My Germany: Day 3 Frankfurt

On our third day in Frankfurt/Germany, we got up early, ditched the breakfast at the hotel and headed for the Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof or Frankfurt (Main) Hbf. We noted the 'false' facade of the station, obviously under construction/conservation. This is the main railway station in Frankfurt am Main (official name of Frankfurt), and the busiest in Germany, which opened on 18.08.1888. The station has Neo-Renaissance features with two halls added in 1924 in neoclassicism style. On the roof of the front hall is the statue of Atlas supporting the world on his shoulders, assisted by two allegorical figures representing Iron and Steam. (Oops, I forgot to get a close-up of these figures, so use your imagination, or you could zoom in lah!).

Yummy pastries at the train station favoured over the hotel breakfast.

We walked along Kaiser Strasse after coffee, chocolate and pastries. We guessed that the few beggars we saw at the train station and along this street were either Roma gypsies or Turks. (We did not/could not ask to be sure.)

We also walked between the very tall sky scrapers of Frankfurt, including the 57-storey Commerzbank, tallest building in Europe (designed by Norman Foster and Partners, 1997).

For a quick lunch we stopped by the old Cafe Hauptwache (estd. 1904), and tried the local specialty of handkase mit musik (hand-cheese with music). Lonely Planet describes this best.

"Handkase mit musik" is the sort of name you could only find in Germany. It describes a round cheese marinated in oil and vinegar with onions, served with bread and butter and no fork. As you might imagine, this potent mixture tends to give one a healthy dose of wind - the release of which, ladies and gentlemen, is the music part." Hahaha ...! Needless to say, we did not make much sweet music.

Quite nearby is the Goethe Museum and Goethe Haus. Here we had a glimpse into the birthplace and early life of the German literary giant - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: poet, dramatist, painter, politician, scientist, philosopher, and landscape gardener.

With Goethe's silhouette portrait in Goethe Haus

We then headed for the Romerberg, Frankfurt's old central square, where postwar-restored 14th and 15th century buildings gave us a glimpse of how beautiful the city once was. The old town hall or Romer is made up of three recreated step-gabled 15th century houses. Interestingly, the Font of Justice in 1612 ran with wine at the coronation of Matthias.

Romerberg's restored buildings, a shadow of the original old town of Frankfurt, biggest old Gothic town in Central Europe, devastated by bombardments of the Allied Forces during World War II.

The Frankfurter Dom or Frankfurt Cathedral we passed by on our way to cross the River Main to get to Sachsenhausen. We did not go into this historic cathedral which from 1356 saw the crowning of emperors of the Holy Roman Empire and emperors-elect as kings in Germany.

We checked out Alt-Sachsenhausen (Old Sachsenhausen) with its narrow cobblestone lanes and small squares with frame houses and "Ebbelwoi" taverns, before taking a taxi back to the hotel.

Germany 31.1 - 9.2