Tag 7 (Hamburg Tag 2)

We left Eilenau Hotel and took a picture of this small car parked outside. In Europe people have really small cars to the point that a VW Bug looks kind of fat and big and the Mini car looks normal-sized.

Auf Wiedersehen, Eilenau Hotel!

We went into town and went to two of the big churches. This church is the only one not destroyed in World War II, although the interior is quite modern for some reason.

Stained glass and such

Alpha & Omega stained glass

Isis and Horus... errr the Virgin Mary and Baby Jesus

After going to this church we passed by the Rathaus again, this time in daylight, while Ashley performs her best Edvard Munch imitation.

Das Rathaus in die Sonne (the city hall in the sun)

The inside of the Rathaus is extremely ornate and beautiful. There is a courtyard with this large fountain...

Fountain with female figure on top and a Satyr playing pan-pipes on the rim below

The top of the Rathaus clock tower

A picture for Jeremy (he will understand), found on the wall of the Rathaus

Ashley with der Löwe outside das Rathaus

After we went to the Rathaus, we walked to one of the bridges that goes over the Elbe river. You can see swans down and to the right...

Binnenalster (the name of this little water-area)

Swans chilling

After that, we saw a Gothic cathedral but did not go inside because you have to pay. Its been turned into a memorial for the dead of WWII...

Gothic spire

After that, we decided it was time to eat and found this nice Italian food place...

Pizza und Pasta und  spritzig Apfelsaft (pizza, pasta, and sparkling apple juice)

With our stomachs absurdly full, we wandered to the famous Hamburg pier...

Schiffen in der Pier (ships in the pier)

A walkway on the pier along the water

In the very far background there is a place that is showing the Lion King (der König der Löwe), which you have to take a ferry to get to... The pier was extremely crowded, full of things to buy, and smelly. It started to drizzle a little bit as we were walking...

Eventually we made it to the far end of the pier and turned towards the inner city again, and we found ourselves in the Reeperbahn, the area known in most places as the red-light district. Its also the place with the most bars (imagine that).  This is a small, small taste of the absurd amount of similar places

"Kino" means movies

After passing through this area which is supposedly quite busy and bright during the night time, rain started to pour heavily with some thunder to complement... We went into a small restaurant/bar thing to wait out the rain. Eventually we ventured back outside to find the U-Bahn but it started raining again. We found and U-Bahn and took it back to the main Bahnhof (train station)...

The gigantic Hamburg Bahnhof

From here we took a train back to Uelznel, and from there we planned to take a train straight to Göttingen. We got on the Göttingen train but it stopped after about 5 minutes and the person came over the speakers saying that a big tree had fallen on the rails (at this point it was raining hard and we could see lightning & hear thunder), so we had to turn back. After being silent for about 30 seconds, the man came back over the speakers and said something like, "Frau Donnehauer (Mrs. Donnehauer), you left your kid back at Uelznel station." I am not sure how she did not notice but luckily for the kid we had to turn back anyways. 

When we got back to the Uelznel station, it was pouring rain and was windy and there were no trains going directly to Göttingen... the train station had called in a bunch of buses to take everyone to the next train station except buses fit about 1/100th the capacity as trains, so they were quite packed. I was smooshed in between Ashley and a large German lady for about 40 minutes on a bus that went to the station past the tree-fallen rail. Eventually we made it to Celle, a small town with a small Deutschebahn station and took a train from there back home to Göttingen. So ends the short excursion to Hamburg.