Unbelievable. We’re nearing the end of the cruise…Thursday May 2^nd brought us to the fourth largest city in Germany, Cologne…or Koln if you are German! Our morning started with a walking tour that covered several key sites in the city, including Heumarkt (Haymarket) and Germany’s oldest rathaus (city hall), plus some interesting sculptures. 95% of Cologne was destroyed in WWII, so most of the buildings are relatively new…but many have been rebuilt to look like they’re original. It’s an interesting mix of architectural styles.

A wedding was underway at city hall; apparently all weddings must occur here; religious ceremonies can happen separately later on if desired. We saw one of their traditions in action – family and friends cut a heart out of a bed sheet and the bride & groom walk through the heart (or the groom carries the bride).

When you think of Germany, you probably think of precision and German engineering. That may be true elsewhere, but Cologne is the complete opposite. Our local guide said it’s more of an Italian vibe…slower pace, easy going, and things just don’t get done. One example, a hotel in the center of town has been closed for renovation for about 12 years. How do you shut down a hotel to work on it for that long? And the cathedral…wait until you hear about the cathedral!

Kolner Dom (Cologne Cathedral) is probably the world’s longest construction project. They worked on it for 300 years starting in 1248, and finished about half of it. Then it sat for 300 years with no progress. Finally, the Prussians came in and finished it in 38 years. 300 years…half done? What?!? When it was completed, it was the tallest building in the world for many years, and to this day, it is the tallest twin-spired church in the world and the second-tallest church in Europe. Pretty impressive! It is just massive and difficult to comprehend the sheer size…hard to get all of it in a photo, too!

(Interior photos later in this blog post…)

After our walking tour, we explored a little on our own, checking out the “bridge of locks” where hundreds of thousands of padlocks have been placed as a sign of love. The sheer volume of locks was just unbelievable…as is the fact that the bridge is still standing with all the additional weight! I hate to think what the bottom of the river looks like – after each padlock is attached, the keys are tossed into the Rhine. Environmentalists are trying to put an end to the practice.

On our way back to the ship, we walked past the concert hall. The hall itself is underground, and apparently they failed to install soundproofing, so the footsteps of anyone walking through the plaza can be heard in the concert hall. Oops. The Cologne solution to this is to hire guards who stand around the perimeter when the hall is in use, to prevent anyone from walking through the area.  

We had lunch on the ship and after a quick rest, headed back into town. Our first stop was Great St. Martin Church; our tour guide had mentioned that there are Roman ruins beneath the church, so we wanted to tour those. Apparently, the church was badly damaged during WWII, and during the rebuilding, the ruins were found. It was pretty incredible to walk through remains from the 1^st century.

Then we headed into the Cologne Cathedral to see what that 600+-year construction project had produced. We admired the entrance and all of the sculptures that adorn the façade. Interestingly, the statues represent a wide variety of people…and animals. The goat mascot of the local soccer team has a place on the cathedral, as does Tony, a foreman who worked there. It is an ongoing process to repair and conserve the statues. The cathedral’s sandstone exterior is largely discolored from acid rain and air pollution. Where you see statues or sculptures that are lighter in color, it’s because they were recently replaced or restored.

We wandered around the inside, through the nave, transept, and choir. The cathedral is home to the Shrine of the Three Kings, a reliquary that is believed to hold the remains of the Three Wise Men.

The Cathedral was hit but not destroyed during the war; it was not a target, but the neighboring train station was, and the Cathedral suffered some damage because of its proximity. Some of the windows are original and were removed during the war to protect them.

Overall, it’s just an awe-inspiring and impressive place, especially when you consider that the original design was incredibly challenging for the time when the building was started – no one had ever built anything like this before. In fact, Gustave Eiffel visited the cathedral when he was designing the Eiffel Tower, to learn from the interior structure.

In a complete juxtaposition, a very modern museum sits next door to the Cathedral – Museum Ludwig, which houses the world’s largest collection of works by Picasso. I wanted to check those out, and Mark was less interested, so he found a comfortable stone bench in the lobby while I zipped through and checked out the Picassos and some other artwork.

We didn’t have a lot of time before the absolute highlight of our trip, a behind-the-scenes tour of the Cathedral. Waiting at the designated place beside the Cathedral, it started to pour and we had fun watching people scramble for cover at the nearby train station. Fortunately, we had seen the forecast and brought our raingear!

Back in October when we booked our excursions, we had either missed this one, or maybe it wasn’t showing as an option. But on Wednesday at our port talk, the program director covered Thursday’s activities in Cologne, including “Top of Cologne” and Mark and I thought, hmmm, that sounds really interesting, we should see if we can join that. Sure enough, there was space available, so we made the last-minute decision and added it to our plans for Thursday. And, boy, are we glad we did! There’s a platform that anyone can access by climbing 500+ steps (Connor made the climb on his visit to the Cathedral in 2020), but this tour gave us access to the construction elevator and a guide who took us behind-the-scenes inside the cathedral. There were just six of us on the tour. The tours are only offered after 4pm, once the workday has ended. We saw the workshops where the 100-person team works on the cathedral. We maneuvered along catwalks adjacent to the flying buttresses. We were face-to-face with the gothic detail of the exterior. We walked high above the nave, looking down on the tiny people visiting the cathedral. It was fascinating and incredible, and a ‘pinch-me’ moment…were we really there?

We were up close with so many of the beautiful stained-glass windows…

It was about two hours long, and we loved every minute of it. The final part was optional…100-step climb on a spiral staircase out onto the roof of the crossing tower where we were looking directly at the spires. The view of Cologne and the Rhine was amazing. And, the bells started ringing while we were up there…it was loud, but incredible to actually see them moving as we descended the spiral staircase.

It was truly a once-in-a-lifetime experience and one that we will never forget. So very glad we made the last-minute decision to sign up! And we chatted the next day with one of the other women who was on the tour, and she was just as awestruck as we were.

We made it back to the ship in time for dinner where I had a bottle of Kolsch beer which originated in Cologne, and has a ‘protected geographical indication’ within the EU, similar to Champagne. All-in-all, a wonderful day in the city where cologne was first invented back in 1709; known as “4711”, it also has a geographical indication, “Original Eau de Cologne”.