East and West Berlin And the wall came tumbling down

 

Easter surprise

I awoke early and went down for my breakfast on Easter when I went to close my door I found a nice  surprise candy tied to door 4 chocolate bar and 3  bunny and it sure made me smile. 

A visit to East Berlin was thing I have wanted to do for a long time, I used to have some penpals in East Berlin and they would me the places they wanted to go when the Wall came down. They all were Beatle fans and they were so inspired by the messages of the Beatles and that helped the wall to come down. Here is a quote I read. "But they were very insistent that not only were the Beatles colossal from the Berlin Wall to Vladivostok but that they'd played a really significant part in helping to wash away totalitarianism - even though they were never able to play there"  I lost track of them and I always wondered if they were able to realize their dreams of traveling to Liverpool home of the Beatles and London and Abbey Road things that I have taken for granted for years. 

Berlin Brandenburger Tor

Moltke Bridge Spree River

I arrived Easter Sunday afternoon and was able to check in my hotel right by the train station and set off. I was going to take a walking tour with Sandeman New Europe tours but I was way to early for that. I walked around a bit watched some boats glide by and then I headed out in search of  Brandenburg Gate. I walked I found it after a bit of a hike and then I snapped some photos I realized I was way too early for the walk I planned to do with Sandeman New Europe tours/Berlin so I walked back over to the park that was having a carnival for Easter.

Cricket at the wall

Holocaust Memorial

I found a place making crepes so naturally ordered a chocolate one, yum was not disappointed. I walked back fro my tour and finally the guides arrived easy to spot with red t-shirts and an umbrella signed up and got my group. Our guide was originally from Missouri and thought Berlin was the best city in the world beating out London I beg to differ. London has it beat hands down to me Berlin was just a big city and nothing much of interest to me. We headed off on our tour the guide was really good and filled us in on all sorts of stuff. The main thing of interest to me was the Wall. We walked through the Holocaust Memorial lets just say it was interesting. The guide was giving a history of all the events with the Wall going up and for me it was a review because I lived through those times, so it was almost a re-indictment. Some parts of the wall were still there and then they had check point charlie and the guide scoffed at the whole thing called it all Disney land and well I enjoyed seeing it. I don't care if the soldiers were actors I still enjoyed having my photo taken with them even it was not real and gladly paid my 2 euro for a bit of fun. After that explored some more on and my own and gradually made my way back to the hotel I got hungry so I went and had some fish in the train station at a place I saw when I arrived it was rather late so there was not a lot of choice I settled for some fish and rather huge yummy chips.

Visiting the Wall is like a Disney attraction