Chasing 100: Berlin, Germany Country #36

The train ride from Prague to Berlin was a lesson to say the least. We purchased a Eurail pass good for 7 days of travel over a 30 day period. We were not told that they over sell the seats and that if you want to make sure you have a seat you need to reserve them and pay extra for each leg. We left Prague and had no seat so we had to stand in between cars. Luckily after 2 stops a nice family offered us their seats when they got off. Now we know to reserve seats for long distance trips. We arrived in Berlin around 6pm, found our hotel and had a nice German dinner before calling it a night. The next day was looking like rain so we decided to stay in and get some work done. We just figured we would add an extra day on to our Berlin schedule so we could explore. We spent the evening looking for a room and finally found one for much more than we normally pay. Turns out that Germany just lifted all its restrictions and everything that was on hold is now going on this week. 3 major conferences and the German Special Olympics. We got an email in the middle of the night saying our room for the next night was canceled so we ended up having to book an even more expensive room. The last in the city. Once we got out we had a great time exploring Berlin. The weather was perfect. Sunny and low 70’s. Our first stop was the Victory Column, a large monument celebrating German victories over Austria, France and Denmark in the late 1800’s. We climbed to the top and had an amazing 360 view of Berlin. Next we headed to the Brandenburg Gate. The gate was once part of the Berlin wall and is now a national symbol of peace and unity. It’s also where Germany holds it big NYE celebration each year. From there we walked to the Reichstag Building. Destroyed by communists in 1933 it is now the building that houses the lower Parliament. Not far from there we visited the Monument to Murdered Jews. Also called the holocaust monument. Walking from place to place was surprisingly nice for walking around a city since many of the roads were pedestrian only and we were able to walk through parks and along rivers making it really quiet and peaceful. Our next stop was the Check Point Charlie monument. A checkpoint made famous during the 1960’s standoff between the Soviet Union and the US. It’s also been in several James Bond movies. After this we went to Berlins Gendermenmark Square. It’s a popular meeting place for locals and tourists who come to see the German Opera house, the German Cathedral and the French Church that surround the square. Our last stop was the East Side Gallery. It is the longest standing section of the Berlin wall. It runs along side of a main highway for 1300 meters. The side of the wall with the highway is covered with 100 murals and the other side faces an abandoned park and is covered in grafftii. The murals are very lame and don’t even qualify as good street art. The once famous mural of the German President kissing the Russian president has been long covered over and no more political messages exist. A real let down. We have seen sections of the wall that have been donated to other countries and all of them were treated as monuments and memorials. Not here.