(CONTINUATION)
Koln is the German pronunciation of Cologne.
And yes, there's more in Koln than the Cathedral.
Like the 12 Romanesque churches which maybe lesser in stature but nonetheless ancient and famous too.
That I did learn later back home.
And realized that I have in fact shot 4 from the cathedral tower: the Great St. Martin Church, the basilica's of St. Gereon and St. Ursula, and circa 970 AD St. Andreas Church (below).
Possibly 6 with the identification of 2 more spires.
But how did I killed 8 hours in between my hotel check out in Bonn and my reserved train ride to Frankfurt from Koln?
I could have easily if I did my usual Google research and found out about the 12 Romanesque churches.
But I did not so I checked at the Lufthansa Air-Rail counter who told me about them luggage storage machines.
Which 5 Euros did for 24 hours of storage.
And enabled me to explore deeper via shop-lined streets called Richartzstrasse, Ludwigstrasse, Bruckenstrasse where I encountered the Antoniter Church (circa 14th century)...
...Sporergasse, Grosse Neugasse, and Am Domhof before sitting down a stone wall and discreetly espied a nearby young German couple in heavy exploration of each other's tongues.
I walked Richardzstrasse, Ludwigstrasse, and Burckenstrasse again.
There I had my currywurst lunch.
There I women-watched...
It's bad enough to have the same hotel breakfast for 15 days straight. (So I made myself braver by making it a hobby to concoct a new sandwich everyday from the daily assortment of cold cuts tucked in between a variety of cheeses and the usual bits of tomato, cucumber, and bell pepper that are pressed in between a sliced crusty Brotchen liberally lathered with the ever present butter and marmalade). [Of course, I made a variation of what cold cuts and cheeses are for the day but the veggies, the spread, and the Brotchen were eternal fares].
It's worse to endure the daily mostly potato-centered fare of the Aubergine & Zucchini near Convention Land that goes by the name Maritim Hotel. (These are mostly french fries, a mashed version then and now, unpeeled/peeled boiled small ones twice or thrice, and the more appetizing but rare garlic sauteed boiled and sliced minis). [[I say the saving grace of the Bonn potato medley is its accompaniments of bockwurst [more popularly known as the frankfurter], burgers [which they say originated from Hamburg], fried fish fillet, fried white meat [that I later discovered to be chicken], and schnitzel [which is actually a slice of fried lean pork] that all came bathed in a gravy that tasted like Jollibee's].
But the evil of them all are the nights of the junk feed dinners, usually in the second half of the negotiations when time out is almost midnight, and the restaurants are therefore closed. (Sometimes, I make do with a panini sandwich and a bottle of coke from the gas station near the tram station; on some rare occasions, I survive with a doner kebab which we know better as shawarma from the only open Turkish restaurant in Bad Godesberg; and twice I lived on McDonald's garbage food). [But there's always crunch time when the going gets fueled by chocolates, candies, cookies, coke and all the sugar required for staying awake as we negotiators try to outsmart each other in who can talk in circles more and say hell in the most polite way possible].
FOOTNOTE: Photos were all downloaded via Google and not mine.
DATELINE: June 2011
"You must go to Cologne."
"The church is just across the train station."
"It's only less than an hour by train from Bonn."
That's what they told me. But still, I did not go. Perhaps it's the daily long walks along Rheinalee from Bad Godesberg Station to Hotel Haus Berlin that sapped my juices. Or I miscalculated my trip back home thinking I would be passing by on the way to the Koln/Bonn airport.
The thing is, I should have went but did not.
DATELINE: May 2012
This time, I don't need to be told.
The cathedral beckoned as I made the changing of the trains in Cologne.
I in fact went out of the Hauptbahnhof a bit to gawk at the ornate imposing structure.
And I did come on the second Sunday after learning that Bad Godesberg has a Bahnhof aside from the underground train stop; walking my way around, trying to get the best vantage view I can manage with an impossible 55-250 mm lens of a borrowed Canon EO 350D; focusing on the details as I can't get a panoramic shot; like from Burgamauer where I miserably failed in getting that full shot...
....and the Komodienstrasse where I got foiled again.
I went inside, tried some low light shooting of the main altar with a lens designed for long distance people photography...
...before venting my frustration on a 144.5 meter climb to one of the towers where I was able to get some good shots of the 960 AD era Great St. Martin Church...
...some not to good shots of the basilicas of St. Gereon (circa 1151) and St. Ursula (Circa 1106)...
...and some other churches which I later found out to be among Cologne's also famous 12 Romanesque churches. Then I decided to be a paparazzi for a while...
(TO BE CONTINUED)
KOLNER DOM: Officially called as as the High Cathedral of Sts. Peter and Mary, the Cologne Cathedral was started to be built in 1248 and completed only in 1880. It's 157 meter twin towers are the second tallest and its facade the biggest of any church in the world. The cathedral houses a reliquary which contains what is believed to be the remains of the Three Maggis. It was damaged by aerial bombing during World War II and was repaired until 1956. The cathedral was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996.
