Cologne

With all the various interesting places to visit in Germany, choosing a spot to relax for a week was difficult. We eventually settled on Cologne, because it seemed to offer lots of interesting museums, a nice thermal bath, and reasonable accomodations. It also appeared to be a little cooler than the cities farther north or farther inland.

Our first night in Cologne was awful. We had booked what appeared to be a lovely spot through Airbnb. When we arrived (after 5, as requested by the owners) it was clean and looked like a score. The very friendly owners gave us a city map and some recommendations on places to see during our visit. Perfect, we thought. 

Once they left we nipped out and got some grub and then settled down for a quiet evening of TV and planning. Click... nothing. The flashy TV wasn't connected to anything. No antenna, and no cable. I emailed the owner and he said he would look into it the next day. As things settled down for the evening we noticed a rumble that shook the entire apartment every five minutes or so. The building was built right over a subway station and the trains were shaking the entire place! Strike two.

Thinking we would get used to the noise, we hopped in the nice looking king sized bed only to find that several of the slats underneath were broken, and every time either of us moved the bed sounded like it was coming apart. Strike three. We resolved to test the Airbnb system and get our money back in the morning.

We were woken up early (after almost no sleep) by work crews working on the side of our building right outside our window. The nightmare continued.

We quickly wrote an email, including pictures, to our host ccing Airbnb asking for our money back and explaining why. The host responded within the hour, refunded everything except the one night we spent there, and Airbnb refunded our booking fees as well. We got back on the website while sitting in the local park and had another place booked an hour later. It was just around the corner, not quite as new, but just as clean, and everything worked and it was quiet. Perfect! Nice work Airbnb. (The host did leave a nasty comment about us being complainers though...)

Cologne is a fabulous city to hang around for a week or so. Once you get past the Dom and the expensive shops there are many other reasonably priced interesting things to do and see. 

Our first visit was to the Ludwig Museum. The museum is known for it's pop art collection (Warhol, Lichtenstein).

The collection is not limited the pop art though, there are many other styles on display.

We also took the tramway across the Rhine to the Claudius Thermalbad and enjoyed several hours of "textilefrei" saunas, baths, and sunbathing. The Germans get spas right.

The tramway goes right over the spa. Zoom in for the textilefrei option.

One of the unique things about Cologne is their special beer (doesn't every German city have a special beer?), Kolsch. It is beer that is brewed a special way inside the city limits of Cologne. They serve it in very small glasses (0.2 liter), in direct contrast with Munich (only liters after four oclock). The Cologne folks argue that beer gets warm in big mugs and so they drink lots of small glasses. The waiters will keep bringing them every couple minutes until you put a coaster on top of your glass. Of course, it is delicious, like all German beer.

Once again, the bike culture thrives in Cologne. There are bike paths everywhere, and drivers are very tolerant and aware of cyclists. There is a city wide bike rental system although we spent our time walking.

Cologne also has some very interesting street art. Of course there are loads of statues dealing with everything that happened in or near cologne in the last 800 or 900 years, but also some recent poignant reminders of the Nazi period.

Edith Stein - German Jewish philosopher nun? - http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edith_Stein

The street art needs to be searched out. I couldn't find any good guides about where to look. It's best to just explore with your eyes open.

Balcony art.

9-11 memorial

Love locks on the Hohenzollern Brucke.

We didn't leave the city core except to visit The Music Store, one of the biggest music stores anywhere. We went to get a banjo fix, and we were very pleasantly surprised (despite the crappy banjo selection). We spent half a day poking around the store, playing everything and buying nothing (except a carrot shaker).

We liked Cologne. It is a much quieter city than Berlin or Barcelona, but there are still many things to see and do. A week to explore was nice. A longer stay would be fun because Cologne is a rail hub and very central to that part of Europe. It's an easy day trip to Brussels, and there are many things to see just outside the city (wine!). Don't miss it.

Munich

Munich is my second favourite European city that we have visited after Berlin. At 1.5 million people, it's a little on the small side compared to London and Berlin, but it has a great townie feel to it. It is almost twice the size of Amsterdam, but doesn't seem that way. What's so special about Munich?

