Cologne with the Louws Family

Yesterday, we took the train to Cologne for the afternoon. On weekends, families can buy a Schönes Wochenende (Happy Weekend) ticket for 40 Euros per day. With that pass, a family can travel any regional train within Germany that they choose to - all day/any train. It's a great way to see other cities. It takes longer than the ICE, the high-speed rail - we spent about 11 hours on the train to see the Louws and Cologne for five hours....but it was so worth it! And we'd gladly do it again! It was so good for us to be able to visit with friends. Plus we picked a neat city to meet in as well.

We decided to meet at the Dom - a cathedral built in the 1200s, or at least started at that point. It is now comical to me that I suggested we meet by the cathedral - it's massive! How in the world were we going to find each other? It was raining outside so we opted to search inside for them....along with thousands of other tourists! The boys were quite concerned that we didn't immediately see our friends so we opted for the 'divide and conquer' approach planning to meet back in five minutes. Thankfully, the Louws did the same thing choosing the same meeting spot!

Wanting to visit more than anything, we chose to see the cathedral on our own rather than pay for a tour. We did, however, pay the family fee to climb the 533 steps to the top of one of the steeples. What a hike! And what a view!

 

Photo taken by Mitchell Louws







All the stained glass was absolutely beautiful!
Photo taken by Mitchell Louws

As we stood talking together near the entrance to the Dom, we
could hear singing from near the front of the cathedral. Following
the beautiful sounds, we found this mens' choir singing a cappella.
Just beautiful! We even heard a song that we recognized -
'Jerusalem, Jerusalem, lift up your voice and sing....' (Holy City)
but it was all in German so we enjoyed the four part harmony
and an occasional word or two!
 

I could have spent the day taking in all of the
details in just the woodwork alone - even the
pews were beautifully carved.



There were quite a few life-size statues
throughout the Dom - this is one
depicting the death of Jesus.

The pipe organ was massive - the pipes were about five stories
above where we were standing. When we were getting
ready to climb the steeple, we could hear the organ briefly - and at that
point we were under the cathedral at its foundation. I can only imagine
hearing it during a service! Breath-taking, I'm sure!
Photo taken by Mitchell Louws
 

 

 



We could have spent hours figuring out which
Bible stories were depicted in these carvings/statues.
I believe I took this photo at one of the side entrances.

The dads and younger boys spent a few minutes figuring out these statues while
the rest of us were taking some photos inside before deciding on a restaurant.
There were about 12 of these Old Testament statues a couple stories
above where we were standing.

This only captures about half of the Dom - can you believe I suggested just
meeting there? Thankfully we didn't have any issues finding one another!

To get a sense of the size - at the bottom of the photo are
the heads of two people - they don't even come the the
halfway point of the doors!

After spending time at the cathedral, we opted to find a restaurant serving Schnitzel. This was the only day that the Louws were in Germany while in Europe so we wanted to find a place to try some German food. Schnitzel was our number one choice but Brats would have been fine, too. Technically, Schnitzel is Austrian but it seems to be quite a common dish for Germans as well. A guy at an information station near the Dom gave us a map and the names of a few good restaurants to try. We were headed for Peter's Brauhaus when the dads discovered some restaurants along the waterfront of the Rhine.

The dads studying the map... in the rain, no less!

The search for Peter's continues!

~ Micah, Mitchell and Joel ~
The boys were basically three peas in a pod most all of the afternoon!

~ Josiah, Ethan and Noah ~
The same for the younger guys as well!

On our way to find Peter's, we stumbled across several restaurants along the Rhine River. One of the restaurants had a sign outside announcing Schnitzel on their menu. Though a chilly day, we sat outside with the blankets and heaters available to us. This was a good option as we had the whole outdoor seating area to ourselves.

We made the ordering easy - all 11 of us ordered Schnitzel!

Helen's mother joined them on their trip - she was a delight to get to know!

After finishing the Schnitzel, we walked along the Rhine for a bit before heading back to the train station. By this point in the afternoon, the rain had stopped which made it much more enjoyable to be outside. Helen brought some Dutch cookies to share with us - so very yummy!

 

We all especially enjoyed the cookies that have
caramel on the inside. Tracy said that he'd had
enough sweets until he heard the word caramel!

Our first train out of Cologne left the station at 5:21 - it was a quick visit with our friends but oh, so good for us all! We had to switch trains several times on the way home - one of the legs was jam packed with travelers so we stood for that hour at the entrance with several others without seats. We were so thankful to not have luggage and all remembered our initial train ride into Göttingen with too many bags and not enough room on the train! What a zoo that trip was! So bad, in fact, that we have contemplated shipping boxes home. At one of the stations, we had 20 minutes to wait for our next train. Because it was chilly, the boys figured out a way to stay warm.

The boys had me time them as they raced up
and down the stairways connecting the platforms.
It worked in keeping them warm!

To pass the time on the train, I brought along the book, Trapped in Ice, by Eric Walters - a great read-aloud! We all enjoyed listening to this book - based on a true story of the Canadian Artic Expeditions of the early 1900s. We arrived in Göttingen around 11:00 pm and were quite thankful to find that it had finished raining here, too, since we had to hop on our bikes for a quick ride home. What a treat the day was for us all!