2006-08-02

Just over 3 years after our last visit to Berlin, we went there again. Once again we went there by bus, we stayed in West Berlin and we experienced a lot of things.

This time we stayed at the luxurious Hotel Berlin on Lutzowplatz, just south of Tiergarten and the Landwehrkanal, 5 minutes walk from Ku' Damm, 15 minutes walk from Potsdamer Platz, and just next to the route of the legendary Bus 100 (which goes from west to east, and passes a lot of the most classic sights) so it really couldn't be more central. According to the newspapers the weather was going to be just awfull all four days of our stay (Tuesday 13/7 - Friday 16/7), but (as usual, and for once, to our benefit) the newspapers were wrong. The weather was cloudy most of the time, but fairly warm and with only a few showers.

Tuesday

After we'd arrived at our hotel (highly recommendable!) around 14:20 and freshened up a little, we walked up Kurfürstenstrasse (familiar territory, as you can read in my Berlin 2001 travelogue) to Breitscheidplatz (Europacenter, Gedächtniskirche), where we lunched at the same restaurant were we had our first Berlin meal in 2001 - a small and fairly cheap italian restaurant next to the Weltbrunnen fountain. I hear from my girlfriend that their Penne alla Quatro Formaggio is excellent. They didn't accept credit cards, however, and we hadn't thought of getting any cash yet, so Louise had to scout the area for an ATM, while the restaurant manager eyed me from behind a door. They seemed very happy when Louise came back with some cash, and even apologized for not accepting credit cards - and an apology from a Berlin waiter is a rare thing indeed, so that was actually an experience in itself.

When the clock stroke 16:45, we left the Breitscheidplatz and walked down Kantstrasse, in search of a shop which was recommended to us, the Zweitausendeins (Kantstrasse 41-42, next to the intersection of Kantstrasse and Leibnizstrasse), which is a small shop with a great selection of Classical, Jazz and 60s and 70s rock CDs and even LPs, and also some interesting books and CD-ROMs(!) about litterature and culture - a rather trendy shop, I thought, and a lot of great bargains - I bought four Chicago CDs for €12 (and they weren't even second-hand!). On our way to the shop we passed the old and beautiful Theater des Westens, and Savigny Platz which was quite uninteresting, but, it seems, also very trendy..

We then had a coffee at a small café on Krummestrasse, and then went to the Trinitatiskirche and St. Thomas-kirche - none of them are worth seeing. The same thing can almost be said about Deutsche Oper (the German Opera) on Bismarckstrasse, were it not because it is exceptionally ugly and a terrible (or should I say typical) example of 1950s architecture. Having seen this monstrosity, we caught a U-bahn back to Wittenbergplatz, next to KaDeWe and 5 minutes from our hotel. The clock had passed 18:30, and we were both rather tired, so we went back to the hotel, rested in our room for a bit, and had dinner in the very excellent and stylish Piano Bar on the ground floor. And then we had an early night.

Wedensday

We woke up around 08:00 and then went down to the restaurant to have one of the most impressive breakfasts I've ever had. The buffet was enormous, and if you're on a tight budget (as Lonely Planet writes on every other place) there is's enough food in this buffet to keep you going until early evening. Weather was pretty good this morning, so we agreed to postpone our visits to the inner Berlin museums until Thursday. Instead we walked to Nollendorfplatz, took the U-bahn to Zoo, and then walked onto the S-bahn to Spandau. Spandau is a Berlin suburb, 25 minutes by train from the city center and most famous for the prison which once occupied a large area in the southern part of the city. The prison is long gone (it was demolished shortly after Rudolf Hess died in 1987), but the city is much more than that. Apart from being the largest district of Berlin (more than 200.000 people live there), it is actually also one of the least Berlinesque and most provincial districts of the city. And the old part of the city, which goes from the S-bahn station and approx. 1½km to the north, is a very pleasant experience.

