Day 2 of Cologne

EDIT: I added a bunch of new pictures, but for some reason its cutting them off, so click on the picture to see the full image.

I Spent the morning working at the HRC. The people there are great, just like Bucharest, for which I am very thankful. With 2 good shoots so far, I don't know how much longer this will last, but I hope the rest are half this helpful.

Spent a lot of time talking with one of the girls I was working with about life in europe, politics, america, germany, history, culture, etc. It was encouraging to hear more positive things about the US and Americans, as well as the state of the minds in Europe. Sometimes I think that America is the only sane nation left, but its good to hear that many of the people I have met are just as rational as we are, and want most of the same things we do. And the differences in our cultures are what makes the world an interesting place.

On my way back to the hotel I stopped at a small restaurant called Pfaffen Brauerei to get some lunch and get out of the rain. I had a meal that included sausage, and some kind of potatoes with fried onions I think..either way it was delicious.

I decided to take a guided tour bus around the city for 10 euro. It lasted about 1.5 hrs and was a good way to see a lot of the city and get some history at the same time. I took a lot of pictures, some of which I will post if I can, but most of which I will try to put online somewhere else. Cologne is a very interesting city with a unique history and place in Germany. The old city, which is where I am staying and visiting, is my favorite part of the city. I am having a blast walking all over and exploring.

here is the Cologne Cathedral
another church near my hotel
inside of the cathedral
candles in the church
a famous square near the HRC
more of the inside of the cathedral
more of the inside of the church
looking up at the front of the cathedral
a famous building designed by architect Renzo Piano
the outside of my hotel
the inside of the hotel

I went to another bridge over the Rhein to get some more photos from another perspective of the Cologne Cathedral and some other churches along the western side of the river. Here is one that I shot tonight:
On the way back to the hotel I stopped at another restaurant called Rheinland Koln, and had a meal of blood sausage, mashed potatoes with onions, and homemade apple sauce. Naturally, it was outstanding.

I have come to the conclusion that it is impossible to get a bad meal here. I am enjoying Germany a lot so far. It has friendly people, beautiful scenery and architecture, tons of history, shopping for the wife, and amazing food. It is a country that I would have no problem visiting again sometime.

I will attempt to post more pictures of my travels around Cologne, but I am finding I have less and less time to edit photos. I will try to put some more up tomorrow.

John

Koln

I wanted to get that out of the way first. That is the kind of image I was hoping to be able to capture at some point, and I am pretty pleased with the result. The cathedral is the Cologne Cathedral, quite famous and easily the most dominant presence on the skyline of Cologne. There's a secret to getting this scene to look the way I wanted it to ;-) I won't divulge that, but the fun part is that this picture is totally unedited, except to merge two images into one to make it wider.

Today started off with me waking up at 3am and not being able to go back to sleep. My taxi came at 5am and we got to the airport quickly. It was a different airport this time, Banaesa Airport. An older, smaller airport, it was surprisingly very close to the larger international airport. Checking in was total madness. The terminal was tiny, old, and full of people. It took me a while to figure out what I was supposed to be doing. When I finally did check in, I found out that this airline (Blue Air) had a limit of 1 checked bag per person, weight not to exceed 20kg. Well I had 2 bags, whose combined weight was about 38kg. So, I paid the fee of 6 euro per extra kg, plus a fee for an extra bag, amounting to about $150. Amazing.

Boarding was accomplished by bussing everyone about 100 yards to the plane, where we piled on. We had some incredible turbulence on the short flight to Sibiu, where we stopped to get more passengers (I guess?). I slept most of the way to Cologne.

Got into Cologne, got my luggage, took a taxi to my hotel, and took about a 2 hr nap because I was so tired.

Woke up, grabbed my camera, and headed out to check out the location of the HRC and maybe meet some of the staff. On the way I would check out what Cologne looked like. I spent some time in the Cathedral. It was very cool. Huge. I took a lot of pictures.

I wandered through the streets until I found the HRC. There are tons of restaurants, shops, small narrow cobblestoned streets, etc. I find it all fascinating.

I ate a very late lunch at a small restaurant along the river (The Rhein). I had marinated porksteak. It was pretty good.

Eventually I went back to my hotel and got my tripod and headed across the bridge to attempt the shot I posted above. I had to wait quite a while in the cold, but I think it was worth it.

That's pretty much it for today. If you don't see as many pictures as you think you should, check back because I add more sometimes. I also updated photos and captions to my last post about Bucharest.

- John

Day 2 in Bucharest

I will attempt to recap the last 24 hrs. Also, if you would like to leave a comment on the blog, you can use your google account to log in if you have one (gmail, etc).

Last night after I made the last blog, I went to a restaurant down the street called The Harbour - here is the website. It was small but that was what I was looking for. It had a lot of old wood in it, supposedly it was opened in the 1800s or something. I got some sort of thing that was like beef, wrapped in pork, wrapped in bacon. It was pretty good.

