7 October

For a full list of all trip photos, click here. For more on the technical specs behind these photos, click here. For the text entry that accompanies these photos, click here.

First four photos: Yet more random shots of the medieval town of Cochem, which I was just getting ready to leave. There's something really magical about visiting a small town in the off-season; since in many cases you are the single only tourist there, it gives you a chance to quietly observe and participate in local daily life in a way you never could in the middle of the summer. My time in Cochem, for example, both this year and last, would always start with an early-morning breakfast down at one of the only two or three cafes open that early (around 7 a.m. or so); for an hour there in the morning, there was literally no one else awake in the city besides me, the fishermen and other sailors, and the women who get up that early to serve us food and coffee. No matter how banal it may seem to those who live there, the daily activities of a new, foreign town can in many cases be the emotional highlight of our entire international trip. It's certainly something I in particular feel very strongly about when it comes to the city of Cochem.

Panoramic shot! This is the Cochem Bahnhof ("train station;" since it's the only one in town, it doesn't get the "Haupt" ("main") prefix to its name that the larger station in Frankfurt gets). This is not really any bigger or smaller than the other 150 or so train stations in the region; it's marked, though, as being the only major stop along the Mosel for all the faster, newer trains, which is why Cochem is a much more well-known city there than most of its neighbors. This was shot while waiting for my morning train back to Frankfurt. (Click on the photo or here for the full-sized [800-pixel] version; or here for a special page displaying just the panoramic shots I took during my trip.)

Next three photos: Just some random shots of the Mosel river and accompanying towns, on the train ride east back to Koblenz and then Frankfurt.

The RegionalExpress (RE) train. When I originally headed to Cochem a few days previous, time was a bigger priority than money, so I ended up taking one of the ICEs (InterCityExpress), new and fast and expensive and zooming you right where you need to go. For my leisurely trip back to Frankfurt, however, I took the same cheap, slow, rinky-dink trains that the locals use to get from town to town as well. If you are a tourist yourself, you should really build the extra time into some of your days to take the clunky regional trains too; the flashy express trains are great for getting you places fast, but you only meet businessmen and other squeaky happy backpackers, while on the regional trains you meet schoolchildren, local retirees, colorful salesmen, bored chain-smoking teens, and the other smart tourists like you who decided to also get off the beaten path. This particular RE is the newer model - clean, modern, designed much more like a contemporary commuter train, but unfortunately without a single smoking car onboard. (Click here for a guide to the German rail system, illustrated with photo examples from my trip.)

Next three photos: Yet more of the Mosel countryside, now nearing the transportation hub of Koblenz.

Next four photos: Koblenz Hauptbahnhof. Jeez, between last year and this year you wouldn't believe how many twenty-minute periods I've killed at this train station. Because of its geographical location (at the conflux of the Rhein and Mosel rivers, right at the intersection of two major rail lines), this and not Frankfurt is a huge location for changing trains within Germany itself. As a result, you always seem to be changing trains here when getting from one side of the country to the other. And the real shame is that their train station is in an even bigger state of repair than most; there are, in fact, no stores at all on the inside, and a bunch of crappy temporary shanties have been constructed on the plaza outside to sell food and drink vendor-style, to these thousands of people every day killing exactly twenty minutes at the station. For what it's worth, I stayed in Koblenz as well last year, and performed at their poetry slam; people tend to dismiss the city as merely a hub and nothing else, but when you get away from the train station it actually is a quite beautiful, historic, and artistic city.

Ah - the wind at your feet and all your possessions strapped to your back, sitting in the middle of a country where you can barely speak or read a word of the native language. There's not much of a better feeling in the world. Am I right or what?

Next five photos: Yet more of the Mosel countryside, now on the stretch between Koblenz and Frankfurt (which I think technically is the Rhein countryside, but the scenery looks the same).

For this second leg of my trip back to Frankfurt, I rode on one of the old-style REs (which still comprise about 80 percent of the working RE fleet); older, dirtier, but more colorful and full of character, designed as a system of little "areas" where four to six passengers all sit together in a circle (sometimes with a table in the middle). I prefer the older trains, but only for romantic tourist reasons; if I lived here and had to take the trains every day, I would much prefer the newer ones.

Back in Frankfurt. Goddamn it, YOU CANNOT GET AWAY FROM THOSE FUCKING OLSEN TWINS NO MATTER WHERE ON THE PLANET YOU ARE. Global economy, my ass!

The home of Kerstin and Michael, my new hosts in Frankfurt for the next three days and two nights of my tour. They live in Roedelheim, a much older, blue-collar residential district due west of the central city. As you can see, their apartment is larger than Dirk's, but a little more run-down, and with a lot of cool little idiosynchracies due to their neighborhood being as old as it is (like water-closet style toilets, where many times the water tank will be separate from the commode and hanging in the air).

The home of one of Michael's friends, whose name I have unfortunately forgotten. She's a former punk rocker, like me, one who still travels to New York about once a year to visit family, now a piano teacher to young children. She was having a new refrigerator installed and it was going horribly; the guys had been in and out of her house all day, so she couldn't leave, so instead she called Michael and said, "BRING ME BEER." So we did, and much rejoicing took place, and much half-lit fellowship was to be had.

And after Michael's friend's place? Bed, bed, bed for this exhausted little tourist.

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