Today was a catholic holiday – Froliche Weichnam, or Corpus Christi. Köln is a pretty catholic city, so there was a huge mass and procession through the city. We went – it was outside the cathedral and was also impressive. The square was completely packed and each parish brought their own banners so they could join the procession. The cardinal of Köln gave the mass (that position has a long history – the cardinal was one of the prince electors of the Holy Roman Empire who picked the king) and then took the cathedral’s relic on the procession.

Next was lunch – another brewery! This time I had soup (potato, of course) and a small salad. Following that was a walking tour of Köln – the current city is actually built on top of the ruins of a Roman city. There are a lot of archeological sites that look like road construction around the city center. We went to an underground museum displaying the ruins of the Preturium, or headquarters/city hall of the city. That was super cool – the only other time I’ve seen something like that was in Manchester, England and I don’t remember that too well.

We also visited a second church that had been almost completely destroyed in the war – unlike the cathedral, which was barely touched. This one wasn’t as decorated to start out with in terms of physical decorations, but was heavily painted on the inside. It wasn’t repainted after the war, so there are only a few blotches of the beautiful paintings left.

After the walking tour I climbed the cathedral tower. That was pretty tough – it was a five hundred step spiral staircase about three and a half feet wide with traffic going in both directions. Getting to the top was worth it – I could see the whole city of Köln and Bonn off in the distance.

Dinner that night was not in the program, so the group went to a Mexican restaurant. The burrito was actually really good – tasty vegetables. Maybe like a 6.5 or a 7 on the burrito scale.

Then it was back to the hotel!