Last minute trip to Germany

A couple weeks ago my boss sprung a last minute trip to Germany on me. On a Tuesday morning he asked if I would be willing to go to a medical tradeshow in Germany for a week with him, leaving the following Monday morning! I felt a little mentally unprepared but I'm not one to say no to international travel, so I agreed. 

I left San Diego on Monday morning and arrived in Frankfurt Germany on Tuesday morning. I spent almost all of Wednesday, Thrusday, Friday and part of Saturday at the trade show and left Sunday morning so that only left a little time to explore. As usual, most of my pictures are of food, so if that doesn't interest you, then you may want to skim through this one...Ok, here we go!

Here is the main square in the old part of Cologne (or Köln in German - I don't know why cities have to have translated names! It's confusing!) on Tuesday afternoon after taking the train from the airport. My boss and I went for a little stroll to keep awake. It was like 2am back in California and we were exhausted.

The famous Cologne Dom ( it doesn't look like a dome to me...). Apparently you can go inside and up to the top for a great view, but I didn't get the chance.

Cologne is also famous for their früh beer - which is served in small little glasses. The server walks around with a little tray (see that silver round thing) and just keeps them coming until you say stop. My boss had like 8 over dinner! I tried to stop at 1 but I think that is unacceptable.

My first meal of the trip was super German. Meat and potatoes...Pretty good except I had an aftertaste of beef sauce for like 8 hours - which, needless to say, is gross.

The next day we took the train to Düsseldorf for the Medica tradeshow. This show is one of the biggest in the world and had over 7000 vendors in 15 halls. It was crazy! I don't think I saw half the show in 3.5 days!

We met up with some of our colleagues in the Munich office. This is Manu, Oliver, Sahar, and Deneb (with my boss Raffaele). 

Every day of the show was so exhausting! I must've walked 5 miles a day around that place. One night after the show we all went to dinner with some of the Munich team's clients from Vodafone. I couldn't read the menu at the restaurant so I just got what Deneb ordered, something called Kaesespaetzle. It turns out it was a plate of what I would consider macaroni and cheese with a salad. I was kind of grossed out at first (so unhealthy!) but it was super delicious and I ended up eating almost the whole thing. Man, it was good! Google Kaesespaetzle recipe and maybe you can make it at home!

After dinner, the Munich team had to head back but the Vodafone people insisted we go to the opening night of the Christmas market with them. I had been to a German Christmas market a few years ago in Leipzig, so I knew how fun they were, so I was in! This one was super packed!

Lieke (one of the Vodafone women) told me all about the traditions and insisted I get one of this gingerbread hearts. So I picked one out for Joey that said "Frohes Fest" - which roughly translates into Happy Holidays (or literally Happy Festival, I think). They were so cute! (Although to jump ahead, they taste terrible!)

Then we all had a cup of Glühwein - which is mulled wine. It is so delicious! I am going to try to make some at home this year. I love how they serve it in seasonal mugs. You put down a 2 euro deposit and you can either keep the mug or return it to get your money back. In this picture from left to right is my boss Raffaele, Vodafone Jason, two dutch guys, and Vodafone Lieke. Everyone was so nice! The three on the right are all originally from Holland and were telling me all about the country and their traditions. I've never been but it sounds like a great place!

One of the specialties of the Düsseldorf market is a brick oven pizza called a Flammkuchen. Yum!

The next few days were filled with the tradeshow. It wasn't until Saturday afternoon that I had some free time. My boss went to Stuttgart to visit his family so I was alone and free to explore! I went back to the Christmas market to check it out during the day. 

They had all sorts of fun crafts and things.

Hand carved wooden ornaments.

Maroni heiß - translation hot chesnuts. I bought a little pouch of these! Yum!

A little blacksmith iron shop thing...

Crepes with applesauce, banana, and nutella!

Little potato puffer things. I think Lieke told me these are a Dutch tradition.

My lunch - a giant bratwurst on a small roll - I mean, why should the sausage and bread be the same size!? No reason! I have to say I usually don't like sausages since they are usually grisly (this does not include hot dogs, I LOVE hotdogs, especially turkey dogs) but this one was actually pretty smooth. 

I couldn't believe how many people were out and about all over the streets. It was so nice to see so many people enjoying themselves! This picture is a little hard to read but it is of an outside bar that's kind of on the sidewalk. See the white awning on the right - people were just standing everywhere drinking those little beers that were being served from the round silver trays again. Although, here I was in Düsseldorf, not Cologne, where they serve a darker version called Albier. Apparently the two cities are very competitive, especially about their beer, so you have to be careful what you say to whom!

It took me like 10 minutes to figure out how to get one of the Altbiers but I finally did, and it was delicious!

Then I took a little walk down to the river right in time for a beautiful sunset. 

Then, exhaused, I went back to the train station to catch a train back to Cologne. Luckily I had time for a Glühwein while I waited. I love that stuff!

And a quick dinner of currywurst and bread at the train station. I didn't take a picture but they had a special machine dedicated to slicing sausages into little pieces. Those Germans!

Man, I was tired!

When I got back to Cologne, it was around 7pm. I thought about going to bed but I felt like that would be a waste. So I talked myself into going for a night walk. Here is the city and the dome at night.

Cologne getting ready for their Christmas market to open the following week. 

And look at one of the booths I found - Wafflehaus! How awesome is that!? Too bad it wasn't open yet!!!

I grabbed a drink at a local bar and eventually called it a night. The next morning I ended up oversleeping though and I actually missed my flight back to the US! I had never done that before! Luckily it was a slow travel day and US Airways just put me on the next flight, no charge. I ended up getting home only 10 minutes later than my original flight because of a better layover stop. All's well that ends well, I guess!

So that's it! Tomorrow I'll post about our Thanksgiving road trip to Napa Valley and Coastal California. Fun fun!