Hamburg, Day 2
The next day Yvonne took me on a tour of Blankenese - a village which is a train ride away from the big city. Well, not exactly a village, it felt more like a suburb, and somehow had a very American suburb feel, like what you get from Desperate Housewives - perhaps that was just in my mind. Later on the place had a feel of Montmartre with its narrow hilly streets and stairways. It also has a lot of villas owned by, well, I guess those who can afford it.
At this point I noticed many Mini Coopers, that I thought I should document all occurrences of them in my trip...
We walked down to the riverside, which also has sand and is a beach. This we all accomplished within an hour or so, but my feet were already hurting again from the walk and the tight-fitting shoes.
Next we went to the bus stop that would take us back to the train station . The schedule said the next bus would be a while yet so we decided to walk back to the station. But walking in the middle of the road towards it, we saw the bus, coming up behind us. And because we were walking on a piece of road that was being fixed, with netting to its sides, we had to find a gap in the nets to stand aside. As we did so, I put my thumb out, and ha, the driver stopped for us! So we got on!
We had valid tickets, but I think he didn't really care about it. The bus was air-conditioned too, so it was a welcome change to the humid day outside. Driving around I got to see more of the fancy villas the place had.
Arriving back at the train station, we had a "now what?" feeling. Yvonne told me of other things we could visit, although I guess I wasn't paying attention, because they all seemed not very exciting. We agreed on something, so we hopped on the train.
It was close to lunchtime, so we were wondering what to eat. Then Yvonne realized it's Thursday, and Thursday is Chicken-Tag at KFC. ("Chicken-Day", although the German word for chicken is not chicken, but hähnchen), so, being a member of the aforementioned KFC cult, I agreed when she suggested we ate there.
This KFC restaurant was located at St. Pauli's, the famous red light district of Hamburg. We went there at around 1 PM, so the place looked normal and just like any other city part. Actually it felt quite calm, probably because the businesses don't open till night...
After lunch we headed out to the direction of the river again, where the touristy sights are. On the way we visited a park with a giant Bismarck statue. I was amazed at how huge it was. I guess it's one of the rare statues of its kind in Germany, considering Germans find it somewhat taboo to feel pride in their nation and their heroes; the last guy the nation rallied behind was quite a nutjob. This statue was built between 1903 and 1906, where it was still possible.
Yvonne and I walked up to the top of a hill, where I had to take a break because my feet were yet again killing me. I wondered if I would have to get better fitting shoes, considering it was my second day on the trip and I had 2 more months in the schedule.
But I decided to wait it and see if it would get better. Continuing our sightseeing tour, we walked to St. Michaelis, a church. Loads of tourist buses there... But it was a forgettable place.
After this we were joined by Juan, Yvonne's friend. It wasn't easy getting him, one time he said on the phone "It looks cloudy over here", so he was reluctant to join us if it was going to rain that day. But after a while we finally managed to get together. We had another look of Speicherstadt and HafenCity, and as they asked me what else I wanted to see, I mentioned the Russian submarine which is parked in a corner of Hamburg, which I read about, somewhere.
"Come on, if you want to do it, just do it."
So we started walking through the great construction yard known as HafenCity. It turned out to be a hot sunny day. Did I mention my feet hurt? My own fault for wanting to see the sub...
After a few kilometers (well, one), we got there. It was what it was, a rusty, beat-up-looking submarine parked next to the quay, with a little kiosk that sold food, drinks and tickets. It looked a bit bland, like a toy sitting in a bathtub (though the water was black), and a ticket to see the sub costs 10 Euro per person, which we all felt was too much.
Rusty piece a junk! :p
Inside the Sub
Here's a story from somebody who actually went into the sub.
Some more pictures of the sub are also available, in this Flickr album.
So we bought some cold drinks and sat outside the kiosk to cool off. We were dreading the way back. A double-decker tour bus that goes around the city does stop here, we noticed, as if making a gesture of giving this "tourist attraction" a recognition of its existence.
So we took the bus back into town and walked around some more. Juan is also a hobby photographer, and he brought his heavy gear (a Canon DSLR) with him. We walked around the Alster lake looking for objects to photograph. By this stage my feet were again killing me, so unfortunately I wasn't really enjoying the tour anymore.
We met up with Adis who got off work in the early evening, and the three of us (Yvonne, Adis and me) went home for dinner. But we planned to meet up with Juan later that night, because Yvonne had appointed him as my guide through Hamburg's red light district.
We went back out at 9 PM, to watch a free water display: it was an art performance consisting of jets of water being streamed out of a lake, with beams of lights giving them color, while they "perform" in sync to classical music.
Some 800 km north from Karlsruhe, the additional daylight hours was already quite noticeable, I wondered how it would be like further up north.
After that, we took the subway to St. Pauli, and Juan and Adis had a dinner at, you guessed it, KFC. Hahaha. We sat outside at the balcony (ah the joys of warm weather!) and I watched as all manners of strangely clothed people walked down the sidewalk.
Later on Juan took me on a trip around Hamburg's infamous Reeperbahn - the red light district. Well, it was nothing too weird. The area also had a lot of discos, with their respective bouncers and weird youth visitors. I feel old :) . There is one street in the area where women are not allowed - traditionally the, uhm, workers of that street would douse any women they find there with water. So Yvonne and Adis waited just outside this street, until they said they got creeped out by the men looking at them, and they went to a nearby fast food restaurant (no, it wasn't the KFC).
We went home taking a bus (it was about 1 AM now, but the trains weren't running anymore), and I went to bed thinking of my next leg of the trip: out of Germany, and into Copenhagen.