The Beginning of Germany

I had read that the German train system was great and after experiencing the efficiency of Swiss trains a few years ago, I was expecting much the same but it didn't happen!

We left beautiful Brugge on Thursday morning to head for Frankfurt Germany by train. We had to change trains twice on the journey, the first train in Belgium was fine but the two others in Germany were late. We arrived at our destination 4 hours late and we have since heard that it may have been the heat that had caused problems with the rails. Who knows! Apparently, we do get some compensation though, so it may not be all that bad.

I did feel sorry though, for the people on the train that missed their flight connections out of Frankfurt but we didn't have any deadlines, fortunately.

After a few nights in Frankfurt, today we started a coach tour of Germany with the tour company Cosmos, the first time we have travelled with them. There are quite a few nationalities on board, Australians, Americans, Canadians, New Zealanders, South Africans and a few from the UK. 

Coach tours are not always our first choice of travel but we figured that this was the best way to see as many of the 'must see sights' of Germany as we can.

I must say that the first day today was great, we spent several hours cruising down the Rhine River in the beautiful sunshine, enjoying the scenery of castles and little villages.

                               

                               

                               

By the time we finish with Germany, we will probably never want to see another castle again but today, it was lovely. At the end of the cruise we stopped in a town called Boppard and had time to wander around on our own. What a cute little town, this is the Market Square.

                              

                              

We continued onto Cologne, where once again, we had plenty of free time to wander around. The Cathedral is enormous (sorry, the photos I took did not do it justice).

We took a stroll over the Hohenzollernbrucke bridge and what did we find?

                          

                              

LOCKS!

Yes,  just like the Paris bridges that lovers put the locks on and throw away the keys, this bridge (almost a kilometre in length) is covered in them. Absolutely amazing, obviously the local authorities are not worried about them, as some of them have been there for quite a while.

Tomorrow we continue on through Germany...........