Memories of Berlin...

Berlin 2007

Memorable Moments

Taking a stroll around quaint cobbled streets, past rows of pastel coloured houses.

Pumpkin’s on street corners in preparation for Halloween.

Golden trees and autumn leaves dotted around the city.

Trying to work out how to get a ticket from the machine for the underground metro, not an easy task…perhaps we should have got bicycles as they seemed a very popular method of transport in the town.

We decided one day to go to the Berlin Zoo and it was one of the best zoo’s I have ever been too! The animals were so close and everything seemed so open I did wonder if it was all that safe!  It was the first time I had seen a real Orangutan (I know I have seen plenty now) and also the first Panda I had seen.  I did have one scary moment though.  We were standing right up close to this humongous tank of murky water and everyone was pointing and saying oooh aaah as you do when you’re at the zoo, but I couldn’t see what everyone was looking at.  I said to Jay where are the hippos? Then when I looked again I realised how big these animals were and that one hippo’s face was right in front of me in the water.  It was like a dinosaur that’s the only way I can describe it, it still gives me goose bumps thinking about it now.

Architectural Genius

After a ridiculously long queue in the cold we went in to see the Reichstag, Berlin’s parliament building, which had an incredible dome at the back with sloping walkways around a huge mirrored centre.  Very interesting especially photography wise!  We spent ages in there walking around, I can’t imagine working in there what a fantastic place to have boring political meetings!

I can’t even remember how we came across this, but in one of the hotels (not one we stayed in) there was a lift which had an aquarium around it!

There is a real mixture of old and modern architecture in Berlin, strange modern metal looking buildings and structures like the TV tower in Alexanderplatz combined with historic monuments like the Brandenburg gate.

There is a lot of history in this city and we spent some time in the Checkpoint Charlie museum.  The Holocaust memorial was a remarkable maze of blocks, different heights, depth and in blacks and greys.  You could walk through and around the blocks which gave the illusion that they were the same height until you started walking down and ended up surrounded by towering walls.

The Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church which had been badly bombed in the past, was a very interesting structure with an enormous hole through the centre of the building.  The inside of the newly rebuilt section of the church was unlike any church I have seen before!

There were lots of decorative fountains around the city, little birds flocking around the water.

Culinary Delights

The Haagen Daaz Café, even though it was so cold outside we couldn’t resist paying a few visits to the café for desert in the evenings!

Sausages! Lots of curry wurst much to Jamie’s delight.

We had a big buffet breakfast at our hotel, although I hardly ever go for the cooked breakfasts abroad and the sausages were frankfurters of course argh!

What the Weatherman Says (October)

Very VERY cold, scarves, hats and big coats needed for this one.  Cloudy skies and the sun peeped out occasionally, thankfully no rain.

Arty Fartyness

Walking along the remains of the Berlin Wall completely covered in graffiti art with messages, pictures, and words.  Expressive and quite something to look at, there is only a small section of the wall left standing now.  It was very quiet and peaceful only a handful of others walking silently along reading the messages.

I love the sculptor Henry Moore and in Berlin they have one of his sculptures as a permanent feature over a pond, called ‘The Butterfly’ a clever reflection turns what seems a chunk of metal into a butterfly.

There were lots of mime artists and people statues in the town centre, lots of people dressed as German soldiers painted silver, quite bizarre.  You never want to get too close in case they start moving!

There were several completely random paintings on the side of buildings like this one:

Walkometer/Exhaustion Level

It wasn’t bad at all walking wise, one of the least exhausting trips I think we have been on. We opted for lots more metro trains to get around mainly because it was so cold.  There are quite a few sights to see but after a few days I felt like we had seen it all so it wasn’t as rushed as some of the other places we had been trying to fit it all in to a weekend.