Europe 2012- Day 3: Aachen, Germany

Saturday

Since our kitchen has very limited pots and pans etc. we have to run the dishwasher every day, or we won’t have enough silverware or plates for the next day. So after we woke up on Saturday and discovered that the dishwasher had only done a pre-wash and nothing was clean, we had to run it again.

 Cereal and toast for breakfast.

 

The plan was to go to an Arts and Craft fair in Aachen, Germany. Nathan and I had been there 5 years ago, but we were limited on time. It’s an annual event that they hold, and on that weekend only they also open up the bell tower to the Cathedral in the center of town, which gives you a good view of the city.

On the drive down to Aachen, Nathan decided he wanted to show us Snowworld which is the large building where he had gone snowboarding the weekend before. The building is huge, and built on the side of probably the only hill in Holland. As we were walking up to the building we saw a huge obstacle course outside as well as a small roller coaster type ride. There was a sign saying only 2.5 euros per ride, so we decided try it. 

The building as we are driving up along with a very long staircase

I thought this sign was cool

First we checked out the inside of the building. They have a restaurant with huge windows looking into the ski slopes. It really is so big that you can see only part way up the hill. Outside Dave and Kristie went first on the ride and Nate and I had the camera’s to take some pictures.  Kristie’s cart apparently had the brakes stuck most of the way on though as she was crawling along, and by the end had some traffic behind her. She probably should have asked to go again for free since her cart wasn’t working properly but she didn’t. 

One of the slopes you can see from the restaurant windows

The outdoor obstacle course.

Dave enjoying the ride

Kristie at the end

 

Nate and I went next, but I told him the only way I would go was if we rode together. As we started getting towards the top of the hill we could see a view of the valley which was cool and then we hit the top and away we went, using pretty much no brakes on the way down.  

 

After our ride we headed off toward Aachen as it was already lunch time. When we arrived it took us a while to find the same garage we had used on our first trip. Walking into town we decided to find food right away. After looking at a few posted menus (for pricing) we decided on a place. After sitting down we realized that it was the same restaurant we had lunch at 5 years ago. We tried to order water with no bubbles but we still got sparkling water. Luckily I had some crystal light in my bag so I was able to make it tolerable. The food on the other hand was really good. I had a schnitzel Hawaii which was schnitzel topped with pineapple rings a thin slice of ham and a cheese sauce and served with fries.

Nice name for a fruit stand

We ate lunch at the "Golden Swan"

 

Now it was time to hit the fair. There were hundreds of booths/tents set up in rows along the streets and in the city center. We started by watching a metal worker. He was working on making a little hand key chain that had the pinky finger up. We asked a guy what it meant and he said it was a symbol for Aachen. I guess they used to manufacture needles in Aachen, and the women would keep their pinky finger out to separate out the bad needles from the good ones.

There were really cool lamps made out of wood. The stand was branches and the shade was really thin wood as well. Any stand that had real flowers also had bees. There was a really huge bumble bee with a white butt, probably at least an inch long if not a little bit more. 

Very cool lamp made of wood

Huge bumble bee

Sheep wandering through a mushroom forest

This was a man being a statue for money

 

This fair had everything from clothes, to toys, decorations, to jewelry, hats, to pottery. If you can make it, it was probably there. We did buy a few little things, which was also one of the reasons I wanted to go. Finally we headed towards the Cathedral. 

Puppet show

Overalls and jumpers made of leather

Pond art?

 

This time we were limited to where we could go in the Cathedral without a tour, but we could still see most everything, just not everything really close up. We didn’t really want to pay for a tour, not because it was expensive but because it was only in German. We were still able to go up in the bell tower though.

The Aachen Cathedral, also refereed to at the "Imperial Cathedral" is the oldest Cathedral in northern Europe. Built by the order of Charles the Great (Charlemagne) around 792, it was used for 600 years for the coronations of Kings and Queens.
After Charlemagne's death in 814, his remains were placed in a vault in the cathedral. In the year 1000 Otto III had the vault opened and this is what was recorded from that event.
"So we went in to Charles. He did not lie, as the dead otherwise do, but sat as if he were living. He was crowned with a golden crown and held in his gloved hands a sceptre; the fingernails had penetrated through the gloves and stuck out. Above him was a canopy of limestone and marble. Entering, we broke through this. Upon our entrance, a strong smell struck us. Kneeling, we gave Emperor Charles our homage, and put in order the damage that had been done. Emperor Charles had not lost any of his members to decay, except only the tip of his nose. Emperor Otto replaced this with gold, took a tooth from Charles’s mouth, walled up the entrance to the chamber, and withdrew again." the Chronicle of Novalesia

The golden box in the background supposedly holds 4 sacred relics: St. Mary's cloak, Christ's swaddling clothes, St. John the Baptist's beheading cloth and Christ's loincloth. Since 1349 every 7 years they are taken out and displayed for a period of time.

