Barb and Baden’s Excellent Return to Germany – Final
The Uniqueness of Bear-leen
Several weeks ago I had written about how we were originally only planning on coming to Berlin (properly pronounced bear-leen) for the entire Germany trip. Back then it was going to be a much shorter 8-10 day trip and of course, it expanded into what became close to three weeks.
As of today we have been in Berlin for 4 days and looking back on it all, if we had only come to Berlin I could have still been very happy. Berlin, Paris, Madrid, London, I could stay in any of them and be content. It’s the excitement of the city that I like and each of the above European cities offers so many things to see and do that I could never get tired of. Of course, I have to say that Paris is still my favourite city in any country but having spent the 4 days so far here I’ve got to say that Berlin has to be a close second.
The one thing that I’m missing in Berlin is the architecture. There is just so much new construction that has taken place over the past few decades that the look of Berlin doesn’t have the same historic grandeur that most other large cities in Europe have.
When we were staying with my friend Frank at the start of this trip, we were reminiscing how we would have liked to have spent more time in Berlin when I came to Germany by myself in 2006. If you recall from my blog stories from that trip (See: Baden’s Excellent German Adventure – Final ), we had decided to spend a few days in Dresden and on the train ride from Hamburg to Dresden we stopped in Berlin for a few hours. In hindsight staying in Berlin instead of Dresden would have been a preferable choice. Nonetheless, we are here in Berlin now and will have 7 days here to get our fill of this unique city.
One of the most unique things about Berlin is that so much reconstruction was done on it after the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 and subsequently East and West Germany reunified into a single Germany in 1990. Not only did massive reconstruction begin in the former East Berlin but in all of the former East Germany. As a result of all of this construction, Berlin has a look and feel all of its own and in many ways is not like any other European city because of its newness.
In addition to the reconstruction that started after Germany reunified, most of Berlin was rebuilt after World War 2 so subsequently there are virtually none of the buildings that are 100’s of years old that we have regularly seen in other German towns that we have visited so far.
Well Located
We are staying in a hotel just off of one of the most famous shopping streets in Europe called Kfurstendamm. For a minute I was going to say that it is like the Champs-Élysées in Paris but while attractive, the shopping on the Champs-Élysées is really horrible. Paris’s Boul. Haussmann would be a better comparison for the city’s premium shopping street.
Speaking of shopping, the must-see high-end department store in Berlin is obviously KaDeWe (pronounced: ka-dey-vey). This huge department store (apparently second in size only to Harrod’s in London) is the place to go if you intend on doing any shopping in this city. Fortunately for us, KaDeWe is just a few blocks from our hotel and I can attest that next to our hotel room Barb and Ruth have spent more time in this building than anywhere else.
Sadly, the large department store chain Karstadt, which is the 128-year-old parent company of KaDeWe, declared bankruptcy this week while we were in Berlin. While its future is uncertain, the global recession seems to be affecting Germany quite hard. Compared to every other trip to Germany that we have been here, I have not seen as many “sale” signs in stores with deep discounts being offered.
Getting Around
In comparison to our last stay here in 2001, we were then on the outskirts of the city where we had to take transit to get to any kind of store. Our present hotel location is ideally suited to walk to just about everything. Of course, Berlin is so big that you could never walk to everything, but as Berlin has one of the best transit systems in the world as long as you are near a subway station known as a U-bahn (pronounced: oo-bahn) then you’re set. As Barb and I normally do we have purchased a 1 week unlimited transit pass. After this, we can ride the U-bahn or S-Bahn (the commuter train extension of the U-Bahn) whenever we want at no extra cost. This is a big consideration as we have often had a spur-of-the-moment idea to go somewhere and if we had to pay each time we would likely end up not seeing many parts of the city.
Favouring Spring Time
Most of you who know us know that we have almost always travelled in the fall – mostly in September or October. We decided a long time ago that this time of year was perfect for us as most people who had children were not travelling as they were back in school and in most parts of the world the weather is usually still pretty good.
However, after this trip, we may have turned all of this upside down.
