Berlin

After our first and only full week of school we had a four-day weekend so we decided to go to Berlin. We caught a train after class and arrived at our hostel late Friday night (it’s about a 5 hour train ride from Prague to Berlin).  Thankfully we had no problems traveling and made it without getting lost, we have termed Erica as “Magellan” due to her amazing navigation skills in figuring our the European railways and streets. 

Train ride to Berlin

Berlin's main train station

Saturday morning we took a “Hop-on Hop-off” city bus tour to quickly see most of the major sites in Berlin (such as the Brandenburg Gate, Berlin Wall, Check Point Charlie, the German White House, Reichstag (German Parliament), and Tiergarten). Halfway through the tour we found ourselves in a shopping district that was hosting a portion of the biking Tour de Berlin. We stopped and did some shopping and enjoyed our first German meal-bratwurst and Berliner beer. Saturday night we stayed in the 40 person dorm room in our hostel, I think we were all a little skeptical about sleeping in a room with 40 other people, but we slept well and didn’t have any crazy experiences.

 Brandenburg Gate

Reichstag

German White House

First German Meal-Bratwurst and Beer

In Downtown Berlin

BaxPax Hostel

Inside the 40 person dorm

 Sunday we checked into the 5-person room in our hostel and met our 2 Canadian roommates. We quickly learned how little we knew about Canada (not one of us knew the capital city) and had a good time talking about the differences between Canadians and Americans. During the afternoon we took the metro to the Berlin Wall, Check Point Charlie and the Jewish Memorial Museum. The Berlin Wall was incredible, it was amazing to think that nearly 50 years ago the wall stood as a barrier separating a whole city of people. After the wall we went to Check Point Charlie, known as the famous crossing point between East and West Berlin during the Cold War. Sunday night we went to Berlin’s oldest Biergarten, the garten seats over 600 people and serves traditional German beer and food, we had a great time enjoying the atmosphere and people watching.

At the Berlin Wall

Berlin Wall

Former leader of the Soviet Union Brezhnev kissing the former leader of East Germany

Check Point Charlie

Prater Biergarten

Monday we walked around downtown Berlin and visited Reichstag (German Parliament), the Holocaust Memorial and the Kennedy Museum. The Holocaust Memorial was definitely interesting the designers main theme was to produce an uneasy, confusing atmosphere, and to represent an ordered system that had lost touch with human reason. After wandering around Berlin for most of the day we had dinner and beers with our roommates and eventually made our way to a local bar called Oscar Wilde that was completely empty. We ended up back at the hostel when Erica, the pioneer of the group, took it upon herself to convince the half-English speaking-German front desk guy to let use the hostel’s main fan for our room.  Needless to say we were all thankful because it was miserably hot in our tiny room.  

In front of the hotel where Michael Jackson held his baby out the window

Kennedy Museum

Holocaust Memorial

Our roommates

Erica and the infamous fan!

All in all we had a great trip to Berlin, the German people were amazingly friendly, the food was good and the beer was even better. If I ever make it back to central Europe I will definitely visit Germany again.