When we left he pulled out a hankie and pretended to cry and wipe tears and then said "shit, shit". I'm not sure if he really understood the translation of shit!
We drove to Koln (Cologne) today to return our car and see the famous cathedral. Our drive was wonderful along the Mosel River and then the Rhine. It was a beautiful sunny day, temperature in the low 70's. We decided to find our hotel and drop our bags before returning the car which was located near the cathedral. I don't know what it is but big cities with tons of cars, bikes, two lanes where one lane turns into parking unexpectedly, all of it kind of freaks us out. It really takes two people to drive, one to yell, "Watch out! And the other one to drive the car! It really is amazing we didn't kill someone on this month long trip...whoops, did I day that out loud? We are thankful Monte is a skilled driver.
So anyway, we found the hotel ok, but parking on the street was difficult. We finally found a place, paid for parking and went in to get our room. They told us they had a garage we could use so we figured it would make it easier to get our bags into the room. Someone had to use a key to let us into to the parking garage. Have you ever seen those lots on TV where your car goes into an elevator and then it is parked within a couple inches of the others...yep! That is what we did. Very interesting. We got our bags to the room and then had to get the attendant to help us get the car back out. A bit scary, but we did it.
We didn't mention in the blog that we had a rental car issue. When we picked up the car in Munich, it was late afternoon, we drove it from the dark garage, and then we were on our way. Sure we hadn't slept much in the last 24 hrs or so, but we drove fine and made it to our B&B ok. We parked in a lot for the B&B where there was only a couple other cars, and we were on the end. Anyway, the next morning Monte was up early, before breakfast, and went out to get coffee. When he returned he noticed a large scrape along the side of the car. I mean a large scrape, like12 inches from top to bottom in a white paint color, and probably 5 inches wide. We couldn't believe it! We never remembered hitting anything, no one had parked next to us, there was no chance it could have been something we did....or could it? We were so tired, could we have hit something and not known it? So, many thoughts were going through our head...do we call our insurance, call the rental car company, call the agent who set up the rental? We did not have a phone and didn't want to spend time worrying about it, so we decided to let it go and deal with it when we turned the car in. All day today we were thinking of what to say, will they believe us if we say we didn't do it, how much will it cost, etc. It has been on our mind the last month. Not to mention our parking brake got stuck (it works by a button) and we couldn't get the gas tank cover off- push button that wouldn't open, even though we had done it many times. So it is clear we were not having a love affair with this car!
So we went to return the car, drove around and around trying not to kill someone and finally found a small sign. We drove in and still couldn't find it. Monte got directions and just walked since we had found a parking place. He says he would never have found it without help. To make a very long story short, there was small writing on our contract noting the damage to the car, so we didn't do it! Even though we were sure we didn't, we didn't know how we would prove that. So, we felt much better! It would have been nice had they mentioned it to us when we first got the car. Oh, well.
We walked to the train station to find out what train we need to get us to the airport. We had no option of return flights, it is only at 9:30, so unfortunately we have to get up by 4:00am, be out to call for a taxi for the ten min ride to the train station, take the 40 min ride, catch the shuttle to the terminal and check in 3 hours early. Well, I was hoping to avoid all this, but what can you do? Maybe we'll sleep well on the airplane.
After dropping our car we walked to the cathedral. It was amazing! We didn't get any information about it, but just looking at it was fantastic. We spent about an hour inside, then decided to walk back to our hotel. And of course, nothing is easy when you travel. So it took awhile to find the right street and it began to rain. Luckily, yesterday we picked up a cheap umbrella since it looked like possible rain. Our raincoats did arrive by mail yesterday but we didn't get them until the end of our day, and today we dropped our luggage at the hotel without thinking about raincoats. It had looked sunny and nice. So our 7€ umbrella was worth it.
We had a nice dinner at the hotel; we are packed and ready for our 4am call.
Makes you appreciate our "all you can drink" soda! This is the size of a coke. Funny how the beer portions are not a problem!
Small elevator! We could hardly put ourselves in much less our luggage.
This was more of a business day just getting ready to fly, but still a fun and exciting day. Many interesting people here in Koln, reminds me San Francisco, if you know what I mean.
A GREAT trip! We have loved every minute! So thankful we have had this opportunity in our lives!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:B9,Cologne,Germany
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