I'm not sure what happened to the weather but over the weekend it pissed down hardcore. One can only blame global warming for such conflicting weather. We originally wanted to go for a drive to the neighboring cities on Saturday but the weather was so bad and neither one of us could peel ourselves from the sofa, so we decided to shift our road trip to Sunday [7th of June].
Just for your information Germany tends to cease function on Sundays meaning all shops and supermarkets are closed on that day as that is their "rest" day. So really there wasn't much to do but just to browse and have a feel for the city.
We had 3 cities in mind: Dortmund, Münster and Gütersloh.
I could try and tell you how to pronounce those above cities but even i can't even get them right. I often find myself stumbling over those damn umlauts [those dots above the 'u'] and swallowing my words. Yes the German language continues to confuse me like hell with its' grammar and tones.
Seriously i could bitch and moan until the cows come home but deep down i know i will have to learn to love it.
Grumble... grumble... Yes i know i have to get my arse back to German classes. I don't need reminding.
So our journey between Düsseldorf to Gütersloh was approximately 158 km, which according to Map24 it says it took an hour and 45 minutes. We figured we'd go to the furthest place first and then make our way back by hitting the other towns.
Gütersloh...
Unfortunately, i didn't take that many photos there. Not sure why i guess nothing struck me as exciting. An industrial small town with a population of just over 96,000. But they still managed to have all the big department stores like Karstadt and C&A but all at a smaller scale. One plus point was food and everything in general was much cheaper. For example a regular Margarita pizza at one restaurant was 2.50 Euros whereby the same sized pizza in Düsseldorf would be closer to 4 Euros.
Yes every cent counts.
The main city centre was rather small. I reckon one could check out the whole city centre in an hour, if not two. But in general the people really friendly. Everybody went along doing their own business. There were no evil stares and even though i was probably the only Asian there at the time, nobody seemed to mind, which was quite nice.
Oh and the town has a helluvalot of shoe stores. So if you're in need of shoes at a good price, head to Gütersloh!
I figured the people at Gütersloh must be really proud of their toilets because no where have i seen such a store that sold such a huge variety of toilet cleaners. This store seemed to stock every bathroom fetish desire.
Although i can't say too much about their fashion sense. Or perhaps they need to hire a new window display stylist.
A cow. Not much different to those overseas. I just thought i'd add some life to the pictures and the fact that i was pretty much at the country side.
Next stop was Münster...
A decent sized city with over 270,000 people living there. They have a big university there with many residents choosing to ride their bicycle every where. I can only assume because parking is expensive and the narrow roads make it hard to manoeuvre around.
This is one of the streets in the Altstadt. Basically bars and taverns line the street one right after the other. And on a good day the tables and benches would probably be filled with customers.
One store sold eyeglasses and in their display window had antique pieces and the old fashion lenses that they used to test ones eyes.
A little up the road one would get into the shopping district. There was a beautiful church in the middle of the cross section.
And the buildings stood side by side behind the of main street covered in cobble stones. Those featured stores had their names in bold gold coloured letters on the front of the buildings and each one was different than the next. Everything looked so fancy.
I couldn't get over how beautiful all the buildings looked. It was like a picture in a postcard or fairytale. A stereotypical view of what one could imagine a German city to look like.
But what a shame that the weather was so shit.
Final stop was Dortmund...
A much bigger city with a population of over 580,000. The city centre was massive! The streets were lined with stores and the pedistrian walkways were far wider than those that i'm used to.
The buildings were a mix of the old and the new. The detail on some of the buildings were gorgeous.
We stopped by Maccas in search for my Gemüse burger [vegetarian vegetable burger] but was disappointed to find out that their suppliers had not yet ordered them. Damn, it must be only in Düsseldorf. But look what i saw on the wall...
Mens World featuring the Hustler Fashion Party. For those that don't know, Hustler is like Playboy but not really. But seriously, my first thoughts were, only in Germany would it be considered OK that such a huge fast food chain be one of the sponsors for a brand known for their beautiful girls and sex.
With a random church being restored.
Even though it was 18 degrees, we figured we'd squeeze in an ice cream. The shop even had one ice cream dedicated to their very own BVB Dortmund football team [as seen in the top left corner in yellow and black].
Some random sign i found with interesting labels on them.
But i've noticed a trend in most of the German cities i've visited. They all seem to have a mascott. In Dormund's case they have the flying rhino. Not sure what that's all about but in various spots around the city one could find these flying rhinos as a marketing tool for a brand or store.
