My favorite picture from Cologne Cathedral

Here I am at the front door! The statue to my left is a saint and look who is standing next to him, a little piggy!! This made me think of my friend Anne!!

Cologne Cathedral

So I must confess when my coworker suggested that we go see the cathedral and a museum I was envisioning we would be going to some pretty little church in Germany. I had no idea we were going to such a big city. This place was massive and all the bridges over the Rhine were beautiful. I am so glad I went with a coworker I NEVER would have maneuvered my car along the streets or understood how to get into the car park, we had to go down 7 stories and squeeze into a tiny parking spot (yes even tiny for the IQ!!) and then walk up the 7 flights and then we were immediately in the middle of the city with so many people walking around me. The first thing I noticed was how the people look different, more edgy and urban and so many different nationalities. You don’t really see different people or huge crowds of people in Venray. Being in Koln kind of reminded me of being in London just people all around you!
So when we first got to Koln we walked all over the cathedral. This place was massive and just packed with tourists. Some of the tourists were humorous. One guy was walking around munching French fries and taking swigs of coke. Another guy was carrying a box for Dunkin Donuts, munching on donuts while touring the cathedral, interesting!
Here are some interesting facts I learned about Cologne Cathedral:
*In 1164 the bones of the Three Magi were transferred to this location. A shrine was finished for them in 1225.
* During the middle ages faithful from all over Europe made pilgrimages to Cologne
* In 1248 an archbishop decided that a cathedral should be built since so many made pilgrimages to this area. The chief architect of this project decided not to use Romanesque architecture of Germany but rather “modern” gothic architecture of France. So this Cathedral back in the 13th century was kind of like Ikea is to us!! Modern and different!
*Construction of the Cathedral was discontinued and resumed throughout the years and the LAST stone was placed on the south tower in 1880.

driving notes

On Sunday a coworker and I drove to Koln.
Here is a map to show the ride- it was a little over an hour drive.
http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&tab=wl
It was my first trip driving down the highway and the ride to Germany was great, but the ride back to Venray was crazy, it was pouring rain and my go kart, I mean IQ, didn’t really care for driving in the rain, she was very angry at me as we rattled down the highway going 120 km. I was really homesick for the saab and for Chris to be driving me, I am NOT the best nighttime driver and I am probably a much worse night driver abroad!! It was so crazy driving down the highway and thinking I was going sooo fast because the number says 110 or 120!
Right before we left Koln we bought some gas for my car. When I got home I did my calculations liters to gallons and then euros to dollars. It all worked out to about a $55 purchase for about 6 gallons of gas, YIKES a little over $9 a gallon! crazy, guess that is why I haven't seen 1 hummer here..........

Eating hole

This is a picture of one of the restaurants I eat at a few times a week. The bar is really cool, it turns different bright colors like green, orange, pink, turquoise and at night looks really cool through the windows (it is a see through frosted glass). They have really tasty soups, delicious cappuccino and delicious desserts! My favorite thing to order here is a baguette with ham and cheese somewhat melted and toasty, yumm!!

His and Hers

Look at these 2 cute bicycles, they are ALWAYS parked near each other in the centre. I like to imagine they belong to a girl and guy that work near each other and they have similar cool bikes, maybe they are dating!

Shopping Fiasco 101

I’ve REALLY wanted milk for my coffee. At some stores milk is sold that can sit out on the counters and they have this coffee creamer that is a liquid, but it isn’t milk and this too sits on the counter. The other day I stopped by the grocery store and saw this cute red container and zoned in on the word MELK and thought, YIPPEE cold milk and grabbed it. It curdled in my tea and didn’t look too good in my coffee. Got the dictionary out and the other word in the title is Butter---wish I had an oven; I could channel Paula Dean and make some southern style biscuits with Buttermilk! Tomorrow night I’ll go back to the grocery store and the hunt will continue, I just want plain milk, at this point I’ll even drink Vitamin D milk, I’m not even going to attempt to find skim!

Venray's version of Raleigh's Farmer's Market

A coworker suggested I go to this building to buy all my fruit and vegetables. She said they have the freshest produce and their prices are much better than in the grocery store. The little shop keeps funny hours and I haven’t seen it open when I leave work. On Saturday (as I was driving home from the post office) I noticed lots of cars in their lot and figured I’d stop in. It was awesome inside (reminded me a lot of our farmer’s market just on a much smaller scale) so many things to choose from and the fruit and vegetables looks so yummy! You stand at a counter and tell the workers what you want, which can be hard to do when you speak no Dutch, but we struggled through it and I just read all the signs and there was a lot of pointing going on too. The guy that helped me gave me an extra apple after I paid and told me it is called a “pink apple” and that he thought I’d like to try it since I had a pink purseJ It was yummy, I’ll have to go back and get more pink apples soon!