Cologne and Brussels: a short trip in photographs

Jon Atkinson

Oct 2

2 min read

Brussels and Cologne · 21–24 May 2026

This was a shorter journey: four days by car, travelling from the UK through Brussels to Cologne. It also brought a different set of subjects in front of the camera.

There are no mountain roads in this selection. Instead, there is a cathedral, architectural detail and visits to two vehicle venues: Autoworld in Brussels and Motorworld Köln. The photographs make a compact record of the trip, with each place contributing something different.

Cologne in the frame

The cathedral opens the selection. It establishes Cologne straight away, before the pictures move into smaller subjects and details.

A building can carry a whole photograph through its outline and scale. An architectural detail asks for a closer look. Including both gives this short set a little variation: the larger view places you in the city, while the detail gives you something to pause over.

I have kept the selection small. It is enough to give a sense of the visit without trying to turn four days into an exhaustive account of the city.

Two stops for the vehicles

Brussels was part of the outward route, and the visit to Autoworld is represented by two photographs. Motorworld Köln appears separately, with a campervan display among the selected images.

The two venues belong to different stops on the journey. Keeping them distinct matters when looking back through a set of photographs: Autoworld was in Brussels; Motorworld was in Cologne.

There is also a connection here with the wider travel on this site. On other trips, a van carries me between places. In this part of the selection, the vehicles themselves are the subject. The campervan display makes that connection particularly visible.

A small record of a short journey

This story sits alongside the longer van trips because the shorter breaks belong here too. Four days gives a different kind of photographic record from a longer journey north, but it is still worth keeping.

The five-picture selection moves between architecture and vehicles, then finishes with a closer architectural view. It works as a small group of photographs, with the trip’s date and places attached so I can return to it later.

These images are from May 2026. I’m bringing them into the blog now as part of catching up with earlier journeys and giving the photographs a home alongside the newer stories.

The photographs below bring those few days together.