Halfway Through

Today we woke up early to get to the BMW plant for our first non-brewery tour (aside from the city tours). It was really nice to get to tour something that wasn’t beer related, but it turned out there were just as many similarities to a big brewery as there were differences. The obvious difference was that the end product was cars instead of beer, but they relied on similar processes. Both BMW and places like Reudnitzer use a lot of machinery in a lot of different steps. BMW, however, uses the machines to move large car parts and do a lot of welding. They also had machines to do different stages of painting for the bodies of the cars. The machines positively charged the paint and the cars were negatively charged in order to increase the efficiency of the painting process; breweries inject carbon dioxide into the bottles in order to fill them up faster. BMW had machines that analyzed each piece to make sure it was perfect, just like breweries have a machine to make sure the bottles are clean before filling them. I was bummed that they wouldn’t let us take pictures in the factory because it was a mind blowing process. Also, the machines were so life like with very smooth movements and scared me a little because they’re so technologically advanced that I was afraid they would come to life and attack—and the last thing you want to be attacked by is a machine capable of lifting and welding cars. Something I found interesting was that the engines were hand put together, as well as the interior of the car was mostly done by man power with the help of machines instead of vice versa.

After our tour, we took a bus to Aying. We had lunch at Liebhard’s which turned out to be the name of the guy who founded Ayinger Brewery—the brewery we went to Aying to visit. I really liked the Ayinger Brewery. First off, it was privately owned by a family—and you could tell; it didn’t have quite the same mass-produced feeling like some of the giant companies we visited earlier in the trip. They had similar practices in general just like any other brewery, but it was really cool that they let us onto the floor of the bottling plant, whereas the other breweries had platforms above for us to watch from. Here you could see up close how the machines worked to wash the bottles, take off the labels, fill the bottles, cap them, and label them. He also told us a lot about the history of the brewery and the family who owned it. This was our first brewery visit in Bavaria and so far I am very impressed!

Tomorrow morning is free and we have a presentation and a tour in the afternoon. Hopefully I will go shopping and get some souvenirs in my free time tomorrow. Today was the halfway point—I can’t believe it! I feel like I’ve been here so long yet not long at all. It’s so nice having a little bit more laid back agenda in Munich but it’s going to get super busy in Brussels, but I can’t wait!