Cologne | Fotoeins Fotografie

25T91 Final travel day

E90: Schengen limit.

I’m on an ICE train from Cologne non-stop to Frankfurt Airport; the trip is 70 minutes if there aren’t any delays. Online check-in completed last night, and the final feature is the 10.5-hour flight to Canada.

At Frankfurt Airport, I pass through security to go from landside to airside, and I pass through E.U. passport controls because I’m leaving Europe. The gentleman noted from my passport I’m on day 90 inside Schengen. I replied: “I know; that’s why I’m now at the airport.”

This ends 91 consecutive days of journaling for my European summer of 2025. Thanks for sticking around to the end, and I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I enjoying putting all of this together. Additional and lengthier descriptions will follow in the coming weeks and months.

*Bahnhofsvorplatz: see ya’ later, Cologne!*

*Bahnhofsvorplatz: Cologne central station.*

*Heading out to Frankfurt Flughafen (Airport); switch of trains not required. The final destination for this short-duration ICE train is Frankfort am Main Hauptbahnhof.*

*Flughafen Frankfurt: The Squaire, on top of the train station for long-distance trains.*

*Frankfurt Airport: Terminal 1, departures hall B. Judging by multiple appearances, is Apple truly pushing use of Apple Pay in Germany?*

*Departures hall C: checking the big departures board for assigned gate*.

*In “purgatory” without an assigned gate; on the tarmac about to board at Frankfurt Airport.*

I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 6 August 2025. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

25T90 Final full day: summer of `25

E89, C06.

I’m in Cologne on the 90th and penultimate travel day. Fortunately, I still have “room” for travel day 91 and Europe day 90: my last day within Schengen to allow for a timely departure. I didn’t need to stay in Frankfurt this time, because with ICE trains, I can go non-stop from Cologne to Frankfurt Airport in 70 minutes. But I will soon leave with another truckload of memories, thousands of images, and time well spent in places crucially important to me.

The 2025 numbers for 90 days:

Total distance walked: 746 km / 464 mi.
Total number of steps: 1.02 million.
Daily average distance walked: 8.3 km / 5.2 mi.
Daily average number of steps: 11347.

*Rudolfplatz: transport junction for lines 1, 7, 12, 15; and bus routes 136, 146.*

*Dürener Strasse 199-203: there’s a dark-grey plaque at far-left and a “stumbling stone” or Stolperstein at lower-right.*

Known for his series of turn-of-the-century portraits, photographer August Sander (1876-1964) lived and worked at Dürener Strasse 201 from 1911 to 1944. This memorial plaque is on the wall next to the entrance at Dürener Strasse 199-203. The August Sander photograph archives are located at the SK Stiftung Kultur in Cologne’s Mediapark.

Stumbling stone (Stolperstein) within the pavement in front of Dürener Strasse 199-203: Photographer and August Sander’s son, Erich, arrested for high treason in 1934; died age 40 on 23 March 1944 at the NS penitentiary in Siegburg.

*Sander family grave at Melaten Cemetery.*

*Rudolfplatz: “BoConcept: (offering) one-on-one consultations on interior design.”*

*Of these great people in the frame, I’ve known two of them since 2002-2003. The setting that is the Latin American restaurant El Inca is a favourite. (Thanks to MW for the image.)*

*Last light of the day, facing northwest from Barbarossaplatz towards the Herz Jesu church (left-centre) near Zülpicher Platz.*

I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 5 August 2025. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

25T89 Cologne Ehrenfeld: “Ihrefeld is my kinda Veedel”

E88, C05.

Some of my best friends in the country are in Cologne, as I’ve known them for almost 25 years. Back in 2002, I’d been introduced to the city’s big football team, as well as the Ehrenfeld district, to which I try and get back when I’m in town. (I tried to stop at Kebapland, but the 630pm queue was already crazy long, and I remember good alternatives in the near.)

To begin my walk west, I’m at the Innerer Grüngürtel (Inner Green Belt) Park, within sight of the Deutsche Telekom building, the 266-metre Colonius telecommunications tower, and the 102-metre Hercules high-rise from left to right, respectively.

*I’ve gotta try to time my stay next time, so I can get a tour of the city’s central mosque. The place opened in September 2018.*

*Opened in 1912, the Neptune Baths have been converted to a fitness and wellness facility since 2002.*

*Helios is a local landmark in Ehrenfeld.*

That’s not a real maritime lighthouse; it’s a structure marking the location of a big factory that once manufactured electrical equipment including maritime lights. I wrote a short blurb about Helios here.

*Kölsch Bloot (Cologne blood) is a clothing company based in Ehrenfeld, which explains the Helios structure, the city’s coat of arms*, *and the silhouette of the city’s cathedral.*

*A 2nd-ad in the Veedel for Netflix and the upcoming 2nd season of “Wednesday”. That queue for Kebapland at lower- right is too long for my state of “hungry.*

*This little tiled piece represents the logo for football team 1. FC Köln. It’s not obvious, but plain as day for fans and for those who know.*

I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 4 August 2025. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

25T88 Cologne: back to where this began

E87, C04.

More than 80 days ago, I reached Cologne. And now again, it’s the Carneval City to which I’ve returned to put a final bow tie on this 90-day summer of `25 jaunt.

*Approaching the city’s central station with the world-famous cathedral in the background.*

*Rudolphplatz: the Hahnentorburg is one of the few remaining medieval city gates at the western edge of Cologne’s Old Town. “Rudi” is today an important transport junction and commercial hub.*

“ruhender Verkehr (Static Traffic)”, by Wolf Vostell, 1969. With his Opel Kapitän car (K-RM175) encased in concrete, Vostell created the sculpture to protest the increasing glorification of car culture. The sculpture has been placed on the Hohenzollernring north of Rudolphplatz since 1989.

*“He drinks Reissdorf Kölsch.” Spanning several vertical floors of the building at Aachener Straße 3, this 1968 neon advertisement is now under Heritage Protection* *as of 2021.*

*“Handy (mobile) on, World off”. The artist’s Instagram profile: liebezurfarbe.rise*

I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 3 August 2025. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

25T05 hallo Cologne

E04, F04-C01.

It’s good I’m able to catch up with former colleagues. I.D. and I used to be astronomers, pursuing different lines of research on the evolution of dwarf galaxies. They now work for the respectable European Space Agency; and as for me, I’ve gone picked up “flâneur.”

After my short trip north from Frankfurt to Köln, we meet in the latter city’s Heumarkt for beer, followed by a stroll through the Old Town to the Cathedral and central station, where we go our separate ways.

*Sünner im Wahlfisch / sinners in the whale; the building dates back to 1626.*

*It’s about knowing where I am. “Alles nur für dich” / everything just for you*.

*Domplatz (Cathedral Plaza), for last light of the day.*

I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 12 May 2025. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

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