Day 6

Day 6 We started by taking a suburban train (S-bahn) to Potsdam. We bought a day Berlin ABC pass for all zones for E7.90, which is valid for all public transport. When we got to the Potsdam train station, we were told to take bus 695 to Sanssouci, but we’d have to wait 20 min. A nice elderly lade explained to us in abundant German that we can take bus 605 or 606 and get off at the Neues Palais and walk 2 km through the park to Sanssouci. So that’s what we did. The Sanssouci park is huge and contains several castles. Neues Palais is the largest, but there is also the Charlottenhof, the Orangerie and Sanssouci, the summer residence of Fredrick Wilhelm II, which we visited. It was lovely. Then we had trouble finding a bus to take us back to the train station, but we remembered the German lady’s suggestion to go to Luisenplatz and take a bus from there. Potsdam is a very pretty city and we wished we had planned to spend more time there. It has a many other historical sites and a great location close to several lakes. After our return and a short rest we went to the Berlin Mall. We shopped until we dropped and then found an authentic Bavarian restaurant for dinner.

Day 5

We had breakfast in a street café and then walked to Hackesche Hofe, traditional Berlin apartment buildings with famous 9 connected courtyards. Very eclectic – each one is different. Then to the Pergamon museum. Amazing collection of antiquities from Middle East from 2300BC to 200. Half of the museum is closed for renovation so it was actually quite pleasant and manageable to go through the collection. Their most famous pieces are from Mesopotamia and Babylon because it was the German archaeologists who got there first and secured them for the German museums. Then back to hotel for a mid-day break and then we took the subway to KaDeWe, which is the largest department store in continental Europe visited by 50,000 people each day. The food court is enormous and has every food imaginable. We settled for German followed by chocolates. Then we walked to the Bauhaus museum, and then walked back to the hotel for evening wine. We concluded the evening in the same Italian restaurant we ate in yesterday having pretty much the same meal --- a rack of lamb with veggies and potatoes + a side dish of eggplant, and a tiramisu for desert. It was a great meal.

Day 4

We had breakfast in the hotel with Phil and Sybill, and took a yellow bus tour of the city. It went around the east part of Berlin first, which we had already walked, but then it took us to west Berlin, including Charlottenburg where Sybill grew up. It’s a very charming area with a big Prussian castle, lots of Sunday antique markets, tree-lined streets with small restaurants and cafes. We got off in the famous shopping boulevard of Kurfursten damm and walked it until the KaDeWe department store (unfortunately all stores are closed on Sunday), and had ice cream and beer in an outdoor café. Then we got on the bus again and got off at Potsdamer Platz. We went up to the Panorama Point to see the view of Berlin from the 25th floor (by the fastest elevator in Europe), and then across the street to see the very modern Sony building with an amazing, enormous courtyard. Then we had an early dinner in an Italian restaurant and went to the main train station with Sybill and Phill to see them off. The station is a beautiful, brand new building, from which the trains leave at 3 different levels. It’s a very attractive building. Unfortunately, German trains don’t always run on time so we had to wait because the train to Hanover was 20 minutes late. Then we went back to the hotel and collapsed.

Day 3

We walked to the Museum Island hoping to have breakfast in the café of the Historical Museum, but it didn’t open until 10 am. So we crossed the river and had breakfast in an Italian café sitting outside by the river. On the way we saw a building being renovated, and its facade was completely covered with a picture of the building as it will look like after renovation. Very cool. Generally, fences covering construction sites are used to display historical information about the sites under construction. After breakfast, we walked to Alexanderplatz, a huge square with the TV tower, a railways station in the middle and lots of action – food, rides, music, people… We did some shoe shopping. From there we wandered into the oldest part of the town called Nikolai from the name of the oldest church in Berlin. It’s a charming area with narrow streets, lots of small garden restaurants and little stores. It looks like a small German town. Then we walked back to the hotel, stopping at an exhibition about the German parliamentary democracy, and waited for our friends, Phil and Sybill to arrive. They came around 5 pm and we went out to the Gendarmenmarkt, a beautiful square in front of our hotel, and sat in an outdoor café sipping proseco/orange drinks until dinner. We had dinner in an Austrain restaurant Aigner, which had to include asparagus since it’s asparagus season now, and lots of wine. We ended the evening in another café in the square with yet another bottle of wine celebrating Al’s birthday

Day 2

We got up and walked across the street to Café Einstein for coffee and strudel. Then, we walked to Checkpoint Charley and Brandenburg Gate. We passed through Potsdamer Platz with its sleek, modern architecture, and through the Mall of Berlin, supposedly the best place to shop in the city. Lots of interesting history in Berlin, and every few steps we come across some historical facts and places. In the vicinity of Brandenburg Gate streets were closed and we saw hundreds of runners. When we asked somebody what the event was, he mumbled something in German so we still don’t know. We walked by a large area with hundreds of cement rectangles of different heights, which turned out to be a memorial to the murdered Jews of Europe. We also saw a memorial for the Gypsies who perished during the war. Then we walked to Tiergarten, a huge park in the middle of the city, and had lunch at a beer garden. In the afternoon, we took a river cruise (1 hour) and saw many beautiful buildings, including the government building of Reichstag and Bundestag, a new railway station, walking boulevards, parks and beaches along the Spree river, and the Museum island with the Pergammon and Bode museums. On the way back, we stumbled upon Galleries Lafayette and its amazing food court. We had dinner in an Italian restaurant and walked some more before checking in for the night.

Day 1

The flight on Norwegian Air from LAX to Berlin was not first rate. I arrived at the hotel (Berlin Hilton) an hour after Bo, so she was already in the room. We immediately left to get a drink and food. Our hotel (Hilton Mitte) is located in the center of the city, in a beautiful square called Gendarmenplatz. We had no problem finding a place to eat or drink because all sides of the square are lined with restaurants. We did, however have a problem finding a table around 9 pm because all the restaurants were jammed. We did finally end up in a lovely restaurant/wine bar. The place was very charming, but it took at least 20 minutes before we finally got our wine. We ordered a wienerschnitzel to share. We knew it would be large, but it was enormous. The food was good, but we wouldn’t call it amazing so we were extremely surprised when we found out that this restaurant was listed as one of the top 10 in Berlin.

Preamble

This is our 51 trip together. I fly to Berlin tonight and meet Bo at the hotel. She has been in Europe (Prague, CZ, Poland) for 9 days visiting friends and family. She is taking an overnight bus to Berlin and arrives about an hour before my plane lands.