A Weekend in Frankfurt

It was long overdue but the time had finally come. I had to break out of Bayern.

When I first came to Germany I had gap year visions of touring round the land and visiting as many cities, castles and UNESCO World Heritage sites as possible. The realities of living and working abroad, however, made this tricky. Cramming in weekend getaways had a debilitating knock-on effect to the working weeks either side of the trip and contending with the tiredness was enough to limit such travels. But now with a potential deadline to my stay in Germany it was time to explore.

It was 5:50 a.m. and I was waiting for the train. The obscenely early start was my fault and the result of a confluence of unfortunate traits of mine. Firstly I had left the planning of the trip far too late and thus by the time I looked at the Deutsche Bahn website, all the train fares were heart-stoppingly expensive. In a panic I opened up another tab and loaded trusty Flixbus but at a journey time of 5 hours most of the weekend would be spent travelling on a bus in disturbing proximity to an abused toilet and possible drug traffickers. It would have to be the train.

The only option that was relatively affordable was the early train from Munich to Frankfurt, which of course meant waking up at stupid o’ clock. I boarded the train feeling like a reanimated corpse complete with pallid skin, a rumbling stomach and grumbling headache. My condition was so far gone not even the usual resuscitation methods of coffee and a croissant could fix it. I consoled myself that the incipient migraine was worth it for a few saved euros and three more hours in Frankfurt and then I knocked back all the painkillers I could and tried to get in the holiday spirit.

As the train slipped north towards Frankfurt the scenery of Bayern rolled before the windows like a running cinema reel. Gentle fields gave way to pine forests whilst the sky converted from mackerel scales to a duvet of grey. By the time I reached Frankfurt it was raining.

The first sight of Frankfurt was reminiscent of the southern approach to London’s Victoria station. There too a train pulls past a motley selection of industrial and residential buildings with an expansive set of silver tracks separating the city from the railway. As the train curved in its approach I caught a glimpse of Frankfurt’s famed skyscrapers glinting ahead, steel grey and nickel blue under the overcast sky. Unlike Munich this was a city in the modern sense of the word, having shrugged off its past low-rise monuments in favour of the big and the new.

I wonder what my impression of Frankfurt would have been had it not been raining the weekend I visited. I wonder whether a bright blue sky and birds trilling in the Taunusanlage on the way to the opera house would have lightened the mood in the city. As it stood the incoming rain made exploring impossible and I found myself seeking shelter in the mall off the main shopping street. This was familiar territory - international brands neighboured each other in the bright confines of the Skyline Plaza Shopping Centre. The shops were carbon copies of those in Munich and Croydon and I found myself simultaneously comforted and depressed by the familiarity of such things in what should have been a completely foreign context.

Eventually the rain eased such that it became possible to perform a quick dash around the sights mentioned in the guidebook. I hurried through the streets towards the lauded Römerberg, the heart of old Frankfurt, desperate to see the famed facades and snap a few pictures before the rainclouds came back. The square was a Grimm’s Fairy Tale delight with 360 degrees of half-timbered houses pivoting around a statue of Lady Justice in the centre. But even with the obscuring groups of tourists and the dull light the Römerberg was not as it initially appeared i.e. the authentic article. There was a newness to it that was in the same vein as the skyscrapers that crowded the central business district. Further perusal of the guidebook revealed that in actual fact the Römerberg was a replica of the old town, which burnt down during a World War Two air raid. The buildings may have been identical but there it was, a perceptible difference.

The raindrops began to reappear. I hurried away from the (new) historic plaza through more seemingly old streets, which had that same present-day gloss on them. Things were not as they appeared. In between the beautiful timber frame buildings there were definite touches of modern architecture. Opposite a picture-perfect medieval-style house posed the glass expanse of the Schirn Kunsthalle with a giant silver sculpture slumped over the side of a neighbouring building. Two eras collided.

A rainy weekend in Frankfurt is certainly not enough to do the city justice, however, first impressions have an unmistakeable impact. Until my next visit Frankfurt will continue to be a city of contrasts for me, a seeming juxtaposition of the old(ish) with the new, but everything heavy under a leaden sky. Yes, there has been some attempt to recapture the past but it has also taken on a modern identity with skyscrapers, art and chain stores proudly on display as part of the city’s new image. Compared to the preserved street layouts and imposing stone grandeur of Munich’s buildings Frankfurt seems a world, not two-hours’ train ride away.

It may not have been my home away from home but it certainly proved a point. There was a lot more of Germany that I still needed to explore.