Cologne

From the airport

Train: every 10-15 minutes, trains leave for central Cologne.

Shop

At Teezeiten in the Sudstadt you can buy tea, high-class chocolate and stylish curios to take home. 
If you are a fan of design and writing, then visit Majesty Paper in Cologne: stationary, invitations and cards, it is heaven for all paper lovers.

The main Carnival event in Cologne is the Rose Monday Parade (February) but the underground highlight is the Geisterzug (ghost train) the night before. Drummers, brass bands, dancers, ghosts and ghouls come together to march through the city.

Belgisches Viertel, between the Ring and Westbahnhoff, is crammed full of fashionable but low-key boutiques, cool cafes and avant-garde restaurants. It is a great place to hand out.

Day trip

Phantasialand. With heart-stopping rides, waterslides and dinner shows, Phantasialand is the best adventure/fun park around. Don't miss the two latest rides, Aztec-themed Talocan and the thrilling African adventure Black Mamba.
Monschau. An unspoilt medieval village in a deep valley in the Eifel Nature Park. Packed with history and filled with gorgeous shops and restaurants, there is no better place to while away a winter day.

According to the Good Beer Guide, Germany boasts more than 1000 breweries and 7500 beers. Even if you drank a new beer everyday, it would take you 20 years to get through them.

But in Cologne, there is only one beer, Kolsch, and the only place you can get it is in the city. Unlike busy,  brashy Berlin, Cologne, which was heavily bombed during the Scond World War, has a distinct air of laid-back cool.

Sitting on the banks of the Rhine, the city also fairly easy to navigate, as all the roads lead back to its two-towered cathedral in the centre.

Sure, it may have a budding cultural and art scene, with more than 30 museums and galleries, but the rest of us, it is about chugging the Kolsch. A light and fruity pale ale, Kolsch is one of the few beers protected by its appellation of origin as if it were a wine.

By German law, only beers brewed in Cologne may be called Kolsch. Go to any of the traditional wooden taverns and you will be served by Kolsch waiters, known as Kobes, who are always clad in blue.

When the beer arrives in tall, cylindrical glasses, the Kobes will keep refilling, unless you put your beer mat on top of the glass. It works at 75p for 200ml.

For places to drink, the historic pub Gastatte Fruh am Dom, is the best place to begin. One of the city's oldest brauhouses (it survived the war), it features waiters running around at lightning speed, topping up glasses from a giant vat.

Brauhaus zur Schreckenskammer, overlooking the Rhine, is very social, with large communal tables. They serve uncarbonated Kolsch from oak barrels as well as Kolsch from the tap.

Afterwards, for variations on taste, check out the less hectic Brauhaus Sion around the corner. If you find that most of the patrons are 93-plus, check out the younger, hipper crowd at Scheinbar, a cool lounge in the upscale Belgisches district.

Of course, in Germany, beer and food are inseparable, and you will need something to soak up all that Kolsch.

And while German cuisine may begin and end in most people's mind as bratwurst and sauerkraut, in Cologne, the heartland of traditional Rhine cuisine, it is a different story.

The best place for local delicacies is undoubtedly Gastatte Fruh am Dom. Check out the dish called himmel und aed (heaven and earth) which is mashed potato with black pudding and apple sauce. For the real gastro-brave, try rheinischer soorbrode, beef marinated in wine, vinegar and spices.

Elsewhere, try hearty Rhineland dishes at Em Krutzche where highlights such as the boiled beef with horseradish have drawn luminaries such as Clinton and Blair.

If you are really down to your last euro, grab a bite at the Dom market where delights such as sausage or grilled steak are available at the stands.

But by the time, standing may be the one thing that proves at bit problematic.