Sunday, May 15, 2011

Berlin Day 1


 
Arriving at 430 am was not fun, but the events of Berlin day 1 made up for it. After resting on the benches at the train station for awhile, we went to buy our Berlin Welcome Card (free public transportation, free museum entries and discounts on other stuff). It took awhile to get our bearing, but once we did, we set out to visit the city.
We first went to Berlin’s gov’t building – Reichstag.





Then we saw the Brandenburg Tor – it was there during the Berlin wall and is now a symbol of unity between both east and west sides. 
 
Next we caught a bus to the eastern side of Berlin and went into the Berliner Dom. It’s a old church that was refurbished in the 80s. While the bricks on the outside were fading black, the inside was spectacular. Everything was bright, there was gold in every corner, and the stain glass beyond the altar was one of the best we have ever seen. It was pretty immaculate.

 We were also fortunate to climb up the dome and look out over the city of Berlin. What a beauty! The horizon was filled with church steeples and numerous famous buildings. Right next door to us was “Alex,” for short. It’s a really tall tower also called the TV tower. It was built in east Berlin and is taller than west Berlin’s Radio tower (yes during the east/west rival).


 
At Alex, we registered for the Berlin bike tour. We wanted to do a bike tour in other cities, but didn’t feel safe. Furthermore, not knowing…. or forgetting some details of Berlin’s history, we knew the tour would be eventful… and it was. It may have been the best straight 4-5 hours of fun we had. We learned a lot, saw a lot of attractions, and laughed along the way. 



 We first learned about Berlin in the 1200s and saw some ancient churches from back in the day.
 Then we moved on to the Berlin Royal Palace, or what was once the their royal palace. It was demolished to try and forget some of its bad history. Currently they are trying to dig up the remains to see if they can find anything.
 
Next we saw some old building during the reign of “the Freds” (first, second, third, and the great) and whole Prussia time period (1800s).
 
Following that we learned more history about how the US, UK, and Russia took a section of Germany after WWII. This lead into the cold war and Check Point Charley. The story hit home with us a lot more while we were at the location than hearing it in history class. Its one thing to be taught it, but to actually seeing the spot when the intensity of the Cold War existed was very different. For those who forgot what Check Point Charley was – it was a gate that connected Russia’s rule of Berlin to the US/UK side during the Cold War. It was a very intense place where guns from both sides were, at times, pointed at each other. We were even able to see where the Berlin Wall was, and heard stories of “no man’s land” – the space between the walls (10-100 meters) where guards were told to shot on site if they saw someone trying to climb over the Wall. Very interesting to hear.




Next we saw one of the lookout towers of where the guards stayed and watched “no man’s land.”


Then we ventured to see the place where Hitler’s bunker was. It was obviously bombed during the war, but we saw where it was and heard the story of how he killed himself and ordered his soldiers to burn his body. Dental records were used to identify his body.

 
Ironically, across from his bunker is now the Jewish memorial for the 6 million killed in the concentration camps and other places. It’s a block filled with stone bricks. It’s similar to a grey gloomy graveyard.
 
Next we saw Branderberg Tor. Got some history on that and moved on.

 We then took the long bike ride through the park. Stopped along the way for some history and continued on. Finally we stopped for lunch at an authentic German bier garden. We got bratwarts and sausage sandwiches. We were able to talk to all the other travelers and learned everyone’s stories. Very relaxing and much enjoyed.
 
When the tour continued, we saw another monument – the Victory Column – which salutes all the victories over France (naturally).

Then the tour came to a completion at Museum Island. We stopped for intro of them, took some pictures and returned back to base. Check out Amanda in the middle. Overall, we learned at lot and seeing the sites/buildings first hand were both informative and had a big impact on us. We were very happy to take the tour and wished we could have done it other places. But you live you learn.

After the tour we went back to the train station to get our bags. The weather up to this point has been great, but just as I expected, it was going to rain in Berlin. Luckily, Amanda’s parents got us nice rain coats for Christmas. Thank you! They came in handy. Once we got our bags, we went to our easy hotel to check in. Our bodies were telling us to take a nap, but we decided to continue our day. We got dinner and headed to Berlin’s biggest bier garden. We had a beer, saw the place, and came back to the hotel. On the way back we stopped by and got a currywurst. Wow, the thing was amazing. Just imagine a gently fried bratwurst that is covered in a curry sauce and powder. Great Germain tradition. 

It was a long and productive day. Berlin had far more to offer than we thought. We "knew" of its history, but to see it firsthand brought Berlin to the tops of our Europe highlights.

On a side note… everyone needs to hear Amanda pretend to speak German…. Probably the funniest thing in the world. She basically pretends to hulk-a-loogie before every word. It’s hilarious.

It will be 2 weeks tomorrow that we left. Time is a flying… They say time goes fast when you are having fun… and we are having a blast.

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