Frankfurt
We had a day to spare in Frankfurt and started it by taking a guided bus tour to get an idea of what was around. It was most informative and we spent a good hour on it before then setting off to walk to a few of the places we had seen from the bus.
The first was the observation tower at Main Tower a 56-storey, 200 m skyscraper in the Innenstadt district of Frankfurt.
Designed by the architect's practice of Schweger und Partner and completed in 2000, Main Tower invites the general public to visit its rooftop observation platform, where they are met by a spectacular panoramic view of Frankfurt and the surrounding region some 200 metres above the city streets. A highlight for every urban explorer! The building is 240 m when its antenna spire is included and has five underground floors and two public viewing platforms.
Below are a few views taken from the upper observation deck.
The tower is the fourth largest building in the whole of Germany.
Next stop was the Alte (Old) Opera House.
The building was designed by the Berlin architect Richard Lucae, financed by the citizens of Frankfurt and built by Philipp Holzmann. Construction began in 1873 and it opened on October 20, 1880. Among the guests was Kaiser Wilhelm I of Germany, who was so impressed he is reputed to have said: Das könnte ich mir in Berlin nicht erlauben. (I couldn't permit myself this sort of thing in Berlin.)
The Alte Oper was almost completely destroyed by bombs during World War II in 1944 (only some of the outside walls and façades survived). In the 1960s the city magistrate planned to build a modern office building on the site.
A citizen's initiative campaigned for reconstruction funds after 1953 and collected 15 million DM. It ended costing nearer 160 million DM, and the building was finally reopened on August 28, 1981, to the sounds of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 8, the "Symphony of a Thousand".
Our next and final stop was at a Winee Fayre we came across and we stopped to sample some really nice German wines while eating traditional German Wursts
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