The Youth Hostel in Hamburg is absolutely superb. It’s perched up on a hill with a great view overlooking the harbour. It’s also really close to the subway. My first day started in the afternoon with a trip to the old part of the city. I took a look around first at St. Nicholai-Kirche. This church has been a Hamburg landmark for hundreds of years, and has been destroyed about 5 times. The first 4 were by nature, and the last one was in WW2. It was left after the war ain its ruined state, as a moving anti-war monument. Basically, the only thing of the church that remained after the war was the approx 137m spire - thatss ironic because the spire was the part that fell down all of the other times it was destroyed. There was a little exhibit under the church which I visited. I left there and made my way to the Rathaus, with 6 more rooms than Buckingham Palace. It was very large and grand, but I wasn’t allowed to go in because the king of Norway or someone was coming over the next day. Bah. I then had some dinner and headed off to check out the Reeperbahn. The Reeperbahn is the red-light district that is supposed to be second only to Amsterdam. I suppose that a large red light district would be expected in Hamburg, seeing as it’s been a very major port in Europe for the last 1000 years or so. My impression was that it was pretty boring compared to Amsterdam, and a lot dirtier. I had heard there was a street that was blocked at both ends by big metal gates, and women and children were denied access. I didn’t see anything like that.
The next morning was spent searching for an internet caf