I know the above title may cause concern that my blog has moved from “PG-13” to “R” or “NC-17” (or worse). Never fear...or at least no more than one should typically fear my blog.
I got to bed very, very late Sunday night, yet managed to get up fairly early on Monday. I have now entered the unplanned part of my itinerary; four days and nights with no solid plans or hotel reservations. The only constraint I have is to be in Brussels Friday morning for my flight home. Assuming I don’t receive a better offer.
I figured I’d be heading out from Berlin about midday. There were still many things I wanted to see, but precious little time. As it turned out, I had only about one hour to wander a bit. I took the subway to Potzdamer Platz and walked along one of the only remaining sections of the wall. That walk led me back to Checkpoint Charlie (now overrun with tourists). I walked from there over to the Jewish Museum. Lilan (and Rick Steves) gave this museum a very high recommendation. Unfortunately, I only had time to look at the very interesting outside of the building, before walking back to my hotel.
After checking out, I went back to the subway, this time with my entire collection of luggage. I headed for the HauptBahnhof, and was a bit concerned when one of the subway trains arrived extremely late. Timing was very important, if I was to enjoy T+A this afternoon. I made the train with about 5 minutes to spare. This train was an Inter City Express (ICE) train, which can travel at speeds of 140mph. After two hours, I had made it as far as Bielefeld. I had a very, very tight train connection here (4 minutes to switch platforms), but managed to make my 8 minute train ride to Herford, the home of all things T+A.
What is T+A, you might ask? I think by now, most of you have been subject to that story. My cousin Stirling, is in the very high-end audio business. His company represents T+A, a very well-respected high-end audio company in the US and Asia. T+A stands for “Theorie und Anwendung” (roughly translated, “Theory and Application”). His business associate Siggi Amph, is the Managing Director of T+A. I met Siggi a couple of times at the Consumer Electronic Show. As it turns out, I managed to catch Siggi at the office (he had just returned from the show in Milan and was about to head to Austria). Siggi picked me up at the Herford train station and drove me out to their facility. It’s an impressive operation that has expanded over the decades since Siggi founded the company. While the T+A brand is not a household word in the US, they have a very large following in Europe, due to their outstanding engineering and very attractive styling. Definitely not a brand you’ll see at BestBuy! Siggi’s employees were very friendly and knowledgeable. It was a very pleasant visit and I was glad to see where all this equipment is designed and manufactured.
After Siggi returned me to the Herford train station, I continued on my journey. I semi-randomly decided to aim towards Koln (what we call “Cologne”). It’s about two more hours on the train (another very fast ICE train). I spent the first ten minutes securing lodging for the evening, and spent the remaining time watching the German countryside whiz by, while I caught up on a day or two of blogging).
Koln has a very busy train station. They have one very slick innovation: Instead of having lockers for your baggage, they have an automated storage system, where you put your bags in & get a code (and they are automatically moved down to the basement on conveyor belts, then brought back when you return. I didn’t get to use it and admit I’d be a little skeptical about it working properly (thoughts of the conveyor belt nightmares that initially plagued the new Denver airport come to mind), but it is cool.
My hotel was 4 stops away on the subway. I’m staying tonight at a Hotel Ibis, an economy chain that’s primarily outside the US. It was a very Spartan, utilitarian room. The area around the hotel had some restaurants and shops, but no major sights. Then again, as I’ve been to Koln before (albeit 29 years ago), seeing the sights wasn’t a priority. I had a simple Asian dinner (at a cook-to-order Asian fast-food place) and called it a night.
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