Bremen – Bremen Cathedral (Tower Climb)

[I originally posted this in April 2018 but I’m reporting it now with the broken image links fixed]

When I had arrived at Bremen Cathedral the little ticket desk to the tower was closed, which I was secretly relieved about as that meant I didn’t have to climb it. I have a habit of always wanting to climb things and then immediately regretting it as it’s often too tiring or I’m reminded that I’m scared of heights.

However, on my way out of the Cathedral I noticed that there was a man in the office ready to take money. So I couldn’t resist, paid the €2 and began the climb.

The good news is that the climb is primarily of steps like this, which are enclosed and in solid condition. The bad news is that there are loads of them and people also have to come down the same steps, so there isn’t a huge amount of space.

There was a platform around two thirds of the way up when I had to change which steps I went up, with a view down into a lower room. Unfortunately the cathedral just seems to be using that as a junk store, but it’d be nice to open it up with a little exhibition.

My first reaction was that it was very windy. So windy that it was hard to even hold my phone, with the gusts of wind being enormously strong and rather never-ending. Fortunately, the edges were well protected with wire and netting, although that took away from the photos a little.

One of the circular windows in the tower, which look rather small when viewed from ground level.

Two things occurred to me here. One is that people are leaving money in some strange and inaccessible places which are in danger of blowing onto the heads of people below. The other is that I’ve discovered where the city centre McDonald’s is.

The other end of the cathedral. It was certainly worth the money to climb up to the top and I was fortunate that it wasn’t at all busy, it’s almost a mystery why so few people wanted to go to the top on a windy and rainy day…. There were two visitors I did encounter at the base of the steps, but fortunately they had only climbed up two steps so they went back down again.