention center, of course, as well as a large park with a man-made lake. The Snook had brought us a picnic lunch, so we walked through the park and found a spot to enjoy our sandwiches. Lots of folks were out and about.

We walked around the lake and the “beach,” then climbed the “Hügel” (hill) to check out the view. It was surreal to see a lake with folks playing beach volleyball, with snow-capped mountains on the horizon!

I parted with the Snook at the train station and climbed back onboard my bike for the ride home. I went by the more direct route, using the bike path alongside the road.

So all up, that ride was about 30km / 18.5 miles!

In June I did an even longer one of about 35km, heading north along the Isar river and into the far part of the Englischer Garten that I’d never visited before.

It was a warm and sunny day but the clouds were moving in rapidly. (Yes, I wore sunscreen!) This was one of the canals that splits off as the Isar moves north out of the city.

Here’s the river properly, far up near the suburb of Ismaning. I had reached my turnaround point and started heading back when I noticed this rocky little beach and stopped for a rest. There was a large group having a barbecue. That box in the river is actually their cooler filled with drinks! Müncheners love swimming and playing in the Isar.

I rode up the east side of the river as I headed out, but for the return journey I crossed over one the bridges so I could head back on the west side.

Whenever I’m doing these really long rides, I’ve started bringing snacks along so I can refuel at the halfway point. I found a nice little bench and stepped aside for some peanuts, dried fruit, and one of my last Aussie snacks… ❤️

Unbeknownst to me, the weather was about to take a turn. A sudden downpour of very cold rain had me huddling under a tree, waiting for it to pass…

Fortunately it passed quickly and I was able to finish the ride. The Snook met me at the biergarten so I could celebrate my longest ride yet!

A month later I broke my record again, this time on a ride to the southwest through Forstenrieder Park all the way to the village of Buchendorf and back. This was a beautiful ride that I really enjoyed… but it ended in TRAUMA! (More about that in a minute.)

As you can see, I was really excited to head off. I had recently invested in some proper cycling shorts with extra butt padding, so I was feeling pretty confident about this ride.

Part of my planned path was along the Würm River, a small tributary of the Amper that eventually ends in the Danube. It flows through a few small villages, which were all very pretty. These photos were near Gräfelfing.

The route I had was from Komoot again, and it was mostly on paved and gravel bike paths. It’s so gorgeous here. People are always like, why did you move from Australia to Germany? JUST LOOK AT THAT! So much green! I just can’t get enough of it.

Eventually I popped out of the forest and found myself in cornfields! It was so surreal. Almost felt like Indiana!

I crossed the Würm again at the village of Gauting and saw this historic water wheel (aka Wasserrad) that used to power a local papermill.

This was after I’d passed through Buchendorf, the village that marked the middle-point of the ride. I found myself riding through gentle rolling fields under an amazing blue sky.

As you can see, I was getting a bit sweaty and tired. I was also feeling some soreness in my bum, despite all the padding in my new shorts. I was starting to suspect that the big cushy seat on the Swapfiets bike wasn’t actually doing me any favours…

I found a bench in Forstenrieder Park to eat my snack and have a rest.

I made the rest of the trip home without incident, and I was feeling pretty proud at having managed such a long ride. NOW WE COME TO THE TRAUMA. Later that night, showered and fed, I was sitting on the sofa in a pair of shorts when the Snook looked at me and said, “Is your leg bleeding?!” Folks, I had a big bruised wound high up on my thigh that had actually burst somehow without me noticing it. It was basically a boil or a saddle sore that had formed from rubbing against the bike seat. We cleaned it up, put on an antiseptic, and bandaged it up. I also took a photo so I could show my doctor the next day via a tele-appointment. “Yeah, you’re fine,” he said. (These German doctors!) So yeah, my first saddle sore. Not fun!

That was basically the impetus I needed to finally buy a new bike. By August, I had found one on Ebay and paid €250 for it. It’s a hybrid (meaning a cross between a road bike and a mountain bike) from local Munich cyclery 2rad.

It’s a couple years old, so I’ve made some upgrades and modifications since I got it. It originally came with a basket on the back but I took it off since I don’t really use it much. I took it into 2rad for a check-up, and they ended up replacing the brake pads for me and one of the chain links. One of the tire tubes had a leak, so Rodd and I managed to put in a new one. I also bought a new pair of handle grips to replace the old foam ones, and I got a hand-pump that I mounted on the frame. (I carry a patch kit and tire levers in my hydration pack, but I’m thinking of getting a little saddle bag.) It’s so much lighter than the Swapfiets bike! It’s also got more gears (27!) and consequently I’m finding it a lot easier to get up hills. And most importantly, the new seat is narrower and so far I’m finding it a lot more comfortable for long rides.

The first long ride I took her on was – where else? – along the Isar through the Englischer Garten.

Thankfully the flooding we saw earlier in the summer had mostly dissipated by September and the Isar was back to its normal size.

I couldn’t resist swinging by the Eisbachwelle to see if there were many surfers there. Yeah, there were a lot!

There were also plenty of folks taking advantage of the beautiful weather at the Chinesischer Turm (Chinese Tower) biergarten.

Every time I ride through the English Garten, I see something new. This time it was a field of sunflowers waving at me across a fence, and an old hydro power station across the river.

Snack time! You can also see in the background here the last bike-related purchase I made – a helmet. They aren’t required here, but I’m trying to get into the habit of wearing, especially for my long rides. I got a plain white Skullcap helmet and I’ve been having some fun decorating it with stickers.

My return trip took me back through the city, and I was happy to see a concert and arts festival happening in the Odeonsplatz. The “net” hanging above is actually an artwork by Janet Echelmann, and it looks incredibly beautiful lit up at night.

As I was waiting at a red light near home, I heard a loud jingling noise. To my delight, all traffic stopped as the Augustiner Bräu bierwagen drove past, pulled by a team of horses and carrying a couple beardy Bavarians in lederhosen. Official Oktoberfest may have been cancelled, but Müncheners still celebrated where they could!

The last long ride I did was just last weekend, a giant loop that took me on a greatest hits tour of Munich…

The first stop was Nymphenburg Palace, which we visited last year. My route took me across the bridge that crosses the Nymphenburger Kanal. I stopped midway to look back towards the palace. That’s it way off in the distance in that first photo. The other is looking in the opposite direction, down the canal…

There’s also an even smaller offshoot of the canal called the Biedersteiner, and I rode along that for a bit.

My next stop was Olympiapark, site of the Munich Olympics. Honestly, the juxtaposition of the green grass and the blue sky was so stunning I had to stop and take this photo. (Note to self: go back there in the winter and sled down that hill!)

There were lots of folks enjoying the day, boating on the little lake, and hiking the hills.

Eventually I headed home via the Englischer Garten and the Isar, and I finished at the Altstadt. It’s a pedestrian area so I had to walk my bike through the Marienplatz. It was looking very pretty, with baskets of flowers in Autumn colours all along the front.

I think that pretty much brings you up to date! Here’s a view of my Heat Map of where I’ve ridden in Munich. The really bright areas are from my shorter trips to the office or through the local parks, but all those little red tendrils are from my longer rides. Pretty neat! If you’re on Strava, you can follow me there and see if I managed to make my 1000km goal after all…