Trans-europe express

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Refreshed by Paris, and vowing to return again to a city that guards its secrets closely, we headed to Gare du Nord and boarded the 8:40 pm Nachtzug to that other Grande Dame of Europe, Berlin. Our cabin was shared by Claire, a friendly French architecture student on her way to Berlin and an anonymous French man who spent most of his time in the corridor alone, listening to his ipod.

After the obligatory cervesas (and €7.50 glass of wine ...not looking at anyone in particular...she knows who she is) in the rolling bar in our socks ('tis the fashion round these parts y'know) we retired to our comfy (honest) bunks to watch nocturnal France roll by and slowly become Germany. Points of light in the distance became flashes of colour as we trundled along through farms and towns to the sounds of Trans Europe Express by Kraftwerk (we had to!) on our synchronised iPods.

A German woke us trilingually in the morning to warn us that our arrival in Berlin HB was imminent. Much tangled dressing and colourful language ensued. Crabbiness has a cure and its name is breakfast, and thus two sandwiches and four cups of coffee later we set forth and found our hostel accomodation (wi-fi connection and all night happy hour - happy days!).

Checked out Potsdam, Alan went sightseeing whilst Aoife read 'In Siberia' (ta Olive, loving the book!). Quaint, touristy town, and Alan was moved by a Soviet war cemetery he found. Back in Berlin we spent the evening chilling on Oranienburg Strasse, which is filled with squats turned into bars, cool basement restaurants and bars and bohemian eateries and lots of cool street art - we even caught a street artist covertly plastering images of toasters on walls.

St. Christopher's Hostel where we stayed was great - with a lovely bar, great barlady and an all-night happy hour, perfect! We had a laugh, and enjoyed earwigging on a gang of Spanish young men watching ladies football, flirting with the barlady and slagging our taste in beer! The room we had even had a view of the Fernsehen tower - so once again, Berlin ticked all our boxes and we're hoping to be back there before too long.

Tschuss!

xx

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