You can see just some of the tents from the Arts & Craft fair. The building across the way is a government building

I love that someone is growing a garden on the gutter

Charlemagne's throne in the cathedral (clearly he had a better Lay-z-boy at home)

The entire ceiling of the Cathedral is made up of 1/2" tiles. That is what all the pictures are made of as well.

 

We decided that we would have enough time to go to Koln on the way home. It’s not really on the way, but it has such an impressive cathedral that we thought they should really see it. We didn’t get there until 6 PM, so we went to the cathedral first as we didn’t know when they closed it to visitors. You can really only go into the foyer area, which still allows you to see down into the church, but they have Catholic church guys standing at a little gate that goes into the pew area. There was actually a nun speaking when we were inside.

The Golden Box in the middle is the Shrine of the Three Kings. It dates back to 1190, and it is said to hold the remains of the three wise men. In 1864 the shrine was opened, and inside they found bones and garments.

The Cologne Cathedral is also known as the High Cathedral of St. Peter and Mary. It is Germany's most visited tourist sight with around 20,000 people visiting it per day. It is the largest Gothic church in northern Europe, and has the tallest facade in the world at 515 feet tall.
Construction on the Cathedral started back in 1248, but it wasn't totally finished until 1880. During World War II the Cathedral was spared due to it's usefulness in navigating the skies. Where the train station and bridges immediately next to it, and much of the city lay in ruin. 

The Cathedral houses a bell called Pretiosa dating from 1448 which was the largest bell in the Western world at that time(10.5 tons), it also houses the largest free swinging bell in the world called St. Petersglocke (24 tons) that was cast in 1922.

 

Soon our stomachs were telling us it was time for dinner so we set off in search of food. We had thought about eating at a restaurant right outside of the cathedral so we could just look at it while we ate, but we didn’t really see anything on the menu that sounded good. Just off the square we found a place called Farmer's which was a BBQ restaurant. I ordered the Farmer's burger which was just a meat patty a slice of garlic bread and a baked potato drowning in sour cream. The meat was actually good but it took a while to remove the sour cream from my potato. Afterwards we stopped for some gelato, which seemed better then I remembered it to be.

Walking back towards the Cathedral we were stopped by a group of women in their 20’s. After realizing we were American one of the girls asked in very good English if we would write her advice on her shirt, she was getting married and this was her bachelorette party. The front of her shirt had 10 numbers 0-9, and she asked if we would give her 1 euro then pick a number and they would sing us a song. She said if it sounded really horrible we could pay another euro and they would stop singing. Long story short I gave her a euro for song number 6. I didn’t recognize the tune, and they didn’t sound too bad.

As it was getting darker we decided to stay until the lights turned on, as we had never seen the Cathedral at night. We walked out toward the water, so Dave and Kristie could see the Rhine River, which is a huge highway for boats.

The Blue Moon Starting to peek up above the trees

Locks of Love

 

There is a bridge in Koln where people attach locks inscribed with their names and sometimes date of their wedding. Nate had heard about this bridge and we found it. Pretty cool how many thousands of locks there where. We might just have to go back and leave a lock :)

The lights finally turned on about a quarter till 9 PM. We took a few pictures and then headed for home which was an hour and 45 minute drive.

This reminded me of telling a scary story with a flashlight

 

I noticed a car hauler parked in front of the hotel, and then the back parking lot was full, which is very unusual. We then saw numbers on all the cars. After parking and getting out of our car we saw some guys and asked them if they were part of the race. They said they were and it was a classic car road rally. This was their last stop before finishing the next day out where they started near The Hague. I’m not sure how many days their Classic Car Race was, but I know he said they had been down to France, Luxembourg, and Belgium.

Parking lot full of old race cars