2016/05 Europe cruise - Cologne/Köln |
|||||
Monday May 9th
We were gliding into Cologne or Köln at breakfast time on another beautiful warm and sunny day. We had a quick German lesson from Frank, our hotel manager. My knowledge of German dates from about 1960 though I also had the benefit of learning German sentence structure from Dennis the Dachshund (BBC Radio Home Service – Toytown 1950 or so.) Frank told us though that many Kölners speak a dialect of German, called Kölsch, which is closer to English in some ways. Kölsch is also the name of the local beer, famous we were told, at least in Köln.
From the river the cathedral totally dominates the skyline, as it was intended to do. It was begun in the 13th century but took over 600 years to complete. And you think you have problems with contractors?
This was another walking tour and our guide took us from the colourful waterfront through the largely reconstructed old town up towards 
the cathedral. Cologne was repeatedly bombed in World War 2 and the old town was burned out. See the B&W picture from an information board. Only the cathedral survived, but not by divine intervention. The story is that the RAF left it alone as it was the perfect signpost.
The old town looks attractive if a little too regular and square for its apparent age.
We stopped in front of the Rathaus (City Hall) and the guide showed us this mooning sculpture put up long ago by the government’s opponents and the answering protruding tongue the government erected on the Rathaus.
The city has been famous in recent centuries for Eau de Cologne. It was invented here by an Italian. 4711 came along a hundred years later and was named after the factory’s street address. Both are still in business.
 |
Cologne (Köln) |
|---|
 |
Cologne (Köln) (2.03) |
 |
|---|
Close up, Cologne cathedral, or Kölner Dom, is hard to photograph without distortion. It looks even more gigantic and elaborate, 
though not what I’d call beautiful. It was built by the archbishop of the Holy Roman Empire to house the relics of the Three Kings, acquired from Milan, and now housed within the cathedral in a box of gold. Tour groups are not allowed inside the cathedral but individual tourists are. We joined the crowd inside but we were soon chased out as a service was starting.
The boat had to leave its mooring and move ten miles upstream to Wesseling and we had the option of returning to the boat or going to it later by bus. We opted to stay in the city, and we walked a couple of miles along the Rhine embankment 
to the Flora und Botanischer Garten. Our first priority though was lunch. We found it at the Dank Augusta stand on the side of this building: meatballs and buns and Köls
ch beers, served in a plastic picnic pail.
The gardens are large, over twenty acres of formal garden, woodlands, greenhouses, lakes, alpine gardens, a bit of everything. We had a good afternoon. The pictures show a small fraction of what we saw.
|
Flora und Botanische Gärten |
|---|
On our walk back we saw these gondolas; they were a fast route across the river but no help to us. The tourist train/bus might have been going our way but it was gone before we thought to look for the stop.
|
Cologne Cathedral |
|---|
We’d left enough time to revisit the cathedral without the crowds and found some spectacular icons and stained glass windows, and that famous golden box of relics. We were ejected again as the place was closing and we had to drink Kölsch to pass the time until our bus showed up. We were back in time for dinner and the boat’s departure from Wesseling.