Cologne

Cologne is about a 3 hour train ride away from Brussels. Make sure to bring something with you for the train ride...a book or borrow a friends nook (like I did- thanks Nancy!). You may think that you can look out the window and be so enthralled with the European landscape but really you will get tired of looking out of the window after about an hour. Sleeping is also a good option. I absolutely LOVE sleeping on trains. I think the rocking motion just lulls me to sleep like a little baby!

Anyway, Cologne is a great German city with one of the most amazing churches in the world- the Dom. When you arrive at the central train station in Cologne, you will literally walk right out to see the Dom. It is Mammoth and beautiful. There are English tours of the church daily so first thing I would do after arriving is find out when the tour is. I think our tour started at around 11:00 AM. The tour starts right in the church and students get a discount (as is the case at a lot of places in Europe :) The tour guide told us a lot about the history of the church and how it was preserved during WWII despite over 90 percent of Cologne being destroyed in the war. The stories of city's people sacrificing their lives to protect the paintings, relics, and other historical artifacts in the church was inspiring.

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The Cathedral/Dom itself is breathtaking. My favorite part of the church were the stained-glass windows- in my opinion, the best in Europe (that I've seen- even better than the Vatican!). The Dom gained notoriety as the place where the Three Magi (Three Wisemen) have been laid to rest. 

After touring the church, we went and got some German food which I think is a must! I, of course, got bratwurst and they did not disappoint. After eating we decided it was probably best that we worked off some of the food so we climbed to the top of the belfry and the view was great! 

After the eating and climbing the belfry, we headed to the nearby chocolate factory. If you want to eat or get some hot chocolate at the little cafe at the factory, make sure you get there early. They stop seating around a half hour before they actually close.