That is very true in Cologne. Lo and behold the magnificent cathedral of Cologne. The cathedral is to Cologne just like the Empire State Building is to New York. Both buildings bear an unmistakable identity that will only fit its respective metropolis. While roaming around the cathedral, the image of the cathedral from the novel The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett kept popping up in my mind. It is a novel about ambitious bishops and priests who aimed to build the largest, the highest and the most magnificent cathedral of Christendom in the 13th century. I could imagine the stone cutters working on these delicately carved figurines. Do you think they really carved these figures by hand? I wonder how many stone cutters were needed and there were A LOT of figurines nestled in every corner of the facade as well as in its interior. As with most of the Gothic style cathedrals, the Cologne’s cathedral is build in the form of a Latin Cross and the picture below is the nave looking east. You wouldn’t wanna leave Cologne without walking all the way across the Hohenzollern bridge (about 410m long) in the night (I did that in high heels! <– talking about being vain)…
just to take a picture of the cathedral with the illuminated bridge at the foreground (<– and mentally unsound as well) and walked all the way back to the other end again because most probably, that’s where your hotel is located!