James' in the UK

In early December we went to Germany for a weekend to find some Christmas markets. Basically a lot of towns and cities have market stalls in December, crammed into any streets and town squares that can fit them. It really seemed like the locals just loved celebrating Christmas, people in the streets everywhere were wearing santa hats and there where decorations everywhere.

The stalls sell lots of hand crafted toys, decorations and the like. They also sell lots of yummy food, which we managed to experience a lot of. We could wander around for hours trying some food from here and there because it was all pretty cheap. The highlights of the food were bratwurst with mustard, warm nuts coated in sugar and cinnamon (served in a paper cone, perfect for wandering around in the cold air), grilled shinken (ham) and fruit covered in chocolate. The drink to have was Gluhwein, a spicy red wine served warm. The taste took some getting used to but it certainly warmed you up from the inside.

Wooden Decorations

Although many of the stalls seems to be selling cheap crap, some had some really amazing stuff. We spent ages walking around the stalls (had to make way for the next round of food some how) looking at all the bits and pieces. The markets smelt wonderful, lots food cooking smells as well as the wine and the spice stalls overflowing with cinnamon sticks and vanilla pods.

Market Stall

We flew into Dortmund which has the distinction of having the biggest Christmas tree in the Christmas market business, and it was huge! It stood in the middle of a bunch of market stalls and was 45m tall. It was actually made up of hundreds of average sized trees arranged into a bit tree shape and decorated with lights – quite impressive.

Dortmund Christmas Tree

Christmas Markets

It wasn't just the tree that were big around these parts, the bratwurst was to! You could buy a half a meter of bratwurst from some stalls, but no matter how long the wurst was, it was always served in the same little dinner roll. In fact any food - wursts, grilled shinken, fish - were served in the little dinner rolls. I swear they must go through thousands of those things.

Another distinctive thing about Dortmund is the flying rhinos. Everywhere in the city there are fibre glass flying rhinos, each one decorated in a different theme. Some where for businesses, some sporting teams, some just christmas-ey. We didn't really know what it was all about but after a couple days it just because normal to see a flying rhino on the street.

Some of the best know Christmas markets are in Cologne which was not to far away on the train. We spend a day there and wandered through endless rows of stalls and ate more market food. Cologne is mostly know for it's Cathedral (which we went inside) and one of the market areas was almost in the shadow of the Cathedral. Another of the markets were on the grounds of a chocolate museum. We didn't go into the museum but that place had a cracker of a museum shop!

The last market we went to was my favourite in Cologne. It was a bit less busy than the others and had some of the most beautiful Christmas decorations and toys. We were walking around as it was getting dark so we saw the stalls and the big carousel all lit up with their Christmas lights.

Christmas Decorations

Before heading home on the train we walked around and got a good view of the cathedral. We found a spot to set up the camera and got some good photos of it in the fading light.

Cologne Cathedral

On our last day in Dortmund we just had time to have our last round of market food, buy the last of our presents, buy the last of the yummy nuts and head for the airport. By the time we got back home we were stuffed full of food and our bags were stuffed full of presents to send back home. And the nuts didn't even make it onto the plane.

Food of choice in Germany: Might be quicker to list what we didn't eat......warm sugar and cinnamon coated nuts, bratwurst, metwurt, grilled shinken, chocolate coated fruit