Deventer to Köln

Deventer was fun. By fun, I mean alright.

I arrived at 11 am and made my way into the city center. It was dead. It was a Sunday. It makes me sad to see a city abandoned on nice sunny days. It's a total waste of space.

Where were all these people? At church? At home with their families?

No... They were all crammed into the city square drinking coffee and beer while watching a bocchi ball tournament. There was spread across the square in front of the old Weigh building. People were having a great time just throwing little coloured balls closest to an even smaller silver sphere. Observers sat at near by cafes enjoying lunch or a cool beer after their game. I walked by and enjoyed the collective spirit.

The early morning antics got me into a merry mood. I thought i would try my hand at the old camping game again. Why not, the sun was high and the clouds were few and far between.

To make a long story short, it rained down on me again.

I only got two hours of sleep, but I did enjoy a wonderful 1am walk around Deventer. I even stumbled upon Deventer's own Red Light District. It's situated along a road just across from the base of their notable bridge and it was busy at 1:30 in the morning.

After my little walk around I tried to get some sleep back at camp. I only achieved marginal success with sleep here and there. But this was not enough. At 6 am I started on another walk. This time I found a nice little windmill that is used as a lumber mill on the other side of the same bridge. I took numerous panoramic shots of the town and surrounding country side.

But ultimately I was disgusted with the weather. It was none stop rain day after day, so it was time to leave the Netherlands.

At 11 am I hopped a train with a ticket to Köln.

I knew nothing of this West German city but I became introduced to it's beauty upon leaving the train station.

A wonderful structure stands in plain sight. 'The Dom' they call it.
Germany's largest cathedral. And there I was at the foot of this colossal church, blown away.

I later ate dinner on the steps leading up to the Dom. Every few minutes I would twist my neck 90 degrees to make sure that this most excellent stone structure had not dissapeared. How could it? Thousdands upon thousands of tonnes dissapearing over my shoulder without a sound. Impossible.

And Beer is so cheap here. In the supermarkets large bottles of beer cost anywhere from €0.60 - € 0.80. I bought six different brands of beer for under € 6.00. And the scary thing is that beer is only going to get cheaper the further south east I travel.