{"id":1876,"date":"2008-12-17T00:13:00","date_gmt":"2008-12-16T22:13:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.breigh.com\/wordpress\/?p=1876"},"modified":"2008-12-17T00:18:57","modified_gmt":"2008-12-16T22:18:57","slug":"the-craziness-of-the-cologne-market","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/archives\/1876","title":{"rendered":"The Craziness of the Cologne Market"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a title=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/36166632@N00\/3106358989\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"323\" alt=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/3295\/3106358989_9b5bf03218.jpg\" width=\"455\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Saturday myself and Penny were off to the Christmas market in Cologne, Germany.&#160;&#160; We\u2019d been looking forward to going for weeks on end so we were both totally stoked.&#160;&#160; I think we weren\u2019t really prepared for what was waiting for us though.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Cologne Crowd - Before it got busy!\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/36166632@N00\/3105825240\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"341\" alt=\"Cologne Crowd - Before it got busy!\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/3072\/3105825240_a36a4e04ac.jpg\" width=\"455\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>We knew it was going to be busy, since it is getting closer to Christmas and we went on a Saturday but christ on a crutch \u2013 it was insane!!<\/p>\n<p>The above photo was taken just after we got there at 11am and that was when it wasn\u2019t even busy yet, by comparison anyway.&#160; At this time we were still able to weave our way through the crowd.&#160;&#160; By the end of the afternoon there was easily 2-3 times as many people and we didn\u2019t move through the crowd, we stepped into it and beyond that it was completely out of our control.<\/p>\n<p>I hate crowds with such a passion, but amazingly I didn\u2019t lose my mind.&#160; I think my excitement of being there outweighed my irritation.&#160; I just wish I had been able to see more as it took so long to go through the one market by the cathedral that before we knew it our time was up and we had to head back to the busses!<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/36166632@N00\/3106352945\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"341\" alt=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/3212\/3106352945_c382fd33c2.jpg\" width=\"455\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>There was a lot of hand painted ornaments, wood carvings and other Christmas decoratings, but also a surprising amount of non-Christmas things that made me go \u2018uhhh\u2019 like the dude making the belts or the entire stand for nothing but boomerangs.&#160; Seriously\u2026 boomerangs?<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/36166632@N00\/3107185094\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/3262\/3107185094_8a26ffd0a6.jpg\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>And the food\u2026<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Deep Fried Potato Patties\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/36166632@N00\/3107195036\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Deep Fried Potato Patties\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/3114\/3107195036_a769d0b546.jpg\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Oh my god, the food!<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/36166632@N00\/3106354831\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/3093\/3106354831_33a35e508c.jpg\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>For every stand with \u2018stuff\u2019 there were three with food.&#160; Whether it was chocolates, crepes, bratworst, potato pancakes or pasta\u2026 there was food everywhere you looked.&#160;&#160; It wasn\u2019t cheap either!&#160; That doesn\u2019t stop anyone from getting it though, because everyone else is and you don\u2019t want to miss out!<\/p>\n<p>The most impressive thing of the whole trip was the Cathedral.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Dom Cathedral\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/36166632@N00\/3105831972\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Dom Cathedral\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/3122\/3105831972_83323eea62.jpg\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m so glad it\u2019s there year round because I really want to go visit sometime when it\u2019s not completely insane and see more of it, and the rest of the city.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/36166632@N00\/3107187658\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/3133\/3107187658_42340cf82a.jpg\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/36166632@N00\/3107192264\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Cologne Christmas Market\" src=\"http:\/\/static.flickr.com\/3071\/3107192264_d52690218c.jpg\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>There were so many other little things to tell about that day, like how we got ripped off 3 hours of the trip when the bus actually left at 5pm and not 8pm like we were told when we booked it, or how the bus driver had the temperature in the bus at just a level above the temperature of hell, making us both feel incredibly carsick\u2026 but who really cares about those things?&#160; We were at a Christmas Market in GERMANY, and I don\u2019t think either of us ever thought we\u2019d be saying that before we moved here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Saturday myself and Penny were off to the Christmas market in Cologne, Germany.&#160;&#160; We\u2019d been looking forward to going for weeks on end so we were both totally stoked.&#160;&#160; I think we weren\u2019t really prepared for what was waiting for us though. We knew it was going to be busy, since it is getting closer &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6834,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,39],"tags":[71,277,276,87,173,879],"class_list":["post-1876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-life-in-nl","category-travel","tag-christmas","tag-christmas-markets","tag-cologne","tag-food","tag-penny","tag-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1876"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1876\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1878,"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1876\/revisions\/1878"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6834"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canadutch.nl\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}