Cologne / Kölner Pegel / reflection (#0593)

Kölner Pegel (Cologne level), a tower housing a float indicating the level of the Rhine. Per the web page below, the zero point is actually not zero water in the channel, but is set to be one meter. On the day I took the picture, the dial seemed to indicate only one meter which was confirmed with the archives connected to the link below, which showed the channel at 92 centimeters on December 3. If the zero mark is actually one meter, that means the level in the channel was only 2 meters (6.6’). I must be misunderstanding something – that seems impossible given the shipping activity on that day.

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Later in the evening I went to one of the Christmas Markets (Weihnachtsmarkt) for dinner (bratwurst) and ended up having a long chat with two German men who were in town on business. That experience fit with what I had discovered in my couple of days in Cologne – friendly people in an interesting history and culture. A pleasant surprise overall.

Watermarker:
www.steb-koeln.de/hochwasser-und-ueberflutungsschutz/akutes-hochwasser/der-koelner-pegel/der-koelner-pegel.jsp (in German)

(Part of a documentation of 2018 exploration/reflection on Brexit and populist movements in Europe, keyword Europe2018)