Hamburg - Getting Ready for Octoberfest!

---

Going to board yet another train, the sky is coloured with a sunrise of pastel peach and pink blush. Onwards to Hamburg, GERMANY.

Two trains are joined together with an apparatus looking like giant plug-ins. There are even double decker trains available. Transferring to another train in Duisburg, the people in the six seater compartment say it is closed and try to shoo us away. But we have made reservations, so one of them has to leave. I am not impressed.

Shortly into the trip, the train stops as someone has pulled the emergency brake. Me thinks it is the inebriated soccer fans on board. The two hour trip turns into five hours as the train was also initially one hour late.

In the city, our hotel seems to be in the Little Portugal area of Hamburg, and so we end up eating at a “Brazilian” restaurant, (go figure), with no bratwurst in sight. Come evening, turns out that our hotel room is directly above an outdoor bar, and groups of people party until three A.M.

Come morning, Chris informs me that we have missed our train as he has misread the ticket schedule. We lose the cost of our seat reservations, and the hotel that was booked in Copenhagen. It seems that we are coming off the rails a bit in Germany.

To start fresh, it is off to a new boutique hotel Henri where they have guaranteed it is quiet. Being Sunday, all the shops are closed, but close by there is an open air Bavarian food stall selling foot long bratwursts. I can’t believe I ate the whole thing! Everything is right again. At the table, a German lady and I discuss the homelessness problem. She expressed that the residents are upset because the immigrants arrive and are provided with a flat, but many of their own citizens remain living on the streets. There are no easy answers.

---