Quite clever and definitely eye catching. If i had the time and if i actually lived there, i would probably make it a point to try and photograph all of them...
For no reason, just thought it would be something to do.
Just for your information Germany tends to cease function on Sundays meaning all shops and supermarkets are closed on that day as that is their "rest" day. So really there wasn't much to do but just to browse and have a feel for the city.
We had 3 cities in mind: Dortmund, Münster and Gütersloh.
I could try and tell you how to pronounce those above cities but even i can't even get them right. I often find myself stumbling over those damn umlauts [those dots above the 'u'] and swallowing my words. Yes the German language continues to confuse me like hell with its' grammar and tones.
Seriously i could bitch and moan until the cows come home but deep down i know i will have to learn to love it.
Grumble... grumble... Yes i know i have to get my arse back to German classes. I don't need reminding.
So our journey between Düsseldorf to Gütersloh was approximately 158 km, which according to Map24 it says it took an hour and 45 minutes. We figured we'd go to the furthest place first and then make our way back by hitting the other towns.
Gütersloh...
Unfortunately, i didn't take that many photos there. Not sure why i guess nothing struck me as exciting. An industrial small town with a population of just over 96,000. But they still managed to have all the big department stores like Karstadt and C&A but all at a smaller scale. One plus point was food and everything in general was much cheaper. For example a regular Margarita pizza at one restaurant was 2.50 Euros whereby the same sized pizza in Düsseldorf would be closer to 4 Euros.
Yes every cent counts.
The main city centre was rather small. I reckon one could check out the whole city centre in an hour, if not two. But in general the people really friendly. Everybody went along doing their own business. There were no evil stares and even though i was probably the only Asian there at the time, nobody seemed to mind, which was quite nice.
Oh and the town has a helluvalot of shoe stores. So if you're in need of shoes at a good price, head to Gütersloh!
I figured the people at Gütersloh must be really proud of their toilets because no where have i seen such a store that sold such a huge variety of toilet cleaners. This store seemed to stock every bathroom fetish desire.
Although i can't say too much about their fashion sense. Or perhaps they need to hire a new window display stylist.
A cow. Not much different to those overseas. I just thought i'd add some life to the pictures and the fact that i was pretty much at the country side.
Next stop was Münster...
A decent sized city with over 270,000 people living there. They have a big university there with many residents choosing to ride their bicycle every where. I can only assume because parking is expensive and the narrow roads make it hard to manoeuvre around.
This is one of the streets in the Altstadt. Basically bars and taverns line the street one right after the other. And on a good day the tables and benches would probably be filled with customers.
One store sold eyeglasses and in their display window had antique pieces and the old fashion lenses that they used to test ones eyes.
A little up the road one would get into the shopping district. There was a beautiful church in the middle of the cross section.
And the buildings stood side by side behind the of main street covered in cobble stones. Those featured stores had their names in bold gold coloured letters on the front of the buildings and each one was different than the next. Everything looked so fancy.
I couldn't get over how beautiful all the buildings looked. It was like a picture in a postcard or fairytale. A stereotypical view of what one could imagine a German city to look like.
But what a shame that the weather was so shit.
Final stop was Dortmund...
A much bigger city with a population of over 580,000. The city centre was massive! The streets were lined with stores and the pedistrian walkways were far wider than those that i'm used to.
The buildings were a mix of the old and the new. The detail on some of the buildings were gorgeous.
We stopped by Maccas in search for my Gemüse burger [vegetarian vegetable burger] but was disappointed to find out that their suppliers had not yet ordered them. Damn, it must be only in Düsseldorf. But look what i saw on the wall...
Mens World featuring the Hustler Fashion Party. For those that don't know, Hustler is like Playboy but not really. But seriously, my first thoughts were, only in Germany would it be considered OK that such a huge fast food chain be one of the sponsors for a brand known for their beautiful girls and sex.
With a random church being restored.
Even though it was 18 degrees, we figured we'd squeeze in an ice cream. The shop even had one ice cream dedicated to their very own BVB Dortmund football team [as seen in the top left corner in yellow and black].
Some random sign i found with interesting labels on them.
But i've noticed a trend in most of the German cities i've visited. They all seem to have a mascott. In Dormund's case they have the flying rhino. Not sure what that's all about but in various spots around the city one could find these flying rhinos as a marketing tool for a brand or store.
Quite clever and definitely eye catching. If i had the time and if i actually lived there, i would probably make it a point to try and photograph all of them...
For no reason, just thought it would be something to do.
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