Day 17

Wednesday morning started off by packing up another hotel room and getting a good breakfast at the hotel.  Then we started off on our journey to Cologne.  Our first stop of the morning was to get a very quick look at the Porsche Museum; however, I was asleep during this stop.  After having been on the bus for five hours we finally made our way to Aachen where we got a nice lunch and where I was able to find another pharmacy to get even more medicine to help me get over my congestion even quicker.  After that we went on our guided tour of the Aachen Cathedral, which was beautiful.  I was surprised to learn that Charlemagne had such an influence on that church.  Below is his seat and some pictures of the church. 

Following that we drove some more on to Cologne where our first stop was the Cologne Cathedral.  Most of the class including myself climbed all the way to the top of the church where the views were stunning.  Along the climb we were also able to see the bell towers.  It was really neat (and loud) being inside the inner works of the bell towers while the church bells were actually going off at 5pm.  After our climb and seeing the insides of the Cathedral we made our way to our last hotel while on the excursion.  

Then, I along with some other class members went to walk around witht Mr. Caldwell were we saw the Peek & Cloppenburg Department Store and Kolumba Musuem from the outside. 

Next, most of the class and myself went to go meet up with Seegren (our German contact for the trip) and her friend for dinner at a nice local beer garden.  After staying there for a good while talking and having a good time we made our way back to the inner city of Cologne.  While some of us were walking back to our hotel we stumbled into a grocery store at 11:30 at night.  This is a very rarity for any grocery over here to be open at this time, so we all loaded up on stuff for breakfast and to finish out our excursion.

And, sadly I am still very sick, but finally starting to feel a slight bit better.  The medicine I got from the pharmacist today is really helping me I feel.  Hopefully I will continue to feel even better as the days go on.