Blogs from Berlin, Germany, Europe - page 4

The day started with a beautiful 27 degrees forecast and it didn’t disappoint. Jumped on the bus to get to the Brandenburg Gate, the Holocaust Memorial and Bundestag. The Holocaust Memorial is incredibly moving. I walked through it slowly as you would a labyrinth, reflecting on this story and it moved me in a way that I didn’t expect. It is a huge undulating space and was ironically originally owned by the German Reich and was destroyed in WW2. It was officially opened in 2005 as a Memorial to the murdered Jews of Europe. I then headed to the Berlin Central Station to sort a couple of things for tomorrow’s travels to Warsaw. It is massive inside with its own shopping centre. As it is both an international and local station it has both above and ... read more

Today.... an airport...a new country and city. Travelling through European countries is like driving through the regional Victoria, Australia. An hour or so here or there and you have crossed the border into a new country. And today is Wroclaw to Berlin. Flying this leg before the train journeys through Eastern Europe and Croatia begin. The rest of the Aussie family met for breakfast but I had a departure too early to fit that in. And for this travelling coeliac I needed a high protein breakfast as I have learnt that even with appropriate language gluten free cards you can be glutened easily and breakfast is the hardest with all the breads and pastries. So an early breakfast at the hotel with more options......... fruit, yoghurt and boiled eggs ?. A safe option for a travelling ... read more

This holiday was a bit different from my usual travels ....I like big country landscapes but when an offer of a home exchange to Dresden popped up the trip morphed into a "why not visit Berlin and Prague moment , followed by why not take trains and where else can we go , why not Amsterdam " and so it became a cities tour . For the first part my son Chris and his wife Anabel along with 6 year old Maya would travel with me . Half way through they would return to the UK from Prague and Jenny would then join me there for more Dresden and Amsterdam. Maya, for a 6 year old , is a great walker but some of the sites in Berlin are spread out so a Hop on/off bus ... read more

15th June we left Frankfurt and caught the ICE train to Berlin travel time was about 4 hrs 15 mins staying at Intercity Berlin where we stayed 6 nights. 15th June we wandered around Berlin City the area where we were staying .16th June Berlin to Potsdam , sight seeing Brandenburg Gate, Reichstag Building Berliner Dom, Sanssouci Palace in Potsdam. 17th June a day trip by train to Hamburg which took about 1 hr 45 mins on the ICE train, sightseeing Townhall , Rathausmarkt, St Nikolai Memorial, St Petri Kirche , Hauptkirche St Katharinen just to name a few things to explore. 18th June a day trip to Dresden by train the travel time was about 2 hrs ,visiting the Neustadter Markthalle ,sightseeing the Procession of Princes , Martin Luther King Monument ,the Golden Rider monument ... read more

It was a rough night: hot, thunder and lightning, NO air conditioning. The room (the same room we had when we were here 10 days ago) has a system on the wall that has all the dials for a heating/air conditioning system … but all you can do is turn the fan on as the temperature dial does not work. This was discovered when John asked the front desk to fix the system. “We don’t have air conditioning; most hotels in Berlin do not have air conditioning.” John told them we would be leaving and went off on a rented bicycle to find another hotel! Turns out most don’t have air conditioning and there is a huge convention coming into town today. Like Oliver hew would get off his little bike and go into the lobby ... read more