Munich is in a great spot. It is right in the southeast corner of Germany just where the alps start. It is a fabulous stepping off point for Austrian, Swiss, Italian and other adventures. There are trains going in every direction. More on the trains later. Munich itself is a destination. There are many galleries and museums, lots of great shopping, and, of course, great beer and food. The whole Bavarian thing is really going on. People still wear their traditional clothes, dirndls and lederhosen and little green hats with badges all over them. 

Munich consistently is rated one of the ten best cities in the world to live in (right behind Victoria, I'm sure). 

We were very fortunate to be hosted by Nancy's cousin Marilyn and her Bavarian husband Eckhard while we visited. (Thanks very much for everything.) They are avid hikers, so we spent several days hiking in various areas around Munich. The original plan was to spend a week up in the Alps, but the weather wasn't cooperating. When we first got to Munich it rained harder than I'd ever seen. It was most unusual for that area at that time.

There were still several nice days which we took full advantage of. Getting into the mountains from Munich is easy, popular and fun. Trains leave very often and are suprisingly inexpensive. We caught the "BOB - Bayerisch Oberlandbahn" to Lenggries on the Austrian Border and hiked up to the Lenggriershutte for the view of the Zugspitz and a bowl of kartofelsuppe and a mug of weissbier (Wheatbeer).

Our next train ride took to Berchesgaden in the Tirol area of Austria. We rented an Airbnb there for three days and did some exploring in the shadow of the Wilde Kaiser, a very dramatic bit of mountain.

(Not my picture)

We had a bit of excitement when we walked in the Airbnb we had rented only to find a family already in there. The mistake was quickly cleared up by the landlord and the people we had frightened went to the correct apartment. We did make friends with them. They were a young English military couple on vacation. He was a recce company commander (Major) and she was an army doctor (Capt). We had drinks with them and their three children in their new apartment. Fun!

The next day we climbed up to the Reidelhutte near the base of the Kaiser. It was a lovely walk.

We spent a day exploring the tourist area of Berchesgaden. It was what you would expect. Yawn.

We returned to Munich the next day and got ourselves sorted out for our final and most challenging hike up the Hollentalklamm (hell's canyon). The Klamm is a narrow gorge near Garmisch that runs through a valley that used to provide hydro electricity to the area. It is one of the access routes to the Zugspitz and the Alpspitze. The hike up to the Klamm was quite steep, but all sorts of folks were on their way up. At the entrance to the Klamm is the Hollentalangerhutte, where we had lunch and changed into our rain gear for the wet hike up through the gorge.

The entrance to the gorge is 4€. The path is a precarious trail hanging off the cliffs and running through tunnels that runs for about 3 or 4 kilometers up the mountain. It is fabulous!

The trail tops out at another alpine hut (being renovated when we were there) and a spot where there is access to the river. There were tired folks recovering from their walk everywhere.

The stroll back down is almost as tough as the one going up. It reminded me of that old alpinist warning, "Remember, when you get to the top, you are only half done."

The ride home on the train was also interesting. It was full of people who had come out of the city to Garmisch to do one of the many hikes.

Munich has a big walking culture and lots of public transport to support it. What a fabulous place to live.

A couple things to note about Munich.

- If you want a beer you had better be thirsty. Most places don't serve beer in less than liter mugs after 4. The one beer you can always get half liters of is weissbeer. 

- Interestingly, alcoholfrei beer is very popular. Every beer tent, bar and restaurant serves it. It is much better than North American "near beer." I drank lots of it, especially at the tops of mountains. It's even good for breakfast.

- People from Munich greet each other with "Gruss Gott." It is apparently a holdover from the Hitler days when people who didn't agree with his policies refused to say "zieg heil. Or something like that.

- Bavarian food is delicious, but lacks vegetables. For our last night their we went out to dinner and I ordered duck (very traditional) and got half a huge duck and a ball of weird Bavarian potato (much more glutenous than our spuds). It tasted great with weissbeer.

- Munich is a popular summer destination for Arabs escaping the heat of Saudi. The streets are full of Arabian men and women enjoying the cool Bavarian weather. One of our neighbours in the Airbnb in Berchesgaden was a family who had just that day artived from Kuwait. The prices downtown reflect the Arab income.

- Dachau, a notorious Concentration Camp is near Munich. We visited. It was a sad reminder of how awful people can be. 

We loved Munich and Bavaria, and the Alps, and the Tirol, and the dirndls, and the beer, and the lederhosen... yadda yadda yadda...