Berlin

What a day!
We woke up just as we were tying up at Warnemunde, the closest port to Berlin. It looked like a great day, weather-wise and after an early breakfast, we met our driver for the day, George.
Because we were in a van verses a bus, our trip to Berlin was a little faster and by 10:30, after traveling through gently rolling farmland reminiscent of Southern Ontario, we were meeting our Berlin guide, Yves.

Our first visit was to the Charlottenburg Palace, home of early German royalty. Looking at today’s pictures, one has to be reminded that Berlin was pretty well flattened by allied bombing. Because there were military targets spread throughout Berlin, it was impossible to avoid collateral damage to historic buildings including churches.

Because none of us were keen to visit any museums, we got the Olympic site added to our itinerary. We took an elevator up to the top of the Fuhrer’s Tower, where he gave his rants to the masses below, outside the stadium.

Next, we drove down the Kurfurstendamm, the Champs Elysees of Berlin, to the bombed out church that has been left as a memorial to the lives lost. It is currently under wraps, as they were restoring the ruin to better ruin conditions. They have built a fascinating new church around it, which looks a little bizarre from the outside with its myriad of cement blocks, but from inside, the blocks emanate a wonderful blue light.


Soon we were getting to the heart of Berlin and the area most recently renewed. This section was mostly East Berlin and therefore pretty much a wasteland. The River Spree runs through the city and with today’s fair skies there was lots of action on the river and on its banks.


After Copenhagen’s elephants, we weren’t surprised to see a similar charity project going on here, with bears this time. The bear is of course the symbol of Berlin.

By now, we’d been at it for a while, so we broke for a traditional German lunch of curried sausage. Yum!

After lunch, we headed for the more historic area of Berlin. This featured viewings of the Bundestag, now wrapped with security fence since the death of Bin Laden.

There was a fair bit of very modern development in this area as well and some kind of funky things, like this Lego giraffe.

We drove to Checkpoint Charlie which was the separation between the Communist and American sector of Berlin. It’s a little tacky now.

The Holocaust Museum, consisting of over a thousand gray cement blocks varying in sizes was a sobering memorial to Nazi slaughter of 6 million Jews.

Hitler’s bunker was filled with concrete by the Russians and now is merely a dirt parking lot with a small sign explaining myths surrounding the site - a fitting end for the story of Hitler.

There are many very beautiful buildings in this area – some of them churches, some part of Humbolt University and some government buildings.

The Wall which until ‘89 totally surrounded West Berlin is now all but gone. You can see the footprint of the wall along many streets, but only one section of the wall remains, a 100 metre stretch with the cells of the Nazi SS excavated beneath it.


We ended up at the Brandenburg Gate, which was in East Berlin and was the rallying point for unification.

Like I said, “Wow what a day”! Our 2 ¼ trip back allowed some time to clear our minds a bit after the fast paced, content filled tour.
Dinner tonight was in the Grand Dining Room. With a different menu every night and Jacques Peppin as executive chef, this restaurant is a Win Win. Tonight was no different with everything from scampi risotto, to duck breast in tortilla crumbs, to rack of lamb to braised short ribs to farfalle with morelles to chocolate mousse to bananas Foster to Tartes Tatin – where is the Lose Lose?
By 9:45 the ship was rocking out of German waters. By 11:00 we’d called it a night. Our room, shown below is right above the lifeboats, which could come in handy. It’s the last room above the life boats with a balcony before the balconies disappear.