From the S-bahn station in the southern part of the city, we walked past the impressive Spandau Rathaus up Carl-Schurz-Strasse. This street is the commercial centre of the city, with a shopping center, restaurants, a lot of small shops and one of the great sights of the day, the Nikolaikirche.

The Nikolaikirche holds its own place in the history books. Outside the church is a statue of Joachim II (of the Hohenzollern family - more about them later), the first Brandenburg ruler to convert to protestantism, and in the church itself a protestant service was held as early as 1539. The church itself is from the 15th century, and inside the church there are artifacts which are even older. The altar is particularly beautiful with its centre panel depicting the last supper. This church is definitely worth a visit - and it's free.

Before we visited the church we browsed through a few shops, and had some typical German fast food at a Nordsee chain restaurant which serves only fish (most of it seemed to be deep-fried).

We then walked further up Carl-Schurz-Strasse and crossed Am Juliusturm to visit the smaller and older part of the Altstadt (the old city). This northern part is called Kolk and is very small. Kolk seemed almost desolate, compared to the much more lively part of the city south of Am Juliusturm. This small area boasts a 78m long part of the ancient town wall, and a few old and minuscule houses, which seems to date from the 16th or 17th century. There is also the Marienkirche, which seems quite ordinary from the outside, but is magnificent from the inside. On weekdays it doesn't open until 15:00, so if you're going to Spandau try and plan your visit so as to be able to get a look inside.

Having seen most of the Altstadt - we actually went back to the south side, had a cup of Cappucino on the other main street Breite Strasse (parallel to Carl-Schurz-Strasse), visited the old Gotisches Haus (Gothic House, a 15th century building, which also houses the local tourist information) and then went back to the Marienkirche a couple of minutes past 15:00 - we crossed the Havel river and walked a few hundred meters to the huge Zitadelle - situated on an island in the river.

Zitadelle is, as the name suggests, a Citadel, and parts of it dates back to the 13th century, most notably the 36m high Juliusturm (Julius Tower). We paid a total of €4 to see the permanent collection and to climb the Juliusturm. The main building holds a collection of (mostly) 18th and 19th century German military helmets, weapons, etc. and various things related to the history of the Zitadelle itself. It is really rather interesting. Most interesting, however, is the Juliusturm. The wooden staircases inside the tower maked me a bit nervous, but they didn't fall down, and they didn't make too much noise when we climbed them, so I suppose they're okay :-) The view from the top is beautiful - you won't see many known landmarks (except for the Berlin TV-tower), but you get an excellent view of Spandau, the Havel and Spree rivers and the general layout of this part of the Berlin area. There is also a museum of local history and other exhibitions on the Citadel area, but after we'd had a beer at the Zitadelle café, we had to go back to the city center, as we had planned to go on a 3 hour cruise on the river Spree in the evening. The U-bahn station (called Zitadelle) is just a few hundred meters from the Zitadelle, so we went there and then drove back to the city.

Having made a short stop at our hotel, we took the U-bahn to the south eastern part of town, Kottbusser Tor, in the Kreuzberg district. Just south of Kottbusser Tor is Kottbusser Brücke, and here we boarded a touring boat which took us on an impressive 23km tour on the Landwehrkanal and the River Spree. During the next 2½ hours we had a bit of food and champagne on the boat, and enjoyed the view of Berlin as seen from the river. As we didn't actually visit any buildings or museums on the river cruise, I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

We arrived back at Kottbusser Brücke at around 21:30, went back to the hotel, and watched the Eurosport re-run of the days stage of the Tour de France. We didn't eat a lot on the cruise ship - you could choose from around ten different dishes such as a small portion of gullasch, a couple of sausages, chicken nuggets, soup, etc. - just enough to keep you from starving, but not enough to keep hunger away for the rest of the night. So we took advantage of the excellent service on the hotel, and ordered a pizza and a lasagne to our room - to a total cost of €18 which isn't really expensive, considering what you're charged for room service in many other hotels.

