Well after an interesting train trip
from Munich that left on time, however stopped part of the way, as the railway
track was closed. We returned to Munich and went on an alternative route. Even
with this upheaval everyone was jolly and accepted it with little fuss and free
coffee to boot. We were 3 hours late arriving at our destination, however DB Rail
will refund half our ticket costs and send us a present as well. You have to
love German efficiency – imagine trying to get this level of service back home!
Checked into the A
& O Berlin Hauptbanhof Hostel
which was a 10 minute walk from the station. Nice big hotel and close to one of
the old check points and a remaining part of the wall.
Started the day going to Alexander
Platz in the old East Germany and walking down Unter Den Linden to the
Brandenburg Gate.
It appears that the re- unification process of East and West
Berlin has lead to a lot of vacant land that was on the east side as they had “the wall”. We discovered later the wall comprised of a 3
to 4 m high pre made concrete wall, a sand strip lane, anti tank lane,
additional wall and a fence to stop people escaping so in some parts the depth
of the wall could be up to 60 metres. Since its construction commenced in 1961
they destroyed more buildings to increase the security zone. Once the wall came
down there ended up being large tracts of land vacant. Strangely all the top
end shops have been built in these areas and this makes West Berlin look old
even though the whole city was rebuilt after the war.
Interesting that when on the East
Berlin side they have the ampelmannchen symbol
on the traffic lights to walk and stop, which is a man with a hat and he now
has a cult following with three stores selling ampelmannchen products.
The Brandenburg Gate was good, however
there were people dressed up as US and East German guards that added interest, that
is until we noticed Mickey Mouse, a bear (at one point had his head off when
smoking) and a Predator!
Continued down the street to see a
huge soviet memorial for Soviets killed in the last few days of the war. Up to
70,000 people died (20,000 German, 20,000 Soviets and 30,000 civilians) in the
last 72 hours before the fall of city. The Russians buried 2000 men at this
spot. In the carve up of sectors the
memorial ended up in the West Berlin British sector so the British had to
provide a guard of honour each day for the memorial and allow the Soviets
access at anytime. Now the German government looks after it.
The German Victory
tower (prior to WW1) was very good with excellent panoramic views of the city.
Surprising how much open parkland there is in the city and this was under snow
making it more attractive.
Headed off to find parts of the
remaining wall. Michael decided it would be good to walk some of the old wall
that is now a path. Much later than planned we found part of the wall that the
Government spends a fortune trying to keep clean. Pictures show the
construction, how the wall cut streets in half and even separated a parish
church and cemetery. Interesting the lengths they went to in order to prevent
people escaping to the West. Must have been strange seeing your street bricked
up when you could walk down it the day before.
We then visited the Hamburger Bahnoff Modern
Museum. The artistic value can be summed up by one piece of “art” which
consisted of a blank sheet with the explanation next to it “this picture will
never be painted as it is in the Artist’s mind”. I think you can imagine what I thought of
that!
Temperature started to warm up to 6
degrees celsius so the snow was disappearing and the ice was melting and it was
getting slippery to walk around.
Continued our wanderings with the Reichstag
that has a new clear dome and has been refurbished after the unification, memorials
for the Gypsies
(very good, showing the history of their demise from 1920’s), the Holocaust
memorial with 2711 grey blocks of different heights representing mounds of
ashes
and the homosexual
memorial which consisted of a concrete box with a movie playing inside of
same sex people kissing.
Visited another modern museum by mistake
and could not get out quick enough. Found the Gemäldegalerie, which had some
fabulous works in it from Botticelli to Ruben, so enjoyed that.
Visited a Dali exhibition that had a
collection of over 400 pieces of work, which was good and contained some pen
and ink works of his that I hadn’t seen before.
Visited Checkpoint Charlie
where there are 3 museums nearby. We only visited one as we can only assume the
others have the same ending to the story.
In discussion with a German tour guide
and he said that every school child has to visit a concentration camp at least
once in their school years and they study the war quite comprehensively. A
visit to the Topography
of Terror Museum would set them straight on how bad the Nazi’s were to non-Aryan
people.
Visited the Stasi Museum, which showed
details of how the people were spied on and the massive records library. It all
seems surreal that this happened only 20 years ago.
Decided to leave Berlin after 3 days
and trained down to Frankfurt to break the trip out to Paris. Staying at the MEININGER
Hotel Frankfurt/Main Messe, which is in a new
development like Docklands. Frankfurt is known as the next largest financial
centre outside of London in Europe and the number of high rise buildings was
surprising after all of our travels. The town was heavily bombed and after the
war it was decided to build the core in the old style, but everywhere else is
modern.
Lonely Planet says not much here, but it
was still good to walk around in pleasant 8 degrees celsius with no snow or
ice. Visited the Staedel Gallery
that had an exhibition of Raphael’s drawings and some other nice pieces.
There were quite a few Christmas
markets and Michael had to have a frankfurt whilst here.
Well that is the end to the land of
sausages and beer as we head of to gay Paris for Christmas, cheese and red
wine.
