fri out

20071020

Frankfurt – Mainz – Koblenz – Bonn – Cologne – Koblenz – Mainz -Frankfurt

Saturday morning happened to be cold and rainy here. Having to meet the high scholl fellow after 4 years of purely virtual communication, on a freshly discovered grounds, with a cell phone barred, posed a significant uncertainty. Anyway, in 12 o’clock i’m meeting V. at Niederrad (quite familiar to see him — having married and getting a descendant doesn’t sometimes change people that much).

It surprise me alot that well familiar S-8 train is not just a usual city route. It actually reach another landstate of Rheinland-Pfalz. So we take it and go to the Mainz. The weather is getting better, the sunshine reflects on a sparkling buildings of Opel factory in Russelheim. In Mainz we should change our RE train to Koblenz, thus getting some dozens of minutes to walk around the railway station. (The reason for frequent train changes is because of a wonderful opportunity Die Bahn gives to a weekend traveller: for 35 EUR one can get a ticket for up to 5 persons, eligible for all local trains. This effectively means that one can cross all the country by train on such a ticket, and even get outside to, say, Belgium or Luxembourg, having paid a small extra fee. Of course there is a drawback with a speed of such travel.)

The trains appears to be a fancy 2-floor vehicle. V. kindly reseves a place for us on a top deck so that we’re observing a bypassing landscape from above. And that said, what a wonderfully landscapes they are ! The rail from Mainz to Koblenz is going just in between of Rhein river and a hills of it’s left bank. Here and there are vineyards just climbing up these hills. There numerouse cute little towns literarely seized in a narrow place between the rail and hanging rocks. Some time on a top of such rocks, there are a picturesque ruins of castles. Sometimes castles are not ruins, at least there are trampling flags on them. Towns seems to come from a middle ages, considering architectural forms. In most of them, on a ground floow there is a tavern. Towns are connect with a thin road wich mainly goes along the rail, sometimes climbing higher on rocks. Again, the landscapes ae fascinating. On the other side, the Rhein flows, and then again, the same hills on the other side, with vineyards, castles and smaLL towns.

In Koblenz we’re paying the visit to a local McD, where a typical afro-deutschlander equips us with cheesburgers (i’m grabbing a stick with a local sugar — dunno yet what for). The we’re changing train for another time and in 1 hour we’re in Bohn.

Initially, we had no intetion to stop In the former W. German capital, but V. said insisted to make another train swap to get to Cologne quicker by making less stops. Bonn appeared to be a wonderfull place to walk a little. From a first glance it looks like a small town with a many pedestrian streets and numerous shops. But there are some reminiscense of formely significance, such as a presense of a subway. Another thing that makes Bonn such a cute place, is that around the railway, instead of a usually expected industrial districts, there are normal residential quarters. So one can feel almost as in a city car on a tourist route observing a local habits and lifestyles.

Getting out of central railway station in Cologne, we’ve found ourselves directly behind the Dome. What a bizarre creation! After being constructed for rougly five centuries, it still is being repared and beutified! Unfortunately, our time resorce is scarse, so there is no chance to me to refresh all the memories of my 12 years old visit here. We making arrange a walk through a center, which is much more crowded than in Bonn. Perhaps tha latter fact makes Cologne is not so pleasant place to relax. But it may well be the fact that it getting dark sooner, thus making it impossible to see aLL of the city landmarks.

The way back is almost familiar. V. is leaving in Bonn central station. I’m travelling alone to Koblenz, nearly alone in the car, seeing almost nothing through the mirror window glass. Waiting for train some 20 minutes, taking my place on the 1-st floor of the same fancy train, and then for two hours watching as a story is rolling back with it’s cute tiny towns, lonely stations, and rocks, now almost invisible in the dark. It’s getting really late, and I began to worry to be on time in Mainz for the last S-8.

Luckily, in another 30 minutes upon arrival in Mainz, i took a place in my S-8, and in another hour i got to Niederrad.

That’s it. There is stillcertain sentiment in my head, but will try to explain it some other time.