Next Stop Berlin

Hi Hensku.

Waving back to my friend Sarah

Charlottenburg is, at least to me, a rather large area west of Tiergarten. The area is known for being a bit cleaner looking than the rest of Berlin, and particullary Eastern Berlin. Not that Eastern Berlin is particullary dirty, it isn't.

Kaiser Wilhelm Gedächtniskirche is in the southern part of the area. Incidently, the joke is that they're trying to put lipstick and make up (Lippenstift und Puderdose) on a face with really bad teeth (Hollow tooth = Holzahn).

Charlottenburg has a large palace called Schloss Charlottenburg. It is a magnificent palace, that I wished I remembered before I wrote my last message. It is open to the public, and really worth the visit despite being rebuilt after the war and thus not the original.

Ku'damm (or officially Kurfürstendam) is a large shopping boulevard with high end boutiques. Not really for my wallet, but you can always go windowshopping. KaDeWe (Kaufhas Des Westen) is also in (or rather on the border with Schöneberg).

The neighbourhoods has some palace like buildings, that are nice to look at when walking around.

It is also close to Tiergarten, which certainly is a nice park.

Sarah: I was never in Berlin before the wall came down. My first visit was in the 90's, so I never saw the "no mans land" in real life. The gate is still on my must see list every time I visit Berlin, but I've never been overwhelmed by it.

I have to agree that Checkpoint Charlie is kind of a Tourist Trap (non VT'ers have to excuse our VT vocabulary). The actors remind me of the hustlers in roman legionares attire outside the Colluseum, but I've never been troubled by the "American" and "Russian soldiers". However I found the museum interesting when I was there. Disclaimer: It's been a long time since I visited the museum so things might have changed quite a bit.

Quoting Hensku

i havent seen the film nor read the book, though cabaret show would be nice to see, i think will have to see what my travel companions think about it

Although the original cabaret clubs of the period were quite 'adult' they were the centre of sarcastic and irreverent humour against the politics of the growing national socialist movement, so were the first to feel the bullwhip of the brown shirts. Lots of humorous skits / sketches with musical (often burlesque) sections in between.
I'm not sure how closely the modern version follows the original, especially as mainstream Germany is consumed by political correctness.

Quoting Skandinavisk

Kaiser Wilhelm Gedächtniskirche is in the southern part of the area. Incidently, the joke is that they're trying to put lipstick and make up (Lippenstift und Puderdose) on a face with really bad teeth (Hollow tooth = Holzahn).

The joke makes sense when you see it but the history of the place is really moving and I like the modern stained glass.

Quoting Skandinavisk

I have to agree that Checkpoint Charlie is kind of a Tourist Trap (non VT'ers have to excuse our VT vocabulary). The actors remind me of the hustlers in roman legionares attire outside the Colluseum, but I've never been troubled by the "American" and "Russian soldiers". However I found the museum interesting when I was there. Disclaimer: It's been a long time since I visited the museum so things might have changed quite a bit.

I exempt the museum from the Tourist Trap label - it's a while since we were in there but I remember finding it absolutely fascinating. Generally I feel Berlin has done an excellent job of accepting the challenges that its own past present (Nazi rule, Soviet divide) in presenting them to a tourist audience - respectful of the past, understanding of its fascinations, but also showcasing how they have moved on and are building a new future. That Checkpoint Charlie set-up really jarred for me all the more because it was the one place I observed where history had become a gimmicky show for the tourists.

It wasn’t my intent to say that the museum is a tourist trap. I meant to say that it wasn’t.

I have only been to Berlin once and that was a day trip from a cruise ship so I did not get to see any of the museums that my daughter saw with my mother when she was there in 1976. (My mother had trouble getting my daughter through Checkpoint Charlie and she almost got in trouble in Potsdam for taking a photo out the window of what proved to be the east side of the border)

We had a bus tour of the city. We were in the old East Germany so we had a tour of the old East Berlin. We saw quite a few Trabi cars which had been - the guide told us - the only cars you could buy in East Germany, and were cheap plastic boxes, which even though they were cheap, you still had to wait several years to get one. About 1030 we got to Checkpoint Charlie and it was clear to me that we were going to get out and walk, so I said I would stay on the bus and I did. My granddaughter walked with the group through and along the old wall which is marked on the road with bricks and saw the Holocaust Memorial. She was disappointed not to get a photo of herself at the checkpoint. The bus drove around to meet them on the other side. By 1100 we were at the Brandenberg Gate, and I did get out there and took some photos of my granddaughter there. Then we stopped for another photo op at the part of the wall that remains and she bought some souvenir pieces of the wall. Then because streets were being blocked off for some kind of bike race tomorrow, we went back to Checkpoint Charlie and this time it was to go to lunch so I did get pictures of my granddaughter there after all.

We went to a place called Maximillians where we were to have 'typical' German fare. It was a buffet. .

After lunch, we got on a boat and rode out to Potsdam. It was a nice boat ride (we were on the top deck). My granddaughter slept a little bit on the life preserver box. We got to Potsdam about 1500, and walked up to Cecilienhof where the Potsdam Conference was held. Here I decided it would be too much walking for me, so Suzanne (our minder) took me back to the bus. My granddaughter went on with the group. She reported that the tour was mostly of the gardens and they didn't go into the house. The best she was able to do was to take a picture of the window in the room where the Potsdam conference was held. Then we got back on the bus and drove around Potsdam itself and then we went to Sansouci Park.

Skandinavisk, thank you for your lenghty answer to my question about the neighbourhood! I am looking forward to see the Shloss Charlottenburg and other "palace like buildings".
Window shopping option might be the one for me, i dont like to carry lots of shopping bags with me while looking around, also i travel with carry-on so not a lot of room available in my bag either
"The Checkpoint Charlies Tourist Trap thingy" lessen my eagerness to see the place, i dont particularly like the places where its opportunity to "fake a photograph"..

GreatgrandmaR, quite lots of sights in short period of time, did the tour feel rushed?
I have thinked about the boat drive, it could be nice way to see around!

It was a very long day because first we had a train trip from the port. But I don't know that it was any more rushed than any other tour.