Moving to Munich
Last month it was time to say goodbye to Toulouse, and France in general, as I headed to Munich in Germany to start my end-of-studies internship.
It was unfortunate that we international students didn't seem to be able to land internships in any of the French companies, be it for cultural or language reasons, or something else. It would've definitely been nice to stay the whole year in Toulouse to get the most out of it.
Nevertheless, living in Germany has long been a wish of mine, not the least to improve my German skills, which are already quite ok from a year spent there when I was a child. So an internship in Germany is actually something I'm really happy about. I'll be starting 1st of May and will be posting more about the job then.
I ended up renting a car and driving all the way from Toulouse to Munich. My friend Edward, who's flying home to Singapore from Munich, joined me, and we made a low-key road trip out of it. We also promised to carry some leftover things for our classmate who's doing her internship nearby in Augsburg. Packing the car was a bit touch-and-go, but after two hours we managed to cram everything in. Keep in mind that my bike is also in there!
The rough itinerary was as follows:
- Wed: Toulouse, France - Nice, France
- Thu: Nice, France - Brescia, Italy
- Fri: Brescia, Italy - Munich, Germany
- Sat: Munich, Germany - Strasbourg, France
We started driving on a Wednesday evening around 7pm, with the goal of reaching Nice on the border of France and Italy some 6 hours later. With a 3-day car rental, this was a deliberate strategy to buy more time for the following days. We reached Nice at 3:30am, dead tired but on track with the schedule.
The next day was considerably more chill. We checked out the Nice zoo right next to hotel (they had kangaroos), and started driving towards Italy. The views around Monaco were amazing, sadly we couldn't stop just yet as it was right after Nice. We stopped for lunch in Arenzano near Genoa in Italy. I had a pesto pasta, completing the first item from the holy trinity of Italian food (pasta, pizza and risotto). After a quick ice cream break, we were on our way again, turning north.
We finished the day in Brescia, a small city east from Milan. The city itself was quiet on a Thursday night, but we managed to find a packed restaurant with risotto on the menu. Second item from the holy trinity of Italian food completed ✅
Friday morning, still on schedule, we continued north from Brescia. You could see the weekend approaching with the amount of truck traffic on the roads, causing congestion and stressful situations at times. Nevertheless, we made it to Bolzano intact, just in time for lunch. Since we were about to leave Italy, it was time to complete the holy trinity and go for a pizza. We found a place on the corner of a piazza with majestic vaulted hallways running around it, and of course the pizza was amazing. After a quick coffee we were happily on our way towards the Brenner pass and Austria.
This was the point of the trip I was most concerned about, since temperatures at the Brenner pass can apparently drop to the negatives even in April. We didn't have winter tires, so I was really crossing my fingers for warm weather. Luckily we had an uneventful passage and were soon coasting down towards Innsbruck.
Just as the Sun was setting, we reached my new home on the outskirts of Munich, in Weßling. My new landlord, who also lives in the house, welcomed us with open arms, and with bread and salt (as is tradition). Our trip wasn't over though. We still needed to stop by Augsburg an hour's drive to the west, and to return the car to France in Strasbourg some 400 km away (the rental price was much cheaper when returning the car to the origin country).
On Saturday, already a bit weary from three days of basically constant driving, we first drove to Augsburg to drop off our classmate's things and have lunch. Time went by quickly, and soon we realized we had to rush to Strasbourg to reach the drop-off deadline and our bus back at 5pm. Putting the unlimited German autobahns to good use, we managed to shave off 30 minutes from our ETA and reach Strasbourg on time. Unfortunately we had forgotten to fuel the car, so we lost precious minutes finding a gas station and ended up missing the bus. Thankfully we found some reasonably-priced (~50e/pax) train tickets back, so it wasn't a total disaster.
We reached Weßling late at night, and finally had a good rest. The next day Edward left for a ski trip and I started settling in to Germany. More on that in the next post!
PS. We also managed to visit our classmates in Köln over the next weekend, and got to visit the European Astronaut Center (EAC), where ESA astronauts are based. Super cool place!
