Germany - Part 2

To finish up the Germany post, we went to Hamburg and did some strolling.

  

Kristie showed us around some beautiful churches and buildings before having lunch and heading home. We stayed in Ratzeburg overnight at her parents’ house, because we were leaving early in the morning for Berlin – Ratzeburg was more convenient for us than Lubeck. So we had some ice cream, swung on what I’m sure was a very old and well-kept willow, and took some naps outside in the sun.

  

Early the next morning, we carpooled with a lady to Berlin – about a 2.5 hour drive. Not so bad, especially since we slept off and on the entire time.
Berlin. Man. Big place. Figuring out the train system was a little confusing at first, but we got the hang of it fast. If you go to Berlin, get a rail map. The trip would have been impossible without it. Our hostel was the “cool” hostel – called Generator. I didn’t take any pictures, but it had all kinds of pipes and lights and cool things around. I felt distinctly out of place.

  

Anyway, after a quick nap (why are we always so tired? Seriously.) we hopped on the train to go see the Brandenburg Gate (Brandenburger Tor). After a quick connection at Alexanderplatz (home of the giant TV tower, and where we spent 25-30% of our time in Berlin), we were there. It’s so big! And Gate-y. Really cool to see in real life what I’ve seen pictures of for years. Then we walked over to the Reichstag, taking a picture of the location of the Berlin Wall on the way.

  

  

After a quick walk through a little park, we decided to take a long (looong) hike down to the Victory Column. We didn’t know what it was, but we could see it and decided it was worthwhile. Along the way, we found some other assorted monuments and photo ops. I met a Russian man who asked me (in so many Russian words) to take a picture of him in front of the middle pictured monument, and I also figured out the map! Because I’M A MAN*.

  

*Also the reason for this picture of me in front of a tank. Yeah. The man thing.

The victory column! Man is it big. Imagine my delight when I found out there were stairs (280 of them) which we could take to the top. (This would have unforeseen consequences for Mary’s legs for the next few days, by the way.) So up we went! Super cool. There was a girl playing a grand piano on the street at the bottom, which was surprisingly loud and clear up at the top. So nice.

  

On the way back to the hostel, we passed by some fountains and things that, although not historical or all that impressive, I had to take pictures of. Because I’m a man?

 

The next day, we set out to find the Berlin City Museum. Which we didn’t. We did find the Berliner Dom (the Berlin Dome Cathedral), which was beautiful – and although I had already promised Mary that we would climb no more towers, we found ourselves climbing up more stairs to get to the walk around the outside top of the dome. Again, the view was worth it.

  

We carpooled back to meet Kristie – this time with an older German man – Gerd – and a travelling student named Oliver. Since I slept for around 70% of this ride, it also seemed to go quickly. I’m pretty sure he was a bit of a faster driver as well. We went out for pizza in Ratzeburg (or nearby) with Kristie and Basti, then went home to sleep.

The next morning (Wednesday) we had to be up at 4:45 am to catch the train to the Hamburg airport. Kristie (again, being very nice) drove us to the station. In a few short hours, we found ourselves in Switzerland – which I will write about in another probably equally-as-rushed post.