Quite a bit of travelling ahead!!
Trip Start
Sep 07, 2006
1
11
15
Trip End
Dec 18, 2006
Bremen and Bonn, Germany
Monday, November 6, 2006
Well another week in Germany has gone by and this week we did quite a bit of travelling by train!
Tuesday we went to the Pflaumenbaum as usual and had a good time! For the rest of the week, we worked a bit on our projects but we mostly travelled!!
Thursday, Anne, Cate and I went to Bremen! (when the Germans say Bremen, it sounds very Scottish!!) It was quite the nice city to go and visit, full of history and gorgeous landmarks! We arrived there at about 11:40 after quite a few train transfers, the first in Hameln and the next in Hannover. When we arrived, I was very thankful to have thought to bring my tuque and mitts because was it ever cold!! On our way to the marketplace, we found a windmill so of course, we went up to it, had a look around and took a fair amount of pictures! Afterwards, we found our way to the marketplace (after making a couple stops in some stores...hehe what a suprise!!) and was it ever cute! All the buildings were so gorgeous and the atmosphere was just perfect! As the weeks go by, we're getting quite a feeling that Christmas is right around the corner, especially when you walk around and there are Christmas lights everywhere, people playing the accordion and all the store displays are all with a Christmas theme!!
After visiting the Dom, finding the Town Musicians Statue and the statue of Roland, we headed off to find Böttcherstrasse which was where there was a carillon!! I think of all the places that I could have stayed in Bremen, I could have easily spent the whole day listening to the carillon there. It was so beautiful! After spending quite an amount of time listening to it and looking around, we headed off to find somewhere to eat! I had completely forgotten that Beck's was brewed in Bremen so of course, we found a restaurant called the Beck's Bistro and during our lunch (and me enjoying a good Beck's Gold!) we decided to go and see the brewery, I was quite excited!! Unfortunately, when we got there, the english tour had already started and they didn't have another one that day so we had to content ourselves with the giftshop! Nevertheless, it was still pretty cool and I can say that I went to the Beck's brewery!!
Once I bought my mug, we headed back towards the marketplace and made a stop in a place called the Schnoor where they had all these nice little shops! Some were for tourists but other were mostly people selling art pieces that they had created. There was actually one store where they had little clay figurings of Tintin, Lucky Luke etc...but were they every expensive!!! After having a good window shopping experience, we went off to find the Drag Theatre which was closed obviously (they had a show late at night) but still was pretty funny. Seems like that kind of thing is pretty popular here since it's not the first time that we've found one!
After seeing all the sights that we wanted to see, we headed to the city centre to see if they had any good shops. We were actually a bit disappointed so we ended our trip with a stop at a bakery to have a piece of cake!! hehe! Our train ride back was fine, very long though and we had to do some more transfers like when we were going to Bremen. All in all, quite a nice little trip! I've got some good videos to show you guys when I get back!!
On Saturday, Emma, Kelly, Anne, Cate and I went with Eurobiz to Bonn...actually we didn't sign up with them we just took the train with them and saw the sights by ourselves. Esther and Maggie had signed up so they followed the exchange students around the city! The first portion of the train ride went well...just until we had to transfer in Hamm. Saturday was the first day of the carnaval in Köln so when the train arrived, it was PACKED with people all dressed up, drinking like crazy and some were even standing up!! Esther and Maggie managed to get on that train and when we figured out that there was going to be no way that we were going to fit on it, we found another connection on a different platform and thank god, that one was pretty empty so we got to sit down. Not long afterwards though, the train started filling up like crazy and once we arrived in Köln, it was quite the sight to see I must tell you!! It was almost like Halloween!! I've honestly never seen so many people on a train in my life, it was worse than OC Transpo in the morning!! haha!
When we arrived in Bonn, we went to the tourist information centre and got a map of the city. We then found out that Beethoven was born in Bonn and that there was his house that we could visit and a couple other things dedicated to him! So of course, we started to get cracking because there was quite a lot of things to see! We first went to the Dom, and also saw the Beethoven statue which was in the middle of the square. At one point during the day, there was a band from what seemed like Peru or South America (sort of like that cd that you bought Mom!!) playing some music and there was also a man playing guitar and others playing the accordion! I must admit, the people playing instruments in the streets in Europe have quite a lot of talent compared to some back home!! hehe! Afterwards, we set out to find Beethoven's house, and came across Bonn University which is quite the large and old building!! After checking our map a bit, we started heading in the direction of the Rathaus where we discovered that there was a carnaval going on there too!! There was a big stage with a man singing in German, loads of people dressed up and of course, drinking beer!! After looking around a bit and laughing at some of the crazy costumes, we found Beethoven's house!! We went and bought a ticket to have a look around and I must say, it was quite amazing! There was so much of his original sheet music in glass cases, and let's not forget his pianos and violin!! We got this really detailed paper explaining all the different articles in the rooms which helped a lot since all the information within the rooms were written in German!! After browsing around for quite some time, we headed back to the Rathaus and had a look around (we also stopped for lunch at McDo's...hehe) and we finally found a STARBUCKS!! We told each other that on the way back to Paderborn that we'd make a stop there and get ourselves a coffee.
When we were walking around we found the Sterntor which was pretty interesting and of course, we took a couple jumping pictures there!! We wanted to try and find the schloss but after trying to find it on our poorly indicated map, we realized that it was too far so we satisfied ourselves with a sorta "schloss" close to the university. After a bit of looking around and some more window shopping (btw, I've been quite unlucky with clothes shopping in Germany...nothing fits properly, mostly the sizes are too big!!) we headed back to the Starbucks and got ourselves a really good coffee for our return trip!
We managed to get a train a couple minutes after we arrived at the station although we were so close to missing it that we had to stand since there was hardly no more room left. When we arrived in Köln, we had a couple minutes so we walked around a bit in the station and was it ever crowded! (and smelt really bad!!) Everyone was drinking, there were people passed out on the stairs (which was pretty funny) and there was dancing too!! Seemed like quite the party that's for sure!! We managed to get a fairly good spot on the train and we didn't even have to stand! When we got to Hamm station, we had to wait a good 45 minutes before the next train arrived and funny enough we ran into Esther and Maggie who told us that they had to stand up on the train all the way to Bonn and all the way back! Poor girls!! Needless to say when we got on the train, we made sure that they both had a place to sit because even the train to Paderborn was VERY full!!
When I got home, I was so tired!! I had a nice talk with Marc as always and then I went to bed!!
Sunday we all took it easy, we came to campus to work a bit on our project, I talked to Marc before he went to work and then in the evening, Anne, Cate and I made supper for the girls!! They had never had fajitas before so we decided that we were going to introduce them to Mexican food!! Afterwards, we exchanged pictures and went home since we have an early class on Mondays!
That pretty much concludes another week in Paderborn! Although next week we may not be doing any travelling, we've still got a couple outings planned and then the week after, ENGLAND!! woohoo!!
Hope all is well and see you all really soon!!
Nat.
