Frankfurt. Certainly not what I was expecting, but to be honest I couldn’t exactly describe what I was expecting from this city.

After having been in the countryside for a solid week and travelling for a fair few hours on a decent hangover (thanks to Rudi’s wine collection) I was pretty keen just to chill, do some reading and soul searching.

Ten minutes after my nice relaxing bout of site seeing, four very loud Dutch students cruised into the room and my three days of peace were not going to happen because they were a lot of fun.

Fighting off gypsies and getting to the hostel was pretty easy but it quickly became apparent that this was not the best part of town. With the red light district one street away, the hostel certainly had a colourful location.

I took to Frankfurt instantly, it had so many good Asian restaurants I was very excited to eat my favourite cuisine again. There was also a lot of health food and of course typical German grills and bars.

On my first night we played drinking games and puzzle games in the hostel and I excercised all my self control to not go out with them (very proud). The hostel had an awesome vibe and provided free pasta each night.

My first proper day I went for a jog around the Mainz, which is the river that the city is built on, mainly to check out potential food and beverage locations (which proved a successful method). I discovered a bunch of riverside bars on the opposite bank which I thought I might revisit later.

There was an english theatre with a free book exchange out the front so I picked the randomest book I could find and sat like a massive weirdo reading.

Later I walked around the city and found an Apfelwien festival (yes!) which is great seeing as I am now hooked on it. However I had already eaten so I decided that would be tomorrows endeavour. The weather was pretty drab as you can see in my terrible photos but it didn’t really matter, in someways this added to the charm.

The following days I realised that sunny weather is WAY better. My new friends and I spent a good portion of our day wandering through a giant market… I guess it was a flea market, is that the one where everyone from everywhere can sell anything?

Do you need an old left shoe? What about a flat bicycle tire? Second hand hearing aids?

After a questionable temporary tattoo and bratwurst, we felt reading to face a some culture. My new friends and I spent hours in a cinema museum (this seems to be a bit of theme of my trip). It was the most hilarious museum experience of my life! We watched an hour long movie which consisted of three screens playing different movie clips of the same theme, a huge Wallace and Grommit expo and interactive cinema features.

Finally, in the afternoon I made it to my Apfelwein festival that I had looked forward to all day!

I loved Frankfurt, which is hilarious because before I went, heaps of people asked my why in the world I would go to Frankfurt… and when I tell people who live there that I visited they laugh and say “What the airport?” which apparently is the standard visit to Frankfurt.