A stop over in Berlin – Germany.

It was a long flight from USA to Germany, we didn’t have any stop overs which was nice.

The first day Dad and I checked into our hostel and just crashed. We were jetlagged and tired. There was a guy in the room when we arrived but that afternoon he was gone. We were both convinced that my WMD (Weapon on Mass Disgustingness’) Shoes had sent the backpacker running. They were very… ripe.

 After a days rest we were up early, still jetlagged and were out walking the streets. We found a nice German baker who made some amazing bread with cheese and meats on for breakfast. It was nice to have a descent breakfast after the junk we had in USA. After breakfast it was time to explorer, we had a small map and I could read and say perfect German… so dad asked me “where do we go?” and I would reply down “hugan fluggan fliggan strazen” and not having a single idea if I was saying it correctly… and most of the time it was way off. But it was a laugh.

After a hour of walking around, most things were still closed being the weekend. We ended up at a great park. In the middle was a monument to wars and battles, with a great golden angel on top. It was cool. 
We tried to rent some bikes which were there but they didn’t seem to work. So it was walking time, which wasn’t to bad.

We strolled though the park at 7am in the morning and people were out exercising and enjoying the early morning. It was nice. Popping back out on the main road we arrived at a old soviet war memorial, the tanks were small compared to ones I have seen in Vietnam. From here we could see the arches and the horse and chariot of the Brandenburg Gate.
We headed back into the park and started walking in the direction of the Gate.

Arriving at the gate there was a mass of tourists starting to come from every direction, guess everyone had woken up? People were taking pictures of the road, but it was a sign on the road, it was the path the berlin wall once took and they had layed stones and signs on the original path to show where the wall went.

The gate was amazing in detail, beyond the gate was a bunch of people dressed up in soviet and allied uniforms. I guess it was a important spot in the wall.

We were both still quiet jetlagged, so we started to walk back to the hostel though the park.

The next day we were up and about as normal, still tired but feeling much better. We decided to book ourselves a 2 day hop on hop off bus ticket, for the next 3 days we used the ticket to travel around berlin, no body checked our ticket so we got a free day ;).

The first day we rode the buss around till it took us to a stop where a large memorial to the berlin wall and the war was. We took some time to walk up and down the memorial and read some of the horrible things that happened.

After the memorial we walked a short distance to checkpoint Charlie and got a look at the old checkpoint guard house and some more people in old uniforms.

There was also a wall with images of what checkpoint Charlie looked like before the end of the cold war.

We stopped a few stops along the way at a old church court yard. There was 3 churches around and loads of cafes. We decided it was a perfect place for a beer. Sitting down at a pub we ordered a litter beer… the best beer ever! It hit a dry spot.

We hopped back on the bus and rode it for a short distance again this time I headed away from the centre of berlin along a road to a river. There was about 2km of the berlin wall still intact here, and it was painted in all different murals and paintings.  We walked up and down the wall for a few hours and then came to a bridge it was very old looking but very nice.

Hopping back on the bus we took the bus all the way around its trip on the loop.

That night we headed to a pub we had gone to the night before, and had a plate size chicken snitzel. It was sooooo good. It would not be the last time we ate there.

The following day we hopped back on the bus and headed to a area we had seen the day before on the loop, a large old church.

Arriving at the church we took a look inside and it was truly amazing, there was artwork and sculptures everywhere, the organ was also very large.
We walked around inside for some time then proceeded up stairs.  There was a area with models of the church though its ages and after the war. We kept walking up stairs until we reached the dome at the top.

From the top we could see a large distance over berlin, and the surrounding area.

After the church we walked around the area looking at the buildings before hopping back on the bus and continuing along.

That afternoon we wanted to stop and see charlottenburg palace but when we arrived they were closed. However there was a nice beer festival on outside the palace. Perfect place to stop and have a beer and some grilled food to eat. It was amazing food… so nice to have potatoes and meat again.

The next day we had seen everything except the palace on the hop on hop off tour. So that’s what we did, we headed to the palace and took a tour around. It was not like it was in the olden days, it had been restored and I guess I should not have been surprised.
It was still nice to walk around but the history of the Prussian rulers and things really didn’t mean much to me.

That afternoon we went shopping, I was in desperate need for some new shoes as my old ones were falling into pieces. We found a shopping street and after a few hours of walking around we found the shoes I was looking for.

The next day we packed up our things and headed back to the airport, it was time to head to Denmark.

The trip to Germany was a nice stop, it was very interesting and I really enjoyed the time walking the streets with my dad, it was nice.

Till next time, HAVE FUN!

Steffen.