The Dom in Koln

Koln is NW of Oberursel, about 2 hours away on train, and on the way to The Hague, where I also went for a cross country race.

I went with Matt to Koln over the weekend to visit his old college friends and see the city. No sooner had we left the bahnhof than we were standing before one of the most impressive buildings I have ever seen - the Dom. It is the largest church in Northern Europe and was, in fact, the tallest building in the world around 1900. It took over 600 years to build and reminded me of Angkor Wat in Cambodia in the superb stone work and un-real feel.

The Dom in Koln

A view from a spire

Elaborate arches

The hollow-mouthed man

A statement of the country: tiny german garden plots

One of the attributes of Germany which I find most pleasing are the tiny garden plots clustered together around the outskirts of every city. Most Germans live in apartment clomplexes, in fairly close proximity to each other, but many people also have a garden with a miniature cottage close by to go and relax. Fantastic. The garden areas tend to be clustered together, with everyone getting their own neat 20m x 20m section of land with hedges separating the spaces.

A visit to Vienna and Budapest over Fall Break

Vienna and Budapest are marked in faint white boxes

I had a long fall break in the beginning of October and went with Matt to Vienna and Budapest. We traveled by train from Oberursel to Vienna, where we stayed for a couple nights and didn't take a single picture. My good friend Katinka used to live in Vienna and we were fortunate enough to be able to stay in her old roommate Marlene's apartment right in the city. The gradiose architecture of Vienna is a reminder of the city's rich history of power and wealth - with most of the stunning buildings built hundreds of years before Lewis and Clark explored the interior of North America by canoe.

We continued on the train to Budapest, where we spent a week exploring the city, oogling at the impressive architecture, eating cakes, and running up large hills.

The Keleti train station in Pest


The characteristic tall stone buildings of Pest flank narrow streets


A conglomeration of brick and stone built over the centuries

Buda Royal Palace from across the Duna

Rakoczi ut.

Great mustard-colored stonework

Szent Istvan Basilica

The Parliament with the chain bridge (Szechenyi Ianchid) in the background as seen during a run around Margit Island

...same brand, different flavor...

We visited a curious outdoor museum, Statue Park, where Communist-era statues and sculptures were collected from the city after the Soviets left the city in 1991.

A proud and hopeful Lenin

Stalin's boots - all that remain after frustrated students and factory workers cut through the legs with acetylene tourches during the 1956 uprising.

The Great Market Hall, built in 1894

The interior of The Grand Market Hall

Ah the cakes...the fantastic cakes...

Just don't squeeze the tomatoes - one woman took the vegetables out of my hands and chastised me for inspecting her nectarines too closely.

some recent outings...

Museumfest along the Main River in Frankfurt


There are dozens of festivals in the fall around Frankfurt. This is one of the largest, with over 3 million people. There were lots of bands, good food, and great people watching along the river on a sunny Saturday evening.


I have eaten more bratwurst and bread in the past month than the rest of my entire life!

Lanternin Festival in Bad Homburg

...in keeping with the meat theme (there was also fruit on a stick dipped in chocolate, which was out of this world)

9th Grade Class Trip with Outward Bound to Havelberge

Last week I went with 120 9th graders and about a dozen teachers on a week-long Outward Bound program in Havelberge. Havelberge is about an hour north of Berlin, in an area pocked with lakes. I was fortunate enough to go with a group of 12 students on a biking/canoeing/biking adventure to the biggest lake in Germany - Muritz (not counting the one to the far south which boarders Switzerland).


Our bus ride was an epic 11 1/2 hours from Oberursel up to Havelberge. I graded a lot of papers!


Biking past beautiful country homes.



Leppinsee Lake, where we camped.


Many of the lakes were interconnected by thin waterways which wove through forests. This was the first time canoeing for many students, but they did a great job.


The students did a great job planning and organizing their gear and food (on a tight budget) and navigating using basic maps. These were the lakes we canoed through.

boat houses with thatched roofs.


This was East Germany territory, and we passed a few war monuments with the statues removed from the tops. Poverty and unemployment levels are still pretty high here after the fall of the wall.

A Bike Trip Through Wein Country!

Last weekend Spencer and I took a long bike ride alone the Rhine River through wine country.

We boarded the train in Oberursel with our bikes, headed down into Frankfurt, and then to Mainz, which is on the Rhine River (close to the spot the Mine River, which runs through Frankfurt, meets the Rhine). From Mainz, we traveled west to Rudesheim, through many small wineyard-based towns.

Waiting for the S8 train in Frankfurt

Look at those grapes!



We followed a specific bike-and-drinking-wine route which followed the Rhine through the various towns. This was the route marker.


We finished in Rudesheim by climbing a giant hill to a church. This was the view from the top overlooking Rudesheim and the Rhine.



We realized later that we could have taken a nice gondola (you can just make it out following the ridge line) ride up the mountain to the church...ach well!