After our long but uneventful night at Stansted Airport we boarded our Ryan Air flight to Frankfurt-Hahn. Unbeknown to Emma and I Frankfurt-Hahn is actually two hours away from Frankfurt by bus. Consequently we landed in sub-zero, snowy conditions on a small airstrip in the middle of nowhere. Although it was a little weird it was definitely the most unique landing I have made as snow was piled 1m high around the runway and taxi way. It was very picturesque and a nice way to arrive in Germany.
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| Something that could not be enjoyed too much, the view of Frankfurt from our hostel |
On the long, two hour bus ride I managed to do one of the stupidest things in my life. After being awake for almost 36 hours the heat on board the bus put me to sleep. My travel documents, including passport and air-tickets, where on my lap when I drifted off and then proceeded to slip under the seat in front of me as I slept. When I awoke in my hurry to get off the bus I did not notice my red travel pouch on the floor. Emma and I gathered our packs and struggled our way through Frankfurt's poorly documented public transportation system to our hostel. Meanwhile my passport stayed on the bus (a little bit like Lord of the Rings), hidden but forgotten about.
Oblivious to this development we arrived at our hostel and promptly fell asleep while we waited for Emma's sister Jess to arrive. At 4:30pm Jess had arrived and Emma and I where up and about. It was at this time (when I was looking for my camera) that I realised the red-travel folder was missing. In seconds Emma and I were stripping the room in vain but it slowly began to dawn on me that the only place the documents could be is on the bus. I got the hostel to ring the bus company only to find the office was only open between 8-6 on weekdays (and today was a Saturday). As we were scheduled to leave Frankfurt on Sunday this was not good news.
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| The site of most of the stress: Frankfurt Railway Station |
We raced back to the railway station in such a hurry we did not even bother paying the stupidly designed ticketing machine. The railway station's lost property department did not have anything so as a last throw of the dice we went over to the bus stop to see if another bus was in. We had to wait 45 minutes for the next bus to arrive (which meant a very nervous coffee) but eventually two company bus drivers turned up. Fortunately one spoke excellent english and was very friendly. We pointed out the bus we arrived on and described the bus driver. Fortunately they both knew who we were talking about and the friendly German rang the man at home on his cellphone. After some chatting in German and a few questions (colour, size, etc.) we were told he did have it and if I came back to the bus stop at 12:00pm he would give it to me. We were all very relieved and hand shakes were exchanged all round and Emma just barely restrained herself from kissing the man (who looked a little disappointed at this). We were all very relieved that this trip ruining disaster was narrowly avoided thanks to the friendliness of a couple of German bus drivers.
We returned to the hostel in much happier spirits and promptly headed down the road to a German pub for some very large beers and a satisfying German dinner.
More photographs from Frankfurt....