Anna and Alex were astonished when I told them at breakfast I would take an earlier train than planned. Instead of around 3pm or 5pm I felt like leaving at 11 or 12 already. I was so lucky to do so! The train took me along the lovely Rhine valley (world heritage) into the middle of Kyrill, the worst hurricane in Europe since more than 20 years!
At 5:15pm all trains in North-Rhine Westpalia (NRW) stopped at the closest halting point. The hurricane had struck! Soon afterwards, all over Germany trains were driven to stations and stayed there for the night. Even now there's hardly any public transport going.
My train was in a small station in Cologne, only 40 km from my destination. I called my sister, and she and her husband Thommy grabbed some blankets, water, and a map, and came to rescue me. At 7:30pm we were at their home in Düsseldorf-Eller. We had made it safely through the rain and storm.
First thing I did was calling Anna and Alex to tell them I was alife and well. Anna had been worrying already, listening to all the bad news on tv, most of them on NRW. Cologne had been one of the worst places with 140 km/h.
But hey - weird, I had felt the urge to take an early train. Lucky me!
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