Graptolite - Karneval
Graptolite's Sailing Log
Martyn Pickup & Heike Richter
Fri 19 Feb 2010 19:41
19th February. The skipper is in Betzdorf, Germany
It's been three weeks since my last confession.
I didn't do much in early February apart from watch snow fall during the
week and drive backwards and forwards from the Rhine to Berlin at weekends.
Frau Richter Snr. has not been well and has been in various Berlin
hospitals. It seems to be the season for it as Frau Pickup Snr. Has also
been in hospital following a careless bit of ice-skating in a car park in
Blackburn.
One weekend, on the way back from Berlin, we stayed in a hotel near Hameln
and met up with Ian Jack (crew Hamble to Figuera da Foz) for dinner.
Last week was Half-Term and Tom came out to Germany see his old dad. The
first night we stayed a short drive from Cologne/Bonn Airport at the
Steigenberger Hotel which was nice. It used to be a place the West German
government put up the odd visiting King or Queen so it wasn't too shabby and
it had a good view overlooking the Rhine.
The next day was Rosenmontag, the main day for parades for the Cologne
Karneval, so we moved to another hotel in the centre of Cologne for the
festivities. We watched the parade during the day. They throw huge amounts
of packets of sweets, chocolates and roses off the floats which is cute but
it gets a bit annoying after the tenth time a Toblerone bounces off your
head. In the evening it was party-central in Cologne and we dressed up in
natty 19th century nautical wear for the costume ball at the Stadtgarten.
Tom in his Johnny Depp pirate gear had a lot of attention from the older
frauleins. The local beer, Koelsch, comes in tiny glasses which are
impossible to keep count of. That's my excuse anyway.
Tuesday, we were off to Dortmund and while Heiki did some more work, Tom and
I tried to amuse ourselves with Dortmund's tourist attractions. The
Steinwache, which used to be an infamous Gestapo prison, is possibly the
least amusing museum I've ever been to though. In the evening Heiki had to
stay overnight in Hameln and Tom and I stayed with Ian and Heidrun in Lemgo
nearby. Ian has a business pressure testing buildings and on Wednesday we
went with him on a job, testing a new house in Paderborn which was
interesting. Later we went to see some wind turbines and pointed a
thermal-imaging camera at them for fun. You may have been wondering what the
strange photographs were all about. Heiki had to overnight again in Hameln
so we got another hotel in town for Wednesday night and explored the
medieval streets and Pied-Piper/rat stuff the next day. After a quick look
at the enormous Cologne cathedral, Tom was back at Cologne/Bonn Airport on
Thursday evening.
M