Picking up where I left off, later that day we went to climb the huge spire of the Cologne Cathedral, the Dom. What a very long way up! Sadly it was spoiled by the fact that there was schoolkid graffiti all the way up! Outrageous! You have to hope that there’s some explanation why it’s not been removed.
We ended the day with a protest steak at an Argentinean steak house. By this point we had overloaded on pork! There’s only so much dead pig a man can eat!
Next day was off to see my parents in the Netherlands, which was good. We did some cycling around and ended up getting somewhat burnt on a two hour cycle ride. Typical. Two weeks of wandering around in the summer heat and barely a tan, but two hours on the coast and WHAM! Sunburn.
After that it was back home via Belgium and it’s curious lack of petrol stations, but overall it was quite painless.
And there you have it.
Here are the stats:
Miles driven: 2000
Days travelled: 16
Borders crossed: 13
Countries seen: 6
ODP members encountered: 5
Speed cameras triggered: 2
Days of “I feel too rough to drink”: 1
Grand Dukes foiled: 1/2 (He hit us hard, but we survived and weren’t thrown in an oubliette. We’ll call it a draw)
Highest mountain ascended: Zugspitze
Biggest lake seen: Bodensee
Most responsible for nigh alcohol poisoning:
Hofbrauhaus in Munich and it’s evil 1 litre jugs of dark beer
Prettiest village: Ribeauville
Prettiest town: Tough, but I liked Heidelberg
Ugliest town: Brussels. It might have been Mannheim, but it was redeemed by the Rhein banks
Most potent memory: “Ghost”, the garlic sausage-eating, foul-smelling monstrosity.
tag:
roadtrip
Perhaps there is something prophetic about this column. I arrived in Rosendaal from Brussels to change trains. Upon arrival I find that the station is nearly empty as there have been no other incoming trains. They have all been delayed due to… suicide.
The benefit of this was that outgoing trains were still running so I had the train to myself for my ongoing journey. The stories the driver told me were most enlightening and, in some cases, downright scary. I now know which stretches of track to avoid during thunderstorms and which to avoid under any circumstances due to failing safety equipment. I could tell you which ones… for a small bribe.
Having just escaped a mind-numbingly boring meeting, I am reminded of the most boring meeting I ever attended. It was a three hour affair in a refinery in Rotterdam and was hosted by a man who loved the sound of his own voice. I’ll never understand why, since it was the most monotonous voice I have ever heard. After the marathon meeting I was told that I had given the impression of boredom. Apparently I had managed this by falling asleep and snoring loudly, but I did receive the gratitude of my colleagues, as this faux pas seemed to end the meeting quite effectively. Personally I don’t think I was asleep. My theory is that Mr Monotony had robbed me of the will to live and I was already in a coma.
Rotterdam itself is a nice enough town, especially those buildings that were not bombed flat 55 years ago, i.e. both of them. However I was not staying in Rotterdam itself, but in a suburb called Spykenisse. The main feature of this town was the 8 refineries that lit up the night sky with their flaming chimneys. I learned a lot about refineries in my six months there, especially their attitude to environmentalism. For example, plant managers love days of low cloud cover as they can then vent their toxic gases into the atmosphere without the local tree-huggers complaining to the environmental agencies. Encouraging, isn’t it?
