I was looking up the The Koln Tourist Board website and I found three interesting things on it that I shall be availing of.
i-Guide
Press a button: the city in your ear.
KölnTourismus offers digital guided tours for individualists.
Besides a considerable range of guided tours, the Cologne Tourist Board offers now an option for individual travellers who prefer to explore the city on their own instead of joining a group.
Using a small hand computer, the so-called i-Guide, you can enjoy an audio-visual walking tour of Cologne for about 100 minutes and discover the most important sights between Cathedral and Heumarkt square. With spoken commentary and corresponding images, the well-elaborated route guides you to all in all 47 sights, such as numerous fountains, monuments and buildings. Pressing a button you may abbreviate operating processes, interrupt your tour or comments and return to particularly attractive sights - just as you please.
The i-Guide is very easy to handle. Just a few buttons allow you a maximum of options. Visitors are provided with a convenient city map that shows the walking route with individual sights. As from now the i-Guide is available in English or German. Further languages are being provided for in the next year.
The Köln WelcomeCardKölnTourismus is pleased to inform you about the new edition of the Köln WelcomeCard leaflet.
The most important innovations at a glance:
o Our Köln WelcomeCard provides 87 offers (instead of 70 so far) now. Some of our former partners have been replaced by others. More than 25 new cooperation partners participate in our joint service project. Cologne municipal museums grant a mere 20 per cent reduction on admission fees (50 per cent until now) though.
o No less than nine additional partners of the free theatre and event scene take part.
o Further attractive partners of the Cologne environs such as the Kerpen kart track, the Königswinter SEA LIFE centre, the Frechen Keramion museum and seven more partners in the Bonn region round up the large scale of interesting features. All partners are located in the VRS public transport service area.
o For the first time, a new offer focuses on wellness and styling.
During the validity of your Köln WelcomeCard you are entitled to free rides on public transport within the Verkehrsverbund Rhein-Sieg (VRS) – public transport association covering the Rhein-Sieg area (VRS) – with buses, trams, and trains (free of extra charge) included. The Köln WelcomeCard is available at KölnTourismus GmbH and many Cologne hotels.
There's also a gay version!
Rheintaler
Permanent savings on the Rhine, without a time limit and with a growing number of institutions on the Rhine – that’s possible with the Rheintaler coin. With a Rheintaler in your luggage, you will receive discounts or free additional services at various museums, cruise lines, cable railways, palaces and castles as well as restaurants and hotels on the Rhine. For instance, Köln-Düsseldorfer, Bonner Personen Schifffahrt and Drachenfelsbahn offer up to 20% reduction on the official rates, regardless of which Rheintaler motif (there are 15 at the moment) you present. One Rheintaler costs € 12.50.
I am defiantly getting the pink card for my first weekend in Koln. and the I-Guide as the Welcome Card gives you money off it. Not sure about the Rheintaler
