Düsseldorf, Dortmund, Essen, opencast mining

Hello people,

I still owe you a few art and cultural highlights from Düsseldorf, Dortmund and Essen. So a really short post about it.

I stayed with my aunt and uncle in Düsseldorf for 5 days and it was a wonderful time with an extra portion of art and culture at the Phoenix des Lumiers exhibition on the old Phoenix site.

I've never been to an old steelworks site before and seeing the furnaces and the gasometer and the scale of the area was really impressive and very interesting. I also think that this redesign of the area is an exemplary transformation and using it for art and culture is a great idea.

The exhibition was fascinating and sooooo beautifully colorful - especially the part that dealt with Hundertwasser. We watched the entire performance twice and enjoyed every single minute of it and always discovered something new. Afterwards we went to cash some more on the site and explored the area.

For the hard cashing there was a reward at the Christmas market - a baked apple punch with a shot. It was very sweet and very tasty. In addition, the Christmas market was really open and there were goodies everywhere, which of course I had to try my way through. ;)

During the tour, my aunt had the great idea of riding the Ferris wheel together. I haven't done that in a very long time and it was really fun and a great memory of those days together.

The next day we went to the opencast mine - another experience that I hadn't had before, even though I had been to the area several times. It's worth a look and I was a bit speechless because I could never imagine the dimensions.

We then also drove through some towns that had been bought and relocated. It was both depressing and frighteningly lonely.

There are playgrounds at this place too and since these are meant for playing, I did that and got rid of some energy. Since that wasn't enough, we continued afterwards to make a few more cashes.

Windy and beautiful - that's all I can say about it. Overall, a few great and relaxing days. With that in mind, thank you both for that!

Until the next post,
Your Britta