Blogs from Berlin, Berlin, Germany, Europe - page 152

We spent three days visiting Berlin, the capital of Germany. This is a very important and historic city! After World War II, in the 1940s, Germany was split into two separate countries, West Germany and East Germany. Berlin was also split into two halves, West Berlin and East Berlin. Many East Germans wanted to go to West Germany, but the East German government in the 1950s built barbed-wire fences and a high wall in the city of Berlin, called the Berlin Wall, to prevent East Germans from leaving the country. Then, in November of 1989, the borders were opened and hundreds of thousands of Germans from both sides were able to meet for the first time in many years! They had a huge celebration in Berlin at the Wall, and used tools to break apart the ... read more

We discovered that we both have a museum limit of one per day. Standing in one place reading all the exhibits really wipes out our feet and makes the rest of the day a lot less fun. Fortunately, we discovered this after we managed to see most everything we wanted. We started the day with a leisurely breakfast in our neighborhood near the Haeckescher Markt (no, for some reason, they don't use the "ä" on any of the signs for it). We then revisited the Brandenburger Tor and Pariser Platz for some better photos (I had camera-battery issues yesterday), plus a look at the Reichstag. The line to get into the glass dome was horrendous, so we skipped it, but did enjoy a street-performance-art piece involving a life-size fluorescent orange marionette operated by ~6 young presumably-Germans. ... read more

Or, perhaps, eine Ostberlinerin. (I can do the grating Boston accent, too, y'all know I can.) We have a spectacular studio apartment on Linienstraße in East, yes East, Berlin. Words cannot even describe how cool it is to be in the East and how ridiculously normal a place it is. The proprietors are Rick-approved and we're pretty sure he has steered us well. Today we took the IC from Bahnhof Altona in Hamburg to Bahnhof Zoologischer Garten in Berlin, a little over 2 hours. Bf. Altona is definitely the way to go if you want a seat on this train. Poor folks who got on at the Hauptbahnhof or later were wedged, standing, in the corridors and stairways the entire time. We added insult to injury by leaving our reserved seats empty while we sipped kaffee ... read more

Finally I take a real vacation! And what better way to spend it than on a bus load of new friends. First stop, Berlin. I arrive by train shortly after lunch. I have a few hours to fill before I meet my group so of course I go shopping. First purchase of the trip...orange shoes. :-) After dinner with my group we take a night time tour of the city that included a stop at Checkpoint Charlie. The next morning we embark on a city tour with stops and Brandenburg Gate, Pergamon Museum and the Berlin Wall among other sites. An afternoon in Potsdam where I visit the Cecilienhof Palace (where Stalin, Truman and Attlee signed the Potsdam agreement) and a stop at San Souci Palace. Since it's only the first stop on my tour I ... read more

i think the main problem is that so far i've been to places in europe that look very stereotypically european. and because berlin is relatively new i think it has more of an american influence and all the buildings are concrete blocks!! berlin has the biggest urban garden in europe - the tiergarten is massive. but there aren't really that many trees anywhere else, except for there. strange. but oh well, that's germany for you!!... read more