Day 22 - Monday May 19, 2025 - Cologne Germany

 

Cologne Church 

We reached Cologne at about 8:00 am and had a walking tour scheduled at 9:15 am.  

Beth Grohnke and I were here in September, 2022 and we were in this beautiful church, but it was still one I wanted to see again.

This is not a great picture.  If you can zoom in on it, you'll see it dates May 1, 1951 and shows, six years after WWII and the devastation from bombing.  The only standing building is this exact store, which is a chocolate shop and has been there since 1584. 

The cathedral is 515 ft. and the tallest twin-spired church in the world.  During the bombing in WWII the twin spires of the cathedral were easily recognizable navigational landmark for the Allied aircraft bombing. 

The cathedral suffered fourteen hits by aerial bombs during the war. Badly damaged, it remained standing in an otherwise completely flattened city.

The mosaic floor still fascinates me.

In the rear of the church is the Shrine of the Magi and was created sometime between about 1190 and 1220 to house the relics of the Magi (Three Wise Men, Three Holy Kings), which were brought to Cologne in 1164.

It is traditionally believed to contain the bones of the Biblical Magi, also known as The Three Wise Men. This shrine is a large gilded and decorated triple sarcophagus.

We walked from the ship toward the cathedral stopping at a group of stumbling stones.  These are all over Europe and are  placed in front of homes throughout Germany once inhabited by victims of the Holocaust as a way to remember and honor them.

Wayne was here in Cologne, several times and since I was here in 2023, we didn't need the guide very much.  We walked into the cathedral and I was able to walk around and see everything as it was still pretty early and the crowds werennt that bad.

My blog from 2023 is still able to be read, so I won't repeat it all. But you want, you can read it.  

2023 Cologne blog

After we left the church, Wayne and I found a beer garden.  The beer is different here.  The beer, a Kolsch, is so smooth and goes down really well.  It comes in 6 ounce glasses and the custom is that they keep filling it unless you put your coaster in top to cover the top of the glass.  Otherwise, they just keep refilling it every time they went past you.  

He's a happy camper 

Lunch, a grilled sausage and a mixture of carrots and potatoes.  Delicious!

Wayne and his sausages, sauerkraut and mashed potatoes 

The huge beer garden and the ceiling in only one room of the place

Yes, after the beer hall, there had to be some gelato.

A few pictures of the area as we walked back to the ship.

Our ship and another Viking ship.  They're docked together.   It's usial.  During the last 24 days we often were the 2nd or 3rd ship at a dock.  To get to land, you walked through the other ships before you got to the gangway to land.  In this picture, our ship is first. The 2nd was traveling Basel to Amsterdam so there's a chance we'll see them tomorrow, our last day, in Kinderjick.