Carnival in Cologne!

We barely made our flight there due to rush hour traffic in London, but thank goodness we made it to Cologne in the end last weekend! We went to visit Conrad's friend Christina, her boyfriend Rob, and Christina's family (who Conrad was an exchange student with in high school, as was Christina with Conrad's family in Gig Harbor, WA). It just so happened to also be Carnival there this past week, so we got to partake in all the festivities with everyone.

This was our first view out of the train station--the Koln Dome--pretty impressive to say the least! We went straight out to a few bars as soon as we got into town. Below the Koln Dome picture, is Conrad with (from R to L) Christina, her mom Heike, and sister Sarah:



Heike with Snow White (yes, that is a man!), and C with Rob in full outfitted pirates garb (beer-drinking parrot included). It's a shame we didn't get a picture of the kebabs we had late-night--SO good!



(Top) The gang in costume before Saturday night's parade. (Bottom) Fire throwers at the same parade.



Conrad and I in costume. They weren't too elaborate, but at least I got to use my mask from Carnival in Venice that I bought years ago!



More interesting characters in costume (some of them anyway?) at the parade:



Outside and inside (at least one of the beautiful stained-glass windows) of The Koln Dome during the day when we made our way there again Sunday:



(Top) Conrad in front of the most amazing donut store downtown--the best Berliners (jelly donuts) ever! (Bottom) Us in our Carnival hats (hey, don't knock them; it was freezing and they kept us VERY warm!):



We had a really fun weekend and it was really nice getting to know Conrad's friends and exchange family in Germany better! We're off to Paris at the end of the month, so come back in early March to view pictures and details from that trip...