I already was in Germany multiple times, but only this time I managed to visit Hamburg, which is the second largest city in the country (the biggest one is Berlin).

I arrived here around 3 in the evening and while I reached my apartment to drop the luggage it was already became dark. Plus it started to rain, so it was the best option to take a good walk outside, but when the rain stopped me from that? (:

Hamburg has a big harbour, that's where I was headed first. It looks really colourful in the night.

Hamburg became a part of Germany just around 150 years ago. Before that is was an independent city.

If you walk a bit further by the river, there will be an Old Elbe Tunnel. It was opened at 1911 and it was a huge innovation back in old days and a big help to harbour workers.

By nowadays standards there is nothing special with this tunnel. It's narrow, bad air condition. In old days it was constructed for vehicles and pedestrians, however today it is allowed to use only for pedestrians and bicyclists.

Neighbourhood is a "hot spot" of the city, Reeperbahn. You can find there sex, (probably drugs) and rock'n'roll.

There are a lot of music, cause The Beatles were giving a lot of performances in local pubs in the beginning of their path to fame. Liverpool four really loved this city (and it's located quite close to England). That's why you can often hear Beatles music from local pubs (and a lot of them claim that they're the ones where The Beatles were playing).

In between all these pubs there are strip clubs and bordels (it's all legal in Germany). There are plenty of them. Even next door to McDonalds had a very erotic photos on it.
Ub Hanburg they have a kind of red light street (almost like in Amsterdam) where ladies are behind the window looking for a client. However in opposite to Amsterdam it's much shorter and it's not allowed for women to visit it (official explanation sounds like "to not harm woman mind). There is a wall on the entrance. I didn't take pictures of the windows inside as it's not allowed.

The night slightly becomes early morning.

So now it's the time to continue night out in quite unexptected place: fish market.

It opens at 4-5 in the morning in summer time, and around 7 during winter. And you can enjoy the music, dance, have some fun. I've seen some young people over there having a good time :)

However it's still a market. The trading goes really good. It's interesting to watch how people sell the things here. Sellers shout really (I mean REALLY) loud. They put (e.g. fish) to the package and shout the name of every item: "Codfish, salmon, a couple of eels, just for 10 euro! Who's in?" and normally someone immediately takes the package. Very unusual. It's a great performance.
Of course one can buy not just fish, but also cheese, fruits, vegetables and a lot of other stuff.

A market is near the water. Here's a good view on harbor.

Absolutely unexpectedly there was a Soviet submarine next to the market. It was sent by Russia in the beginning of 2000s and turned into museum. The submarine was built in 1970s, so there's no bleeding edge technologies there.

Anyway it was very interesting to check it from the inside.

Meanwhile the city awakened.

I was surprised to learn that over 30% of city are immigrants from outside Germany. There are a lot of Polish, Turkish and even African people.
Also I saw a lot of homeless and beggars here. Quite unusual for Germany.

In such a big city it's just impossible to miss a great observation point on top of Church (or at least its ruins). St. Nicholas Church is one of the best options. It was almost ruined during WWII, fortunately the tower survived, but it was decided to keep it as it is as memorial to the war. Nevertheless it's allowed to go up.

So one can observe the beautiful city.

A bit further there is a city hall. Here one also can enter inside as well. For free!

Even though it's just end of November, they already started Christmas preparations and started to built a Christmas tree.

Another interesting place is city warehouse, Speicherstadt. It's one of the largest in the world. The building are more than 100 years old. Looks beautiful.

Many houses are based on oak logs. I even saw if over the water.
And here's a perfect example, why smart is so convenient (:

Moreover Hamburg is famous for its press. It's a headquarter for most famous German mass media: Spiegel, Zeit and others.

Well, it looks like a managed to visit most interesting city highlights during the weekend.