I decided to go check out the concert at the Hard Rock since they said I should check it out, and I didn't have much else to do. Besides, how often can you say you have been to a concert in Romania? So I took a taxi over there. I only stayed for about 15 minutes. It was very crowded, I dont speak any Romanian, so nothing made much sense, and I got the feeling I had already seen the best of them during sound check anyway, so I left. I had to walk a bit to a large intersection to find some taxis, and I ended up finding the same guy who had taken me over earlier.

Friday

I had much the same breakfast today as I had yesterday, but added a very good omelet to the mix. I like to take full advantage of free breakfasts.

I then headed back to the HRC to finish things up. We were able to get everything done that I wanted to, and it went quickly.

After I had finished with things this afternoon, I decided to try to see more of the city by using the Bucharest Metro. For 8 lei, I could purchase 10 stops. not bad for about 2 bucks. It was by no means easy to figure out my way around the city using the metro. Their concept of "map" leaves a lot to be desired. I got off at a few different stops, walked around, and then would get back on. I found a gigantic park and walked through that for a while. Eventually I figured out how to get to the one thing that seemed interesting, a gigantic building called the Palace of the Parliament. Supposedly it is one of the largest buildings in the world. It was built by Nicolae Ceauşescu, former ruler of Communist Romania.

an intersection near my hotel

heading down into the metro
more of the metro
same kind of cars as Atlanta and DC...made by Bombadier :-)

that large building i talked about
colorful fence

vagabondul...hey i found it funny.
who buys a Ford when you live in Europe???
I guess this guy couldn't live without his PT Cruiser....(check out that parking job! crawl out the passenger side much??)
average street in residential area
graffiti in the park
walking in the park
corner of the park looking towards a large intersection
another large intersection near my hotel.
crossing the street
another metro stop
interesting way to get onto the metro...

I then headed back to the hotel, and got a taxi back to the HRC to finish up some evening shots of the exterior. On the way over, I realized a few errors I had made: I had only enough money to pay for the ride there; I did not bring my debit card, only my credit card; I left my room key in my room. Yes, 3 stupid things all at once. So, after I was done taking photos, I found another taxi, and had him drive me to the hotel. Right before we got there, I told him I would need to get some cash from the ATM before I could pay him. He didn't look thrilled. So I had to get a new room key. It didn't work. Finally I got into my room to get my ATM card, ran outside to an atm, and paid the guy. From now on I carry the ATM card with me.

After talking to Katherine on Skype (best invention ever quite possibly), I headed out for hopefully a quick meal. I walked a few blocks and found some kind of restaurant with a large courtyard. I went up some stairs and found a very small restaurant called Case Veche that was not busy at all. Just the way I like them. I decided to have a traditional Romanian meal before I left. I chose Sarmale, which is essentially minced meats wrapped in boiled cabbage leaves. It came with some kind of corn meal, which I ate with it. It was good. Not something i'd eat every day, but not awful either.

Then followed a fiasco where the waiter informed me I could not pay with credit card. When I asked why, he said it wasn't working. Well then, how can I pay you? I don't have enough cash (again!). He shrugged his shoulders. Ok, well, I can either give you 10 lei, I can leave, or I can go to the ATM, get money and pay you back. He didn't seem to want me to leave. Eventually we went to another restaurant that they owned I guess and paid using their machine. So much drama.

I have pictures that accompany this post, however it is getting late, and my flight to Cologne leaves at 7am. I will need to be up by 4:30 am at the latest, so I need to wrap this up.

Some final thoughts on Bucharest, Romania, and the Romanian people.

- Bucharest is not the prettiest city ever. A stereotypical example of a post communistic regime in eastern europe. Interesting certainly, but not tourist material.
- This city is home to one of the largest populations of stray dogs. They are in packs. They are everywhere, and it is extremely strange to say the least. The barking gets old.
- It is easy to see why Coca Cola is the worlds most recognizable brand name. It is everywhere here. On the buildings, on the streets, on tv, on the radio, in the airports. I have seen tons of people drinking it. I have seen exactly one Pepsi ad. Of course, this pleases me.
- The Romanian people seem like genuinely good people. Everyone I have met has been helpful and courteous. They go out of their way to provide good service and are very polite. Perhaps this is just Europe and I am used to America, but either way, its great.

I probably had a few more things to say, but I can't remember them now. I will add things to this if I think of them. I will also add pictures, so check back tomorrow, hopefully I will have internet at my next hotel.

If you are reading this, please feel free to leave a comment about anything, I would love to hear some feedback as to who is actually reading this (if anyone at all).

And now, I will begin re-packing everything.

- John

Well it is Thursday night here, and I have basically completed my first full day.

It began about 4am. I did not sleep well. Someone called my cell about midnight, which is very strange, but that woke me up. Then about 4am someone's car alarm on the street started going off very loudly, and after that I couldn't go back to sleep. So I got about 5 hrs.

I took advantage of the Hotel Amzei's free breakfast this morning. It was a very nice compilation of random foods. A lot of meat and cheese, the usual bread and yogurts, and some sort of fish thing. The coffee mugs here are very small. I need to take a picture of one. They are like doll cups.