Thursday

This day was spent visiting a few of the sights in central Berlin. We left the hotel around 10, and took the bus 100 two stops to the Siegesäule, the 68m tall war memorial in the middle of the Grosse Stern roundabout - we could have walked, but we'd planned a lot of walking for this day, so... We saw Siegessäule the last time we were in the city, as well, but this time we actually climbed the 285 steps to the top. When the weather is good, there are a lot of people who wants to see the view from the top, which can be something of a problem, as there is only one rather small spiral staircase used by both people going up, and people going down. There are a few "stops" on the way, where people can pass each other and sit down for a minute, if necessary, so it wasn't too bad. There are actually two levels inside the Siegesäule - the first one is at about 10m, but still gives a nice view of the long straight roads going to the Grosse Stern through the Tiergarten. This level also has got a beautifully decorated wall and roof (see pictures). The next level is at the top (60m), just below the impressive 8.3m tall golden Victoria-statue which can be seen from a long way away. The view is excellent from up here.
The wall painting on the first level of the Siegesäule

We then continued on Bus 100 to Berliner Dom and the Museumsinsel (Museum Island). This is at the opposite end of Unter den Linden from Brandenburger Tor and the Reichstag (Parliament) which we passed on the way (in the bus). After we'd had an icecream to cool us down, we went to the famous Pergamon museum, which has one of the finest collections in the world of ancient Greek and Babylonic art, mostly sculptures and giant doorways. We spent about 2 hours in here, which was actually too little time to really get a look at all the magnificent works of art. We were tired and hungry, however, and we'd planned to visit the giant Berliner Dom as well..

So around 14 we went across the Spree to a very good restaurant called hEAT, in the ground floor of the new Radisson SAS hotel, which outdoor service beside the river - the hotel itself has been built after 2001, when we tried to visit the Berliner Dom, but was prevented due to the finding of an unexploded WW2 bomb on the very same place on which the massive Radisson SAS hotel stands today. The Dom area, and the first part of Karl Liebknect Strasse was sealed off after the finding, and so we didn't get to see the church that day. We did see it this time however..

The Berliner Dom is an impressive structure - it was built in 1905, damaged during the war and rebuilt afterwards - the rebuilding wasn't complete until 1993. The building is 114m long, 73m wide and an astonishing 85m high. We walked the 270 steps up to the dome, which is one of the best sightseeing points of the city, due to its extremely central location. Below the church in the crypt lies the tombs of the Hohenzollerns - the old emperors of Brandenburg. In the sermon church itself are various impressive grave monuments, and a lot of beautiful mosaics. I really recommend a visit to this church!

[Some pics will be added here, when I empty the second memorycard]

The clock had passed 17 by the time we had finished walking around the Berliner Dom (we actually spent more than 1½ hours in there), and we once again boarded the Bus 100 and drove back towards Brandeburger Tor. During our stay in Berlin in 2001 we actually visited the Brandenburger Tor, but we didn't actually see it back then, due to renovation works. We did this time, and well - it is nice to look at, and pretty big, but I don't really see what all the fuss is about - there are structures all around the city that are far more beautiful and impressive.

We went to Potsdamer Platz for dinner - we found a chain beefsteak restaurant, which was decent, although the waiters were just awful, and even thought it necessary (when they saw that we didn't leave any coins on the table) to remind us that tips are not usually included in the bill in Germany. Well - we didn't really want to leave them any tips!

We walked back to the hotel along the Landwehrkanal - a 20 minute walk in the nice evening weather.

Friday

Not much to tell - we got up late, had a magnificent breakfast and went to KaDeWe to do some shopping. We didn't actually buy much - I got myself a wodden tea-case (no, not tea tree but a wodden case for keeping and serving various kinds of tea) and a vintage Evian bottle of water. Louise bought some other junk.... (Women.. ;-)

The drive back home didn't go quite as planned, but we've had worse travelling experiences, and it worked out pretty well in the end.. But that is another story, which I might tell you over a drink sometime ;-)