My Dad lived in Munich many years ago, so thoughts of him were strong as I wandered around the famous Marienplatz. I kept imagining him running around as a teenager, his spirit lingering. I am sure he is proud of me, returning to a place that he loved.

Once I had dragged and pulled and lugged my bag down steps, up steps, across cobblestones, and kerbs, I made it to my hostel. It was hot in Germany, constantly sweaty, stifling heat. It was the first part of a hot European summer I had encountered, and it was nice to add some colour to my skin.

I firstly wanted to explore downtown, so I jumped on the subway and had a wander around town. Tourists flooded the main squares, children squealed, pigeons flapped, it was an international hodge podge melee. It was all very overwhelming. As beautiful as the old buildings were, I really can not stand crowds, I am a bad tourist like that. Plus there are only so many shops you can see right? I was all shopped out. And my bag could not take it any more, it was putting up a fight, a big bulging heavy, hard to shift resistance.

After seeing the beer garden, no joy there as I am still booze free, and admiring some gardens, I decided to eat more fruit. After smashing two punnets of raspberries, I still enjoyed their sweet plumpy goodness; I headed back to my hostel again for some down time and a rest.

The next morning I rose early and made my way to the central train station, I was determined to get out of town and into nature, no more central city madness for me please! After helpful advice from my ticketing man, I travelled by train to Lindau, a small town on Lake Constance.

I really enjoyed the train ride there, as I was feeling chatty after one vanilla Americano, then magically there appeared 6 people I could chat to, it was great. Word quota up, tick! Really nice people too, hi Josh, Brix and Vulcho if you are reading this! Of course I gave them my ‘Live your Truth’ card…

They were all heading to a castle. It was tempting to join the castle party but I was also looking forward to my lake adventure. After an hour or so of a good chat session I waved good bye and carried on solo towards a very magical place.

Lindau is well worth travelling to, I was really impressed by this beautiful little lake side town. Full of flowers, cobblestone streets, pretty old buildings, and small unique shops to explore, I had a really great afternoon there.

My first activity was to travel on the ferry across to Bregenz. Then I took a really high gondola ride up to the top of the mountain, it was awesome and well worth doing. With views of the Austrian alps, I was technically in Austria, apparently. Pathways galore, you could have walked around the tops of this mountain for hours. My birkentocked feet couldn’t take it, so I took a more leisurely stroll.

Sadly the Wildlife park was closed, instead I simply enjoyed walking around, taking lots of great photos of the alps and flowers and basking in the glory of nature and fresh sweet Austrian alp air.

I returned again by ferry back to Lindau, walked around the town again until I was sufficiently knackered. Fuelled by apple streusel and a sparkling apple juice, I regained some energy to investigate an art exhibition.

Nolde was an old German artist who expressed his artistic flair via watercolour, painting and drawing. I enjoyed this exhibition so much I dedicated an entire post to it. So watch out for that one!

As I typed up my post on the train ride back to Munich, I felt happy, tired and proud. I was really making the most of my life, travelling around, taking lots of great photos, writing abundantly and living my dreams. I hope my actions can help to motivate you to follow your heart and do what you have been dying to do. Do not wait, do not delay your dreams any longer, start today towards making your dreams a reality. Start by writing down what it is you want to do or be, then take some action to make it happen. You can do it, it is very possible.

I hope you enjoyed my first day trip and stories from Munich. I also came up with some brilliant book ideas over the last few days, more about that coming up soon!

Love Anita xx

‘Feel the fear and do it anyway’ – Louise Hay – one of my all time favourite motivational writers.