Germany 1998
Taxi to the train station for our train to Germany. John Farnham’s “You’re The Voice” on the cabbies radio - You gotta be shitting me! Poor buggers endure half a century of oppression and now have to endure Whispering Jack. We apologised to the driver. “Be thankful it wasn’t Sadie The Cleaning Lady.” We offered. He gave a blank stare and drove off.
Another purchased fare to the border where we could once again reactivate our Eurail pass upon entering Germany. We were headed for Nuremberg famous in my mind for two things - Massive orchestrated Nazi propaganda rallies in the late thirties and war crimes trials in the late forties, with the stars of the former being the defendants in the latter.
Nuremberg early evening, a slight drizzle falling, shoulders painful from lumping backpacks up unfamiliar streets - The guide book fails us and does not account for recent road works. We back track around grand towers of the old city foundations, draped in colourful triangular flags and find ourselves in a shopping mall near the Konigstor. Sheltering from the rain in a doorway we discover an entrance to a hotel foyer. Bell boys in uniforms straight out of a Waterloo re-enactment wearing white gloves like a snooker referee, marble reception desk, ambiance screaming expensive. What the Hell! No harm in asking.
This was our first encounter with the practical realism of hotel pricing. After 7pm at night the chances for any hotel to rent out a room for the night drops away considerably. In many cases they are glad to take what they can get. After a few minutes of haggling and we found ourselves standing in the honeymoon suite which took up half the top floor. For $18US less than what we paid for our room in Zurich we effectively got a three bedroom apartment complete with bubble bath. Great, we had one and a half rooms each. I half expected L to erect barricades half way like she did with pillows in our shared bed.
With the rain spoiling any chance of night time exploration I bought some Pizza Hut sustenance and we retired to our luxurious abode to each continue pretending that the other wasn’t there.
With our pockets and bags stuffed full of rolls and meats from the hotel’s continental breakfast spread we returned to the station to continue our journey westward. The first stop of any consequence was the station under Frankfurt Airport where we paused for around fifteen minutes to discharge and take on passengers. Soon after that we emerged into sunlight again and followed the banks of the Rhine River. The scenery teased like a fan dancer providing glimpses of spectacular castles and chalets on the hills overlooking ferries and houseboats traversing the wide waters. These items flashed into view long enough to provoke interest before disappearing in an instant as the train entered a tunnel or a plantation of trees masked the view.
At Cologne the train parked in an inner city rail siding for ten minutes for no apparent reason. From our elevated vantage point we could see down into a seedy area that we presumed must have been the city’s red light district. Even given the intervening distance we could clearly see several figures in fishnet stockings and negligee prancing behind window glass parading their wares to passers by. As to the sex of those putting on the show we were less certain.
Over the next few hours we passed through towns and cities straight out of the pages of the war comics I read as a kid. One was Dusseldorf where a few weeks previously during renovations of the local soccer stadium an unexploded allied bomb was found underneath the goal at one end. It certainly would have brought some spice to a dull nil all draw if that one had gone off in injury time. We followed the Rhine into Holland and passed through Arnhem site of the famous Bridge Too Far and the battles of Operation Market garden before passing Ajax Stadium and entering Amsterdam. It was 8.30PM.
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