“How about Dortmund?”
“Dork Man?”
“No, Dortmund.”
“Yeah, Dork Man sounds awesome. Let’s go there!”
And just like that, we booked two weeks in Dortmund, Germany knowing nothing about it other than the name made me laugh and our Airbnb was one of the most cost effective ones we could find in Germany.
Dortmund, it turns out, is one of the largest cities in Germany (who knew?) and was a big steel town before WWII. Unfortunately, because of that, Dortmund sustained quite a bit of damage in the war. Today, most of the buildings are post-WWII and it feels a bit more like a center of commerce than it does a quintessential European city. That being said, we really enjoyed our time there.
They have some beautiful parks, great food, and of course great beer.
We made it out to Cologne for a day trip, which about an hour out by train. Cologne IS that quintessential historic European city with its church spires that loom over the town, historic buildings and of course, the tourist crowds.
While we were only in Cologne for a day, we did see quite a bit of the city, including an underground anthropological museum where there were still active digs going on.
Although, when we first arrived at the museum they motioned for us to go down these stairs to start out self-guided tour, and we ended up going down a long, long tunnel that felt like it had no end. Was this a trap?!
Eventually, we hit a dead end and had to turn around. We are sure that if we had seen and been able to read the big sign at the beginning of the long, dark, scary tunnel, the experience would have made more sense.
Back in Dortmund, we hula hooped, (every hotel or Airbnb should have a hula hoop! ) got some work done and found 3D Blacklight Mini-golf.
3D – Blacklight – Mini-golf!
It was epic. Each room was hand-painted in gorgeous detail. And while it was a kid-friendly place, it’s Germany, so of course, you could still buy beer.
The challenge of hitting a ball over a 3-dimensional surface, that’s really only one or two dimensions is surreal! We had a lot of fun. 😃
Dortmund’s history is so fascinating! If you want to dive deeper into the city’s past, our audio tours are a must-try. Head over to http://www.wman.com/dortmund to discover more and tell us how to improve our free audio guides!