Cologne, Germany - Part 1

This week, I'm in Cologne, Germany.  After spending last week in London, I'm back at work and heading towards a tradeshow that is focused on gaming. I'm here to attend Gamescom - one of the largest gaming conferences in the world.  If you follow this blog, you've seen the other heavyweights (E3, ComicCon and ChinaJoy), covering North America and China.  This show is even larger - just in terms of pure floor space.  More on the show later...

I arrived in Cologne (also known as Koln, in German) on the train from Brussels.  It was an easy two-hour ride that continues to make me wish we had a similar infrastructure in the U.S.  Oh, well...

Coming out of the central station, I was b-l-o-w-n a-w-a-y by what I saw next.  It was the Cologne Cathedral...a massive (and I use that term with as much expression in my voice that you can imagine) Gothic structure that reaches over 500 feet in the air (157m):

Not my picture, but I wanted to show all of the cathedral, if possible...

I went a little closer to the main door, so you could see the amazing detail in the carvings and statues:

The building has a great deal of history.  If you're interested, you can look-up the details.  The building took almost 600 years to complete...at least when they decided to declare it done in 1864.  Construction of this massive cathedral began in 1248.  Before that, there were a series of chapels on the site, dating back to 870.   The style - inside and out - is much more like French cathedrals than the typical German style.  It felt very much like Notre Dame.

I made my way inside and was delighted to see different styles of stained glass:

A little more modern approach to stained glass ; )

The mosaics of tile on the floor were equally impressive.  This one is about three feet in diameter:

A little more history is required for this next picture.  The snapshot depicts the Chapel of the Three Magi.  According to the church's history, Archbishop von Dassell transferred the bones of the Three Magin from Milan to this cathedral in 1164.  If you've studied any European history, you know that holy relics were a big part of many of the cathedrals:

What a delightful surprise - finding a cathedral this big, in the heart of the city.  I was glad to spend just a little time in a very peaceful place.

Back in the train station, I love the vending machines here - you can find entire machines dedicated to Gummy Bears!

For dinner, we went to a restaurant that specializes in Schnitzel.  Traditional schnitzel is made from pork, smashed down almost to a patty, and breaded for taste.  Mine was delicious, with a mushroom sauce, as I am trying to go down the list of German foods that I can eat while I'm here ; )

My plate wasn't nearly as pretty as this photograph...

It was a good start, here in Cologne.  Tomorrow holds the start of the show, press interviews and plenty of meetings with developers.  See you then!