Berlin

We are coming to the end of our German tour. I'm currently sitting in the lobby of the AO Hostel using a wifi that we paid for and listening to Johnny Cash -- yes, Johnny Cash.

But, since time on the wifi is ticking, and it's 9 p.m. and I need to get to bed, here's what the last two days have entailed.

We moved from Hamburg to Berlin via train

Arrived at one very large train station and tried to figure out how to get to the Hostel

Got it figured out and walked the several blocks or so

The hotel is under construction (crew started at 5:50 a.m. today) with really tiny rooms (smacked my head a couple of times) and furnished by IKEA.

Toured around the area immediately by our hotel, which included the Brandenberg Gate (very cool) and the Jewish Memorial (also very cool and very emotional).

Today we went to . . . gasp . . . a church. But this was a church that had been bombed during the war and never rebuilt. It was the Kaiser Wilhelm I Memorial Church and was something to behold. But the war pretty much destroyed it. It was pretty impressive, and so was the replacement church, although I'm not really into modern. But still . . .

Then we went to the Berlin Zoo. In short, it was a zoo. But what really caught my attention was the fact that there were practically no fences. Once I realized that, the rhino seemed a bit closer.

After wandering around the zoo, we did some souvenir shopping. Then we had lunch at a fabulous Indian restaurant. It was very good; but what really impressed me was that the waiter cleared the table with all the dishes on one arm.

From there we hopped on a train to Check Point Charlie. Even knowing the history of it, it is totally different being there in person. There are a bevy of museums, memorabilia (surprisingly, clothing from the old USSR is big -- I thought about coming home with a Soviet cap but decided against it). And the history markers around the area are amazing.

We also had our pictures taken with a couple of "American" guards at the checkpoint. One "MP" came up later, and was flirting with all three girls (Mrs. Ref, The Kid and The Kid's Friend). They got some cute pictures with him, passports stamped appropriately, and lots of fun. We looked at more souvenirs I'd like to purchase, but just don't have the room to take back, and followed the path of the Wall.

There's a walking tour you can take following the Wall. For the most part, where the Wall was are bricks along the whole path, so you can walk the entire circuit. It is, like everything else we've seen, amazing. And also lots of fun.

Then back to the train station for a light meal and dessert and back to the Hostel were we need to get packed up for tomorrow. We are leaving at 5:45 (just before the construction crew starts) to get to the station by 6. We'll eat breakfast there, buy some lunch for the train trip, then make our way to Amsterdam. It's about a six hour trip.

And, if everything goes as planned, we'll fly out of Amsterdam for home, arriving in at 11 p.m. local time. That's a long day. And it's going west, so it's much worse for jet lag.

Oh, and that construction thing . . . Mrs. Ref talked with the staff and got us a free drink. So I'm going to sign out, enjoy my VERY LARGE Bavarian Wheat Beer, and get ready for our mega trip home.

So, as the Germans say . . . "Tschuess."