Germany, the trip that started it all

I was born in a really small town in Germany called Rinteln, in 1991. My parents moved us to Manchester in 1993, and I’ve been here ever since. (Apart from 3 years in Stoke for university). I was too young to have any memories there, only the stories my parents told me over the years about where we used to live, going to nursery and the different places we used to go. I’ve always wanted to go back and see it properly now that I’m old enough to remember, but if you’re not from Rinteln, there’s really no reason to go and visit there. It used to be a British army base, which is the only reason my parents where there. So I was born in the army camp, which doesn’t exist anymore. I still wanted to go and visit though.

Finally in 2022, after months of watching solo travel videos on YouTube, I booked the trip! Since Rinteln isn’t big enough to need more than one day there, I booked an Interrail ticket and a bunch of hotels, and decided to visit a different city each day. I still have the map I made when I was planning it, I didn’t end up going to Hanover.

I flew to Berlin first. It was right at the end of June and it was super hot, over 30 degrees. It wasn’t my first time flying alone, I’d flown back from Paris on my own a couple of years before. This was my first time spending a few days on my own, in a country where I didn’t speak the language. Apart from the hotels and trains, I hadn’t made specific plans for what I wanted to do each day, so when I got out of the airport, I just decided to get an Uber to the nearest monument in town.

Right next to the Brandenburg Gate is the Jewish Memorial, which is what my Uber pulled up right beside, so I decided to go in there first. It’s rows and rows of these giant statues that you can walk through like a maze, and they get taller and taller as you go in. It’s eerie how quiet it gets once you get further in, you can’t hear any of the city noise all. When you’re in the middle, the statues are so tall you can’t see anything past them, but when you come out and they get shorter again, you can see how far the rows go on for.

Once I came out, I walked over to the Brandenburg gate and did some sightseeing around there. There’s a really long path coming out of it so I just went for a stroll down it and stopped in a few different museums on the way. There was quite a few market stalls open aswell.

I came across a few river cruises while I was walking along the canal and since it was so hot, it felt like the best idea. One of my favourite things about solo travel I’ve realised, is that you can just do whatever you feel like in the moment.

You can also eat wherever you feel like! I thought eating alone at a restaurant would be awkward but when you’re in a place where nobody knows you, it’s really easy not to care about it. Plus I was so hungry from all the walking, I wasn’t even thinking about it.

Day 2 of my trip was the big day. It was the day I was going back to Rinteln for the first time, and the first day I’d be navigating the German trains on my own.

The trains ended up being really easy to navigate, I used the DB rail app to find my trains and it was no different to finding trains in the UK. Apart from the trains are a lot nicer in Germany. Because I had the Interrail pass aswell, all I had to do was select the train that I was taking and add it to my pass. Some trains aren’t valid on the Interrail pass and others you have to book a seat reservation, but I didn’t end up having any issues with that, all the local trains were available.

It took 4 trains to get there, one of them ended up being cancelled aswell so I had to find a different train to take, but it all worked out fine! The views from the trains ended up being my favourite thing about the whole trip, it was just all forests and lakes and castles.

I’d booked an AirBnB in Gutesloh, which is like 20 minutes from Rinteln, so by the time arrived in Rinteln, I had about 4 hours to spend there. Which was more than enough! It is really very small. The main thing was, I’d made it! Back to my birth town for the first time since 1993.

My favourite thing straight away was the fact that it was raining. It was so hot everywhere else so being from Manchester, I felt even more at home here. Especially because Rinteln is twinned with Kendal, a UK town, of course it had to be raining.

There’s really not a lot to Rinteln, one thing I found cute though was this little beach!

I spent most of my time there in the town square, which did very much feel similar to small UK town square in the Peaks or the Lake District. They did have a little souvenirs shop so I got myself a Rinteln hat, and sat outside and had a waffle and a beer. Even though it’s not the most exciting place and there’s not a lot to see there, it felt really nice to be there because it was such a huge bucket list thing for me so it had to be celebrated!

My dad had also sent me directions to the actual building where I was born. The army camp is long gone now and the building is now a retirement home, it was still really exciting and a bit weird to see it after all this time. Also maybe I can go full circle and come back to retire there when I’m old!

Also another exciting thing I found! On the street leading up to this building, was the Kendal sign! I wasn’t even looking for it, it just happened to be on the same street where I was born!

Once I’d made the most of my time in RInteln, I got the train to Gutesloh and went straight to the AirBnB for the night. Gutesloh is where we used to live after Rinteln, it was also quite a small place but they had some really nice parks, so I spent most of the next morning walking around the parks before getting on the train again.

I left Gutesloh on day 3 to make my way down to Cologne and Dussledorf. They’re really close together so I decided to do them both in the same day.

Getting off the train at Cologne, you’re greeted by this amazing cathedral.

I was in Cologne quite early in the morning so there weren’t many places open yet, I found some souvenir shops but I spent most of my time walking along the canal.

I got back on the train and set off for Dusseldorf. I’d heard a lot about Dusseldorf from my mum, she used to live there at one point before I was born, when my grandad was in the army.

The first thing I noticed about Dusseldorf was how big it was! I don’t know what I was expecting, maybe just because the past 3 towns were smaller, but Dusseldorf was a huge city. It was like being back in Berlin. The sun was fully out again and it was back to being 30 degrees. Luckily, I found another boat!

I did a lot of sightseeing in Dusseldorf, I got lots of steps in that day aswell. One of my favourite highlights was this bridge, the area around it was so nice, I spent a lot of time sat in cafe’s and sitting on the grass nearby. There was also this really nice park that was huge aswell.

After a long day of sightseeing and walking through the city centre, I came across a nice restaurant on the way back to my hotel that had some nice outside tables.

I spent the night in Dusseldorf and on my 4th and final day, I got the train to Frankfurt in the morning. Frankfurt had an old town which had this big town square that had lots of really nice old style buildings.

There was lots of shops in this town square aswell so since it was my last day and I was going straight to the airport from here, I just spent the day shopping and just taking the time to relax and celebrate my first ever solo trip. I was very tired by the end but I was also so sad to be leaving. To visit 6 cities/towns and get 9 trains in 4 days, across a foreign country where I didn’t speak the language, was quite a big task for my first ever solo trip. So I was just so happy that everything went well and I was so proud of myself. I definitely came home with a bit of sunburn aswell.

Here’s some links that might help if you’re interested in Interrail or solo travel in general:

DB Rail: Trains

Interrail: Passes

Berlin hotel: Hotel Zoe

Gutesloh AirBnB: Townhouse

Dusseldorf Hotel: Hotel Friends

All these hotels were super safe and friendly, Timo from AirBnB in Gutesloh was really nice aswell! I told him I was going to be late after the train delay and he picked me up from the train station in the car with his dog!

This was a super long first post so if you made it to the end, thank you so much for reading/watching. I hope you enjoyed it!