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the great knomad-trek
Hameln
Hey, remember that fairy tale "The Pied Piper of Hameln"? Where that guy piped away the rats, but didn't get paid, so then he piped away the town's children? Well, this is it.
Our first ever weekend trip was to Hameln, home of the Rattenfanger, or the Pied Piper of Hameln. We managed to get a group of 5 together (me, Plato, Kitty, the other Karen and the other Derek) and we left almost at midday and still managed to get to Hameln by 1 p.m. We walked from the train station to the Altstadt, and passed this park called the Burgergarten that had a gateway decorated with - what else - a frieze of the Pied Piper leading away the children of Hameln. Cutting through the park, we reached the Batman Market just before it closed down and we managed to score some wursts before the stalls completely closed. To anybody interested, I highly recommend currywurst. It's cheap and it's covered with this unique blend of curry powder and ketchup/catsup. Hehehe, that just reminded me of Mr. Monty Burns in "The Simpsons". And it's filling and made of mad-cow-free schweinfleisch (pork). So we took pictures of the Rattenfängerbrunnen (Pied Piper fountain) outside the Rathaus... hehehe... RAThaus and walked further into the Altstadt. There was this really old street where we bought some cheap postcards and got snap-happy all over again. Walking further into the old town, we came across this church (I think it was called Nikolaikirche), took more photos, walked down this really old street called Osterstraße that had nice hundred-year-old buildings (possibly hundred-year-old try-alikes, because the real deals may have been destroyed during the war) and was a cobblestoned pedestrian zone. We also managed to squeeze in a bit of shopping at the not-very-old shops like New Yorker ("Dress for the Moment!") and Karstadt. After that we walked further down the street, met up with some construction, and discovered that we were back at the Burgergarten and the Tourist Information Centre.
Highlights 

-  Lots of Pied Piper related paraphernalia, including the ever-popular bread rats (are these even edible?). 

-  Lots of really old streets with hundred-something year old buildings. 

-  Not a lot of tourists. 

-  Not a lot of walking.
Total time needed to complete Hameln: about 3 hours. Final grade: A, because I liked the city's personality and history. I also enjoy the fairytale so that's a plus. Some people might find the constant presence of the Pied Piper overkill but hey, how many of us can say that we were in the actual town where the story "happened"?