Discount travel blog

So there we were, only a couple of days before the weekend and it was up to me to find a decent place to stay in the city centre of Cologne. Well, the first thing I had in mind was of course a hostel. So I went to hostelbookers.com and quickly I narrowed down my choices to three different places. The Warsteiner Hof, the Hotel Goethe and the Meininger City Hostel which still had vacancies and is located right next to the Rudolfplatz. And I have to say that in the end the Meinigner Hostel was a good choice, we got a double room for 60 Euros. That was cheap I thought, and stayed as central as we could imagine. I cant actually remember if there was a breakfast, I think we simply skiped it. But the hostel was clean, and inside it looked more like a hotel to us. Perhaps typical for Germany, a clean and high quality place to stay. Well, if you go to Colgone you should definitely check it out.

Well, due to the fact that the Meininger Hostel is so central, parking was not that easy, but we were lucky. There was a little parking lot just 50 meters down the road from the hostel. And the good thing about this parking was that is was for free on Sundays. On the Saturday we arrived however we had to pay some 2 Euro the hour, but there is another parking garage just a 100 meters further down from the Meininger hostel where a day parking would cost you about 12 Euro.

The good thing also about the Meininger Hostel is that there is a hostel in a number of cities like London, Vienna, Hamburg, Berlin and Munich in Germany and that means that these guys have really standardized their accommodation service and tailored towards the low to mid budget range travellers. So whenever you visit any of these cities you already know where you can find a clean, quite and cheap place to stay for a couple of nights. So here is their main website in case you wonna check it out. http://www.meininger-hostels.com/

We stayed at the Meininger City Hostel in Cologne, at that was a very wise decision in terms getting around on foot. The Meininger City Hostel is only a stone’s throw fromt the Rudolfplatz. And the Rudolfplatz is pretty much the heart of the city in terms of nightlife, shopping and attractions. It’s been simply so much fun hanging out there and watching the people and chatting to the verz friendly German’s in that area. So many cool bars, like this one bar was a combination of pipe smoking lounge, cocktail bar and pool table bar.

To plan our trip to Cologne was an easy task, although we didnt know until the last minute weather we actually would travel there or not. The plan was to see the finals of the European Football Cup in Germany, in case Germany would make it there. And surprisingly they did so 2 days before the finals we had to organize everything very quickly. The hostlel, transport and all without crossing our budget of just 200 Euros. So that means 100 Euro each person, for a weekend in Cologne inculding the car rental fee.

Despite the fact I felt a bit weird wearing that German hair, in the end it made the experience much more like I am part of this huge German fan club. Bearing in mind that I am originally from the US, that means a lot! And hey, Cologne is my number one German city, it simple turns you into that party mode.

Yeah, well after thinking the whole day where it would be best to watch the finals in Cologne, we considered one of the many sports bars or cafes down the road from Rudolfplatz, we finally decided to go the the huge “Koeln Arena” which has room for about 20.000 people, but there where at least another 10.000 outside in front of the Arena enjoying the view of the big screen and craziness that was happening amongst the mostly German fans.