Day Trip to Frankfurt
Trip Start
Apr 18, 2011
1
11
14
Trip End
May 03, 2011
Frankfurt, Hesse, Germany
Friday, April 29, 2011
After breakfast, we headed to Bacharach Train Station (which was about 5mins walk from our hotel) so that we could take the 930am train to Mainz Train Station. Guess what!!! Waiting on the opposite platform was the old uncle who carried the Rick Steves guide yesterday! I guess he should be continuing on his journey to visit Cologne, which I would very much want to visit because the Cologne Church was very majestic, and the town was rather pretty.
Upon reaching Mainz Train Station, we took the ICE 1559 train to Frankfurt Main Train Station which departed at 1042am.
The ICE Train was indeed speedy! We reached Frankfurt Main Train Station around 1113am.
Frankfurt wais a 'stopover' city for us like Innsbruck in the Austria leg. We would be taking the overnight train to Berlin. Sigh... this only meant that our trip was coming to an end soon... ...
We followed Rick Steves' self-guided walk around the city. First, I snapped a picture of the Train Station, which featured a facade constructed in Neo-Renaissance style. This was a style popular with the Industrial Revolution era architects. This classic late 19th-century glass-and-iron construction survived World War II. High above, a statue of Apollo carries the world!
From the train station, we crossed to the opposite side leading to Kaiserstrasse. Beyond the stretch of nice 19th-century looking buildings lies the financial district of Frankfurt where tall buildings and skyscrapers stood!
We had wanted to go to the Main Tower (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maintower) and take a panoramic view of Frankfurt city, but I think we walked in the wrong direction and mistook some tall building as the Main Tower...
We finally reached the Main Tower, and there's a long queue for the lift to go up to the 200m tall building, finished in 2000. We had to spend EUR5 to take the lift and climb the remaining 55 steps to the Observation Deck. The view was so-so only... because its a modern city filled with skyscrapers! Luckily the view was not obstructed by nets...
There's this bunch of tourists who were very noisy and kept obstructing the way! ARGH! They even took photos at the lift, which caused MAJOR obstructions! What's so interesting about the lift?
After coming down from the tower, we decided to find something to fill our stomachs. We wandered around the entire banking district, which consisted of a lot of sandwich shops with little seats.. We chanced upon Nordsee and decided to have our first taste of fish in Germany. As usual, we ordered 2 sets - one fish & potatoes, and 1 big bowl of salad, with 2 cold drinks.
After lunch, we walked past Zeil, which was Frankfurt's shopping street. As the skies suddenly grew dark and the winds began to blow very strongly, we decided to go into one of the malls to seek shelter and continue onto our next destination when the weather turned for the better. All the things in the shopping mall were branded and we decided to check out the weather outside as we don't really have eyes for luxury goods.
We managed to walk to Romerberg (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%B6mer), the old town of Frankfurt, where the houses were prettier than those skyscrapers in the financial districts! The Town Hall housed the Kaisersaal (Imperial Hall), where Holy Roman Emperors celebrated their coronations. Today, the Romer houses the city council and the mayor's office.
We walked through Romerberg and arrived at Saalgasse and the Roman Ruins. St. Bartholomew's Cathedral stood majestically in front of these ancient Roman ruins. We walked past the cathedral and came to the river, where we crossed the bridge to go to Sachsenhausen, in search of the apfelwein (apple wine) pubs.
We were almost lost when a kind-hearted woman gave us directions and we found Adolf Wagner - http://www.apfelwein-wagner.com/htdocs/english/index_d.htm - a traditional joint that was recommended both in Rick Steves & Lonely Planet guides.
I personally think that apple wine is definitely an 'acquired taste'. We also ordered 2 types of desserts - apple strudel and strawberries with whipped cream & ice cream. I guess they are famous for their pork knuckle as well because a bunch of men sat beside us and ordered that! WOW! IT's Gigantic and it attracted the attention of the ang moh sitting behind us!
We decided to take the U-bahn to Zeil to shop. At the U-bahn station, we had some slight difficulty in buying the tickets from the machines... It took us a while to decipher how to buy the tickets, but our hearts were warmed by the number of concerned people who tried to help us.
The shopping street was super duper crowded! I managed to buy a wallet & a new "mix & match" watch strap from FOSSIL. After that we went to Adidas and saw that there's a limited "Frankfurt" edition T-shirt like the Hard Rock Cafe city T-shirts.
There's a boutique called "ZERO" and I went in to try some very nice skirts & dresses. However, the skirt is EUR59.95!!! I doubt I am going to spend so much on a skirt. Hence, we moved on to H&M and some other shops before stopping at McDonald's for dinner, and to while our time away, since we need to wait for our midnight train...
I ordered the Cesar Crispy Chicken burger... which doesn't really taste that nice... Anyways, we felt more tired sitting down and waiting, so we decided to head towards the Main Hbf.
The horror of horrors struck us here when we realised that the midnight train we were supposed to catch did NOT depart from Frankfurt Hbf!!! ARGH!! It's actually Frankfurt Sud Station. We had to quickly catch a train to Frankfurt Sud Station and wait for our midnight train to Berlin.
Frankfurt Sud Station was very deserted ... ... The train would arrive only at 0054 hours! Sigh .... There's no waiting area and the platform level was super cold! Brrrr..... we had to go to McDonald's to take a seat while waiting for our train to come ...
When we were at the platform level waiting for our train, we saw some commotion at the opposite platform. It seemed that a man was being subdued by some police and security personnel. He was handcuffed as well...
When our train finally came and we headed towards our cabin, we realised that the people inside had locked it, thinking that they were the only occupants! How selfish! Anyways, we had to quickly put our bags, remove our shoes and sleep on our beds the moment we got into the cabin.
Oh well... I hope it doesn't take me long to fall asleep!
