April 12
It’s Thursday evening and we’ve had a great couple of days. Before we get into that, though, let’s wrap up Tuesday night. The Collabro concert was wonderful. Lynn downloaded two of their albums (are they still called that??) from iTunes so we know they have a beautiful sound but whether they can reproduce it live is another question. Well….they can. Even though there are only 4 of them now (the guy on the far left in the audition video left the group to go out on his own) they still sound great. It was a small theater, maybe 600-700 seats, but it was virtually sold out and the fans were very devoted. A few women in their 40s who were in the first row peeled the song list off the stage floor at the end of the concert (really??). The guys mentioned that they will be touring with Barry Manilow (Peter’s comment after he heard that was; “Barry Manilow is still alive?) so that should be great exposure for them. They really are quite good.
Here are a couple of links. The first one is their audition clip from BGT. If you watch until the end you’ll hear Simon make a comment that was absolutely true. Their first album was a huge hit in Britain. The second clip is a video Lynn took at the concert. It was with her phone so the quality isn’t great, but it will give you an idea of what we saw. The blond guy on the far left is the one who stood far right in the audition video. He’s bleached his hair.
We met a couple of women at the concert who gave us a few ideas for what else to see in the Netherlands before we move back into Belgium. We decided against The Hague as the weather was going to be cloudy and rainy so what’s the point of going to the beach. But we decided to go to Maastricht as they said it was a pretty medieval town.
Our our way we stopped in Arnhem. This is where the famous Operation Market Garden in WWII was held and was an absolute disaster for the Allies in Sept of 44. The movie, A Bridge Too Far, is about this battle. There were two museums to pick from and we randomly selected one of them. As we drove into the parking lot, we were very skeptical as it was just a large house and Lynn was afraid, we’d be paying 8 euros each to see a half a dozen objects someone dug up out of their yard. Well, she couldn’t have been more wrong. The museum was amazing, the best we’ve seen yet, and we’ve seen quite a few. Turns out the house was occupied by the Nazis during the Operation and a Panzer (tank) division was stationed in the backyard. There were thousands of objects in the museum, all of which were authentic. All the other museums had replicas of the guns, machines, vehicles, etc., but virtually everything in this place was authentic. There were a lot of objects donated including a box of cigars that a Brit was carrying when he was shot. The bullet bounced off the cigar tin, hit him and breaking off a rib which landed in the tin. The tin looks as it did that day with the bullet hole, all the cigars and the broken piece of his rib. It was very cool. There was also a small picture painted by Hitler as well as a typewriter from the Fuhrer bunker in Berlin. We had a guided tour of the museum and heard a ton of interesting stories about the objects. We thoroughly enjoyed our visit.
From there we headed to Maastricht about 90 minutes away. We planned to spend the night but the first 2 hotels we found were sold out and we couldn’t find an Airbnb flat anywhere close. So, we had a quick snack and headed to Fort Eben Emael just across the border in Belgium. This fort figured in the first battle in Belgium. The fort had several big guns that could shoot up to 20 miles away, so they thought the fort was safe. Except, the Germans parachuted in, disabled the guns and took the fort without much difficulty. Unfortunately, we couldn’t tour as it’s undergoing renovation and is only open for tours one weekend per month. There also wasn’t too much to see on the outside as most of the fort was underground.
By this time, it was after 4pm and we had no idea where we were going to spend the night, so we looked at the map and decided on Aachen, Germany. It was only about an hour east and a good spot from which to tour Cologne. We found a Hilton property that was actually cheaper than an Airbnb flat so that’s where we spent last night and tonight.
After checking in we took a cab to the train station to arrange for our train tickets to Cologne, then walked to the old part of town. The Cathedral is beautiful from the outside but unfortunately it was after 7pm so it was closed. We had a nice German meal then walked back to the hotel. It was a long, but very nice today.
Today (Thursday) we were on an 8:55 train from Aachen to Cologne. Lynn was there in 93 but didn’t remember too much of it. Our first stop was the Cathedral which took over 600 years to complete. Construction started in 1248 and the last stone was placed in 1880. It doesn’t look piecemeal, though, as everyone followed the original plans. It was badly damaged during the war but most of the artwork and stained-glass windows from the Middle Ages had been removed and were saved. Most of the 19th century windows were destroyed.
We were very fortunate that we got the sit in on a rehearsal for the Koln Philharmonic Orchestra. They have an open rehearsal in their beautiful orchestra hall every Thursday. It seats about 2000 and was virtually full. It was a lot of fun, and the music was beautiful.
Here’s a link to a video Lynn took of the rehearsal. Koln Philharmonic Orchestra.
Then we had lunch by the Rhine River waiting for our afternoon scenic boat tour. The boat was almost empty, so we had a seat on top, right in the front of the boat. By this time the sun was out (had been very foggy and cloudy in the morning) and it was a beautiful 65 minutes on the Rhine River. We saw a lot of river cruise ships and decided that we’d like to try one someday. One more thing to add to our ever-growing list of vacation ideas.
After splitting a delicious pizza for dinner, it was back to the train for the one-hour ride home. Tomorrow we’re off to Bastogne and will spend the night in Luxembourg City. Then it’s back to France for our last week before we get rid of the car and spend 6 days in Paris. So much yet left to see. Keep you posted.
