Cologne

Woke up with a small headache. The 4-euro hostel breakfast is calling me to get the beer off my breath, get a solid piece of food in my stomach, and take as much as possible for the road.

It was an easy walk to the station to catch a train direct to Cologne, but we attempted to catch a free ferry ride on the Rhine to see the old robber baron castles, which we narrowly missed, and ended up in Mannheim for an hour or so. It wasn't a total loss however, because a train we eventually took to Cologne rode along the Rhine for a stretch, letting us get a glimpse of some castles.

Downtown Cologne was fairly artsy, reminiscent of a large Ann Arbor, Michigan. The only major difference is the gothic castle-church jutting into the sky just outside the train station, The Dom. This building looks more like a demonic temple than somewhere to worship holy beings. Two main spires stand tall above the rest of the structure with black crosses mounted on the each point. Large stained glass windows and weathered gargoyles add to the overall eeriness.

Again, I was drained and hungry from the long day riding through Germany. Derek shared these feelings, and we went on a hunt for a restaurant, seeing a good amount of Cologne on the way. It took us over an hour to find somewhere that we both agreed on. It wasn't due to differences in taste that kept us walking, but that irritating indecisiveness that takes over when you're too hungry to know what to eat. We ended up picking the most American stereotype restaurant, and were two of four people there. Mini American flags hung from the walls, ceiling, and everywhere else. Very strange.


Not much else to report on Cologne. We got to bed fairly early to rest up for our journey to Belgium in the morning.