The cab ride to the Hard Rock Cafe this morning was pretty interesting. My driver spoke enough english that he was able to give me his opinion on almost every topic imaginable. Topics included: Romanians invented baseball, 2,000 years ago no less; Bucharest has the largest building in the world, not the Pentagon, which he said was "BS"; Romania is the only country left where you can see real animals (wolves, bears, lynxs) in the wild...apparently the US killed off the Buffalo, and now we have no more animals living in the wild - I didn't argue; He is sick and tired of people's misguided (apparently) views of Dracula, and is on a mission to set the record straight, starting with me. Little did he know that I know practically nothing about Dracula, myth or fact! He also told me an entertaining story about some Irish people he was driving around, and how they got very drunk and he had to take care of them on his own dime, much to his frustration.

All in all he was a good cab driver. I have found that a good way to get a feel for a city and its people is from its cab drivers. Thankfully the fare to and from the HRC is only about 15 RON (or Lei), which is about $4.30. Not bad.

When I arrived at the HRC, I was informed of the inevitable twist, the improbable yet always present catch - they were having a very big, important concert that night. The entire stage was set up for a concert, and the band would be doing sound check that morning. This was of course something I had no idea would be happening. So that changed things a lot, but thankfully I am not terrible at thinking on my feet. I think we made the best of it, and maybe got some good shots that we might not have otherwise. We'll see.

Around 1:30 I headed back to my hotel after finishing up what I could at the HRC. At this point I was pretty tired, so after talking to Kat for a little bit, I took a nap. It ended up being about 2.5 hrs of sleeping, and I am not even sure if I feel better. At this point my biological clock is ready to just give up. I plan on staying up as late as I can and then trying to sleep until 7am or so.

I had planned on going back to the HRC and getting some exterior shots of the building as it was getting dark (the exterior during the day is absolutely the ugliest thing I have ever seen), but the rain put a stop to that. Maybe if I had an umbrella I could pull it off, but I wasn't willing to risk it. Hopefully tomorrow night it won't be raining and I can attempt it again. If it is raining, I will just have to make it work somehow.

Instead I decided to take a quick stroll around the block and try to get something interesting. It proved a lot more difficult than I had hoped it would be. I really wish I had a lens hood for my prime lenses, and also having a professional weather sealed body would be nice too. I don't worry too much about my camera getting too wet, but any drops on the lens basically ruins the picture. I walked around with the camera under my coat, occasionally pulling it out for a very quick shot. Since it was cold, windy, and rainy, these pictures are very poor in quality, but at least its something to look at, and will give you an idea of what the area around my hotel looks like.

this is the rainy view out my window. Not very informative or helpful...think of it as "art" ;-)

a view of the very busy street close to my hotel

looking toward a large intersection

the entrance to my quaint Hotel Amzei

I didn't post all the pictures I took, you can see more of those here

Now I am off to find some dinner.

John

I am in Bucharest!

I had an uneventful trip here, I am very glad that everything went smoothly and I didn't lose any luggage or miss any flights.

I got a few hrs of sleep on the flight to Amsterdam, but other than that I have been awake since 7am Tuesday morning, so I am fairly tired.

From the little I have seen so far, I think I can say fairly confidently that Bucharest will be the least interesting and my least favorite city I visit on this trip. It looks pretty much how I expected a large eastern European city to look. Not very impressive to say the least. But, I will try to get around and see some parts of it.

I had a fairly long cab ride from the airport due to traffic. My driver spoke almost no english, but we managed to find some common ground in "football", and talking about various cars here and there. The driving style over here is amazing. I haven't observed any road rules yet, at least ones that people follow. I enjoy it.

I had a great time with KLM on the way over. I really enjoyed the service, the planes, everything. So far the stereotype that International carriers are better than American carriers is holding up. I'll have a better guess about that when I fly Delta back home from Madrid in a few weeks.

So now the plan is to get some money from an ATM, find a cheap place to eat some dinner, and then crash. Hopefully I won't be too jetlagged tomorrow if I get enough sleep tonight.

- John

I am in the airport in Columbus (CMH).

My flight to Detroit leaves at 7pm

My flight to Amsterdam leaves at 9:15pm. If you feel inclined, you can track my flight's progress using this link, after it leaves - http://flightaware.com/live/flight/NWA8618

The next time I update this I should be in Bucharest!

John

Schedule

Well, I will be leaving tomorrow at 7pm. I will connect in Detroit, fly to Amsterdam, and eventually get to Bucharest around 5pm local time, which should be about 10am Wed morning eastern time.

Here is a rough breakdown of my schedule for the next 3 weeks:

Bucharest - March 5-6
Cologne - March 7-10
Venice - 11-13
Rome - 14-16
Malta - 17-19
Barcelona - 20-21
Mallorca - 22-23
Madrid - 24-25

I will be flying back home on the 26th.

Check back often as I will attempt to update this as much as possible. I will even through a few photos your way as much as possible.

- John