This past weekend was my first hostelling experience! I took the 300+ km/h ICE train to Cologne, passing cars on the autobahn like they were standing still. Upon arrival at the hostel at 8pm, I asked the guy at the counter what there was to do at night here. His response: "get drunk."
Arriving on the brick subway
My Hostel
Awesome bag storage system
He gave me a map with all the bars in the neighbourhood, and checked out the local concert scene for me - I decided to go to some live music show 10 minutes away. After claiming a bed and putting my things in the locker, I bought a beer at the supermarket and set down the road solo drinking like a champ. Arriving where I thought the concert would be, I saw a huge lineup going into a warehouse. I walked up to some people in line and asked what was going on.
"Every Friday night this place has "happy hour" from 9 to 11. You pay 6 euros and get free beer until 11 pm"
Sold.
I got in at 10:40, drank 6 "test tubes" of beer (they were tiny mom, don't worry), and grabbed three more before time ran out. One of the guys from the line, Tim, had lived in Squamish for a year. We talked about cars, skiing, mountain biking, Vancouver lifestyle, and whatever else in between. After partying in the massive warehouse club, I called it a night at 2am and wandered on back to the hostel.
Saw this giant on the way home
After a solid sleep, I woke up and decided I needed a haircut. So I got one. Then I rented a bike from the hostel and went downtown.
Parking spots are different here
I made a beeline for the spires of the Kölner Dom (Cologne Cathedral); my mouth gaped ever-wider as I neared the massive building. This church is seriously big, and seriously crowded.
Big. It survived being hit by 13 bombs in WWII.
People give you an idea of the scale
The buttressed rear
Naturally, I had to climb to the top. I went down below to the cored-out entrance tunnel to the stairs.
Right through the foundation
509 stairs later, I was as high as I could get in the cathedral. The view was spectacular, but the tight mesh of the fence made for poor photos.
Stupid mesh.
A bit of the view, including a giant shiny slug
The 24-tonne Bell
The inside was equally as spectacular as the facade. Gorgeous 12th-century stained glass and amazingly high ceilings make one feel rather small and insignificant.
The architects meant business
12th Century Stained Glass
I like picturing a lone balloon floating for days, completely ruining the cathedral's presence
Leaving the Dom feeling a little more humbled, this drunk fella was wandering through the none-too-clean water feature in the cathedral square, occasionally stopping for some air guitar.
Getting some odd looks
I walked down to the waterfront and took a seat to watch a street performer for a while. He'd make fun of people passing by to draw a crowd before starting his show:
Segways and a game controller
In the middle of the show, some guy walked by and started doing pullups on the tree in front of ~100 people.
Redpants humoured me
After taking a quick walking tour of some city sights, I set across the bridge to the Music Store where Tim works.
Love padlocks on the bridge, some people have bigger hearts than others
They got seriously dense
Oddly enough, the Music Store store was a highlight of the trip. 5 stories high, it had thousands of guitars on display, along with entire floors dedicated to drums and classical instruments. Tim works on the top floor in the DJ/sound system/stage setup department. We got to play around with some seriously nice equipment (the centre light in the following pictures costs 18000 euros), and listen to the differences between expensive and really expensive monitor arrays.
Awh yeah.
I went home with the intention of heading out again, but found myself too exhausted. I chatted with a classically Eastern European Romanian guy for a while, but didn't feel like joining when he went out searching for prostitutes and an allegedly good time.
The next day I went to the Roman museum, which was pretty neat. The whole museum was built around a massive mosaic which was discovered while digging out a bomb shelter during WWII.
The mosaic
Statues 'n stuff
Gold leaf leaves
Closer shot of the mosaic floor
When I stepped out of the museum, I heard loud exhaust notes echoing through the city. I promptly changed course and headed towards the noise - guess where I found myself?
Karl arrived on Thursday afternoon, fresh from a trip to Munich. It was the first time in three and a half months that I'd had an in-person conversation in good ol' Canadian English! I gave him a 1-hour tour of Donaueschingen (that's all it takes to see the town), grabbed groceries, and proceded to cook exactly like we used to in Vancouver.
Donauquelle (the start of the Danube river)
It's AMAZING!!
Cheers for Beers
On Friday we went to Shooter Stars (a local bar) and ran into Flo's sister and some of her friends. Being the good-planning people we are, we stayed out past 3am.
Caption is on the Shirt
Shoooooters
We slept in as late as possible on Saturday, and were out of the door by 9:00. I felt bright and alert on the train to Frühlingsfest:
Pizzaz
The closer we got to Stuttgart, the higher the energy levels got on the train. There were people all over the place wearing their lederhosen and drinking beer - and apparently wine:
We hopped off the train and saw a couple sights in Stuttgart before heading to the fairgrounds
It was about 1:30 when we arrived at our final stop. Walking from the S-bahn (metro train) station, we followed the hordes of plaid shirts and dirndls towards the fairgrounds. On the way, we passed an incredibly drunk, old, 6'6" black crazy man dressed to the nines in a dirty suit and top hat. Making loud "nnnngngngnngghhhhhhhhhh" sounds, he would walk up to frauleins and ramble away incomprehensibly (maybe it was comprehensible to the locals). The variety of reactions he got was impressive: some girls gave him a disgusted look and hustled away, while others mobbed him and posed for some assuredly memorable pictures.
While finishing our beers (it's the strangest feeling to drink on the street in plain view of the Police), a bottle-collecting, possibly homeless guy came up to us and struck up a conversation. I threw in all the meaningless conversational words I knew, and answered the one question I recognized as he rambled on for 5 minutes. We said goodbye, gave him our bottles, and told him we didn't speak German.
The fairgrounds weren't anything special, but they weren't why we were there.
Nope. This is why we came:
It was crowded at 2:00, and at capacity by 3pm. The crowd was mainly young (the drinking age is 16), but there were large areas of mainly older people. We walked around with our litre beers having jovial yelling conversations and an all-around good time.
The massive tent (that stage in the distance ain't small)
Beer.
Also Beer.
This guy had a cigarette stuck through his earlobe
Wandering around, we ran into a group of 8 burly 'mericans who stuck out like 8 sunglass-wearing muscle-shirt-clad moustache-touting thumbs. It was my first time meeting the epitome of the unwanted American traveler; they stood to the side of the tent, one of them throwing dirty remarks at girls walking by (to their credit, most of the guys tried to stop him). Two of the guys were cool to talk to, but it wasn't a fun crowd to hang out with.
Moving right along, we walked, drank, talked and danced as the tent became progressively more alcohol-infused
The music was all over the place
Let's play Spot the Sobriety! Best of luck.
Karl learned that language barriers are often non-existant with people our age when he tried asking some girls if they spoke English in a hilarious butchering of Spanish, German and English - in three words he managed to speak three langages, and none at all.
Things were clearer after repeating in our native language
We hustled out for the last train home, which was at an unpleasantly early 9:15
Tearing up the streets
One more must-experience German adventure crossed off the list!
