Berlin
Friday– Sunday May 20–22, 2005 & Sunday May 29, 2005
This is Brandenburg Gate, taken from Pariser Platz in the former DDR. The wall and the West were just through the gate.
At the conclusion of the Second World War, the gate was a shambles. The black and white display shows what the area looked like—rubble everywhere, wrecked trucks, etc. The area today is completely rebuilt; just out of the photo on the right is a new French Embassy and over on the left is a new US Embassy that is under construction. The Reichstag is through the gate and a short walk to the right. The Memorial for the Murdered Jews of Europe (Denkmal für die ermordeten Juden Europas) is also just on the left, out of the photo.
This is the Memorial. There are paths among the blocks, and the paths take one down more than ten feet below the tops of the blocks. Everything inside is all light and shadow, and the effect is remarkable. It is also very quiet inside the Memorial.
This is the 130 foot high cupola on top of the Reichstag. Inside is a spiraling path to take up for a view. Why is this a principal tourist destination?
Berlin’s “museum island” has many great museums, including the Pergamom museum with treasures from ancient Babylon.
We took a train out a short way to the city of Potsdam to visit Sanssouci, built by Prussia’s Frederick II in the 1700s. This house was intended to be a modest retreat. Sure it was. The expansive grounds are quite nice. The palaces and parks in the area make up a Unesco World Heritage site.
We toured the inside where we were made to wear funny slippers to protect the floors.
An small sample of the grounds between the modest house and the Neues Palais, about a five minute walk to the right.
In comparison to this pile, Sanssouci is indeed a modest residence. Kaiser Wilhelm II lived here on and off until he settled on a move to the Netherlands in the autumn of 1918.
A close up of the Neues Palais. Our guidebook says Wilhelm II had the lights installed. He must have had a distinctive taste for art. But, again, the grounds are large and make for a nice walk back to the bus stop to go to Potsdamn Station to catch a train to Berlin Zoo Station.
Here on the Kurfürstendamm is the Kaiser–Wilhelm–Gedächtnis–kirche, bombed in 1943.
Peace is much better than war, but governments sometimes forget history.
Our first stop on our trip was Berlin, and out last stop before returning home was Berlin.
Next—an early morning flight from Berlin Tegel Airport to Amsterdam Schipol, and then on to San Francisco, 5,000 nautical miles/9,300 km.