With us deciding to break with tradition and take our “big” vacation in the spring time we have had a chance to see some real advantages of travelling in May/June. By far the biggest plus is that the evenings are far more usable this time of year since it’s daylight much later. By late September it starts getting dark earlier and earlier (at least in the northern hemisphere). In Berlin this week we have been walking home after dinner and it’s still light outside. We may need to completely reassess if a spring vacation is the way to go from now on.
Separate Ways
It’s Friday now and it’s our 5th day in Berlin but the number of days before we return home to Vancouver are getting closer. We have the full weekend to ourselves but on early Monday morning, we will be heading for the airport.
One of the things that being in Berlin has changed for us is that we are no longer all together for the whole day. Today Barb and I were together for part of the day and then we went our own direction. We only saw Ruth for breakfast and won’t see her again until dinner.
All of this is quite normal and not unexpected so don’t read too much into this. Ruth has been running out of energy to keep up with Barb and me as we will typically spend most of the day walking around. As a result, she has been staying closer to the hotel each day and only going out shopping here and there. Luckily our hotel proximity lends itself to that.
For Barb and I, we no longer spend the whole day together as I am usually off scouring the city for places to photograph and Barb finds other things that are of more interest. I’m sure that most of those places involve stores that sell shoes. So it’s a win-win situation. 🙂
The Food
It is impossible for me to visit any place in Europe and not talk about the food. If there is any bad that has come out of our travels is that we have become so spoiled for all of the good food that we have had in Europe. In particular, pastries, breads and cakes are so much better than what we normally have at home that it’s difficult to describe how much of a difference there is.
The most noticeable difference in the variety of foods here is when we were in a small town. Fresh public markets appear at least once or twice a week in the public areas (or platzes) where the sheer variety of different foods like produce and seafood exceeds our local supermarkets in Vancouver by a wide margin. And it’s not like all of the food sold here is grown in Germany – much of it is imported from countries like France, Spain and Italy but the taste of the imported food seems so much better.
Comparing restaurant food on the other hand is a different story. By and large, much of the German food that we have eaten in restaurants is heavy on meat and potatoes and gravy is served in quantities about twice what I would normally like. Vegetables served with the main dish are often cooked a lot more than I normally like them but virtually all restaurants that we went to offer side salads that in most cases were more than just boring lettuce and tomatoes.
Barb was commenting to me last night that she has not seen any sidewalk vendors or in the pedestrian zones here in Berlin that sell the brötchen und würstes (buns and sausages). The last time that we had one of these was just before leaving München so maybe they’re not such a Berlin thing.
In Germany, Everything’s Good
Today is Sunday which means that it’s our last day in Berlin (and Germany) and we will be flying home to Vancouver tomorrow. I can honestly say that if we had only come to visit Berlin as we had originally talked about I would be quite happy as I really do like this city. As we have done for Paris, I can definitely see us coming back to Germany in the future to only visit Berlin. I could easily stay here for 8 or 10 days on another trip.
Over the past few days, I have gone to many different parts of Berlin and keep finding something new just around the corner. With my rudimentary German speaking skills, I have found that I am comfortable enough in most situations by myself as when I am with Barb or Ruth I almost always let them do most of the speaking.
I will be sad to leave Germany tomorrow. I feel that there is a lot of the German culture that I can identify with – perhaps more so than any other country that we have visited. At some point in the future, I can easily see Barb and I staying in some part of Germany for a long time, months, perhaps when we are retired.
I think that our Excellent Return to Germany can be summed up with the following thought: I was by myself this morning walking through an area of Berlin called Charlottenburg. I went there primarily to see the Schloss Charlottenburg (the palace) but afterwards was walking through the surrounding neighbourhood just taking in the sights. It was one of those nice sunny afternoons where most everyone was just relaxing in the parks or just sitting at an outdoor restaurant having a drink. I happened to sit down on a bench in a park and next to me on the bench was an old man. After a few minutes, the man turned to me and asked “Alles gut” (is everything good)? And it was.
The photos from this trip can be seen on my photo website here.
.Barb and Baden’s Excellent Adventures will return on our next trip that we have not planned at this point. No doubt that during the summertime, this will become clearer.
Take care.
Baden
