Arrive in Cologne, Germany

Dom Am Kolm, a huge cathedral in Cologne. The largest of all the church I have seen on my trip.
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We got up checked out of the hotel and had to take another very crowded bus and tram to the train station. I guess it was the Saturday morning rush hour or something. We got a train to Cologne, Germany which is up near the Netherlands and Belgium. The train followed the Rhine River north and there was some amazing scenery. There were lots of small towns with old castles and battlements up on the hills above the towns. We went through lots of tunnels in the hills and we zig zagged back and forth across bridges on the Rhine. It was a long train ride about six hours, so we didn't get into Cologne kind of late. We also didn't realize that the hotel was pretty far from the train station. We were both tired and a the fifteen minute walk to the hotel from the station is definitely not enjoyable. The huge cathedral, the Dom Am Kolm, right next to the main train station was the biggest church that I have seen so far on my trip. One of the books about Cologne said that the Allied planes in World War II agreed not to bomb it and pilots used it as a landmark to help in navigation over Germany. After we checked into the hotel and dropped off our bags, we went back to the main train station to find some dinner. As we walked near the river there was a firework show going on, so we stopped to enjoy it. Then we went to one of the brewery resturant called Peter's Brewhaus, which was pretty crowded. We got seated right away, but it was kind of off in one of the corners of the resturant. The food was okay, but the beer was really good. The beers were small only 200mL glasses, but the waiter would bring a large tray of beer and you could grabbed as many as you wanted each time. We just got two each, so they wouldn't get warm while we drank them. It was really smokey and there was no ventilation, so we didn't stay long after eating. It was getting pretty late, so we just went back to the hotel and went to sleep.

There were lots of small towns with old castles and battlements up on the hills above the towns.