By the numbers
2 museums
14.41 kms
19653 steps
I woke up in the early hours of the morning after I had
crashed out around 11pm the night before. After a long flight that is a given.
The day was going to be another wet day and I woke to the rain. I was unsure if
there was going to be a cold snap outside or not, but I was prepared with my
jumper and I needed to try out my new brolly. I had a token for one free
breakfast.
The breakfast was free coffee and food with the token I was
given the night before. It was kinda basic, but pretty filling. I was worried
about the pass that I had printed off that could get wet in the weather. I
ended up making sure it would be covered in plastic from a folder. I guessed
that would protect it from harm. I wanted to head to the train station to make
sure I did not need to activate the pass. I did learn that no you don’t, but
also you could hop onto everything without scanning the ticket unless
inspectors were on board.
The information centre was in the train station and I
wandered around in awe. I learnt how easy it would be to catch a train to
Berlin, which will be soon. Each diagram matches the train and destination like
train 874, carriage and the red dot marks where you are on the platform. The
timetables are helpful too. I went for a look to orientate myself and
understand the system. Now that I know and can sort out the railway lines on
Germany, I can sort that out when I am there next time after this trip. Of
course I went wandering like a gobsmacked person looking around the station and
it was good to see how everything worked.
Back into the wet weather as I wanted to visit the Natural
History museum and I wantred the tram that would get me cosest to it. On the
way I did get distracted by some park as there was a little buit of water, but
they do make some interesting arty farrtty entrances to the Ubahn stations,
which is like the underground tube stations that run through London. The public
transport seems to be really good here. I am thankful that I have a travel sim
as I would never have moved around the city without any problems or know where
I am. As I got closer to the museum, I wondered if I would know it when I seen
it, but I did not need to wonder when its a lovely old building with dinosaurs
out the front. Across the road is a TRex and outside the museum is a diplodocus.
Kids had the same idea as I did to visit as well. The Frankfurt card gave me a
50% discount and in I went.
A website last year that secured my visit to Frankfurt was
about the dinosaur museums sand mentioned a Stegosaurus. Even though the
original is elsewhere, I got to see the cast. Though never fear, they had
plenty of skeletons that were originals especially the water creatures of the
past. There are fossil fields in Germany that are very rich in findings and a
UNESCO heritage area called Essen I think it is that the findings of many
different animals and plants from the time of the Gondwana type land masses. I
do like how the displays were a mix of English and German. They also tell you
the basics of the animals and where the original is located. There were heaps
of children chattering away and ?I had to tolerate them, but they did make a
bit of noise. The natural world part had animals we know today and even a
display on Lucy, but unsure if these were casts or not. Lucy was found in the
1960s and was an early man of sorts. I came across a scientist lab of sorts
that had brains in jars, breeding anatomy including penis’ in jars. I used
Google translate on them and was going uh huh. I came across a display of
Archaeopteryx, feathered birds of the dinosaur age. They had the 11th
one that was found and is being loaned from a private collection. It shows the
feathers around the bird and nearby shows casts of the others, which are kept
in London and Berlin. The First is in London and was found in the 1800s. I am
glad that I came along.
The next museum on the list was the cartoon museum, but I
was distracted by the university grounds and wearing a UNE jumper I might have
fit right into the area.. I decided to look at the botanic gardens as they are
usually free to visit and I thought I could quickly use the loo there. I found
a map outside of the Frankfurt area that I am currently in and included a guard
tower called the Bockenheimer Warte. It was part of the defences from around
the 1400s. I was torn about seeing that or the botanic gardens as it was lunch
time and I was getting hungry. The botanic gardens would cost me to walk inside
and they had turn styles that anchored my doubts to visit. I wanted the other
museum anyway so turned around to head to the guard tower. Along the way I came
across some street art, but wanted a closer look by going through the ubahn
area I found myself in a huge pedestrian area before you get down to the
trains. I poped out the end I wanted and found the street art to be the station
entrance. It looked like a train carriage had started to come through the
street level. I found something to eat, but was unsure what the bread thing was
apart from it was a bakery item and food.
A closer look at Bockenheimer Warte meant I walked a little
further up the road and got stopped by some guy who I wasn’t sure what he was
doing until he told me he was a political party guy. A uni student and since I
couldn’t vote I was free to go with a high five. He did ask if I wanted to move
to Germany though. Nice guy even if it was still a mystery, but he spoke
English. I had a quick look at a warehouse building outside, but cannot
remember the name or if it was a theatre building. I went down to the Ubahn
station at Bockenheimer Warte and wanted to get out at another one. It was fast
and spoke English and German too. I popped out at the Konstablerwache station
and it looked like a shopping area. Sistracted again I followed my map and seen
the museum of arts and then a church that I had a look at before finding a
clown outside a building. I was near an archaeology dig for the archaeology
museum showing roman ruins and a palace that had something to do with
Charlemagne who was a king in the early
800s area. I made a video of the walk through and headed to the Town Hall and
was stunned by the beauty there as it was pretty painted houses and the town
hall. I wandered through and past the history museum heading to the cartoon
museum that I found was closed.
Turning around I made my way to the history museum where the
guy seemed to be annoyed I had the pass that gives me 50% off. I stopped for
coffee and went into the museum, Frankfurt has had interesting times being the
centre of banking including after the war where the Americans set up banks. At
first I thought I would be stuck with german written displays until I found
they also had English. The city was bombed heavily during World War 2 and there
were attempts during the clean up to repurpose the rubble which is a good idea.
There were stories about several people like Margot Frank, sister to Anne Frank
and what happened to them and several other people including one boy who was
part of the Hitler Youth, but defied some of what they were doing like growing
his hair long. The old town area, which is the town hall was heavily bombed and
there has been many debates including knocking the remains down. Though they
have rebuilt and have been many protests in Frankfurt’s history including the
expansion of Frankfurt airport. A small town was built in the woods by
protestors, but that didn’t stop the expansion. I was impressed by a display
that was spinning slowly as you were reading the information so you would exit
elsewhere on the same floor just facing a different direction. I found that
kings and queens had been crowned in the city too. One of the last displays I
looked at was a huge diorama of the city. I kept on kicking the table by
accident, but I was not the only person to do so. We all got looks and should
watch where we are walking. The toll tower was the last area that I went to
look in and it was an actual old toll tower. It was where the people in
authority would collect money from crossing the nearby bridge and funnily
enough used as a clock tower to, so it could warn people of events like
invasion, the time and during executions.
I thought about going for a longer walk, but realised it was
getting late and I could get food at the hostel like a pizza. I didn’t want to
be near the streets in the dark even though nothing would happen. Instead of
catching the very regular public transport, I walked back into the hostel area.
I found the banking district was interesting, but I had my goal of returning to
the room before dark. I followed my handy online map that showed me that I was
getting closer. Once I was in the hostel I had to buzz the door. How to get in
is to buzz the front door for entry and then you show your card with room
number on it so you can then use your card to enter your room. The key card
runs out at 12pm on the day you leave. Considering the area and that the
reception is 24 hours, thats what I call good. I ended up having two beers with
my pizza and that hit me like a mule a touch. I ended up going to bed not long
after I started writing my blog at 8pm. I thought an hour sleep would be good,
but I turned my alarm off and slept until around 4am where I decided now was
the time to finish my blog. Maybe not in my room though as the keyboard kinda
annoyed one girl, but polite not to tell me to f off.
