My Journey to see the Northern Lights: Oktoberfest & the Loch Ness Monster! 20/09/2011-25/09/2011

As you would have probably guessed from the title that there were two destinations in this journey; Germany & Scotland. Let me begin by summarizing our entire journey then I will describe each part in greater detail.

Itinerary

Map View

Train from Bergen to Oslo S
That was the first time that I was taking a train in Norway. The train was really nice. Much better than the Malaysia trains that we are so familiar with. It was spacious, clean and even had a dining car. Before we boarded the train, we peeked into a 1st class cabin and it was awesome! The cabins have 2 beds inside and a personal wash basin to freshen up. Despite the longer journey, I prefer taking the train to airplanes. (I blogged this in real time on the train. Yes! it has free wifi!)

By the way, they allow dogs on board! There was a dog in the seat in front of me. The dog belonged to a crazy guy. I think he was drunk or on drugs. Anyways, the conductor told him to move to another cabin, he didn't have a ticket and had to purchase one on board (i heard thats really expensive).

Train from Oslo to Rygge
We reached Oslo S in the early hours of Wednesday morning. It was really cold... We waited for a connecting train from Oslo S to Rygge station. Rygge station is near Rygge airport which is the small airport that Ryanair operates out of. The train from Oslo to Rygge is somewhat different from the train from Bergen to Oslo. It looked like a bullet train and the interior looks more elegant. It had red cushion seat and wooden tables.

Next we took a 5mins bus ride from Rygge station to Moss Airport in Rygge. The bus ride was included in the train ticket.

Rygge Airport
It was a small budget airport with 2 airlines operating out of it. Norwegian Airlines and Ryanair. It had free wifi though. And it's very good for a budget airport. It has a few cafes, shops, DFS and its full air-conditioned.

Ryanair

We had to walk down a flight of stairs and out of the terminal building, onto the tarmac and up the plane!

Despite lots of horror stories about flying with Ryanair, my experience thus far have be satisfying. For the price, I wouldn't expect great service. Hence their minimal service met my expectations. And I was really impressed by their marketing and sales effort. When you operate a budget carrier and sell tickets at such low prices, you have to find all possible ways to get other sources of revenue. Ryanair does it very well. Firstly, from check-in, to boarding to the interior, they use their corporate colours; blue and yellow. I would instantly associate these two colours with Ryanair. Next, their luggage compartments had advertisements. These were mostly from the various countries' tourism boards. Thirdly, they sold all kinds of items on board the plane. From food, drinks, smokeless cigarettes (ingenious, all their flights were non-smoking), lottery scratch cards (some money goes to children's charity) and International calling cards. Finally, after landing, they would play a recording flaunting their reputation as the cheapest and most on-time carrier in Europe. When the budget airline industry is this competitive, you have to do anything and everything to survive. Ryanair has done it well and that's probably why they are the number 1 budget carrier in Europe.

Honestly, I wouldn't mind taking budget carriers in the future. They are cheap and fuss free. However, I doubt that I would take budget carriers for long haul flights. The seats are far too cramp for long distance travel and I can't imagine paying for all my meals on board. No to mention free seating. You might be seating beside some annoying person throughout the flight.

Memmingen Airport

There are two words that can fully describe Memmingen Airport in West Munich. Small & Smelly. Its really a very small airport. We alighted from the plane, walked into the terminal and out into the arrival hall. It was also really smelly. I have a hunch that it's because the airport is surrounded by farms. It smelt of cow dung. We took a bus from the airport to the city centre.

Munich - Germany

Oktoberfest!
It was awesome! I will let the photos speak for themselves!

Oktoberfest Hats!

Drinking with Yin Hao!

We tried two brands of beer.

1. Hacker-Pschorr

And 2. Augustiner

Personal preference: no. 1

Pork Knuckles! It was Delicious...

Just a point to note. Pork Knuckles is special to the Bavaria region in Germany (Munich) not the the rest of Germany. Some of my German friends have never heard of pork knuckles before. Hahaha... And they have never been to oktoberfest!

Next up... We had Curry wurst (German sausage with curry sauce). Well... I didn't really like it. The sauce was mainly tomato sauce with a sprinkle of curry... hahaha... no at all as I expected it to be. But it was worth a try.

Chocolate coated apples... Yumm... And healthy too!

More beer pictures...

Sight-Seeing

1. München Hauptbahnhof (Munich Central train station)

2. Rathaus (the new town hall)

Built from 1867 - 1909 in Flanders Gothic style this is one of the most famous buidlings in Munich; its facade, over 300 feet in length, features strikingly elaborate stone ornamentation. Its 260-foot tower with carillon is, with St. Peter's Church and the twin towers of the Cathedral, one of the most distinctive features of the city's skyline.