It was a beautiful sunny morning when I woke up at 6:30 AM. We were looking forward to having a nice sunny, but cold day according to the weather forecast. I worked on the computer for a little while, processing some photos from yesterday before I woke Stephanie up. She was suffering a little from a slight cold, so it was good to let her sleep in a little longer. We did not have a pressing schedule for today, we only needed to be at the Reichstag by 10:30 AM for our appointment to go up into the glass dome.
We took our time getting ready, and we set a goal of leaving the room by 9:00 AM. We ate a little bit of breakfast in the room, I had my yogurt that we purchased yesterday, and Stephanie had some leftover cheese and a diet Coke. We were planning to stop at a bakery right around the corner from the hotel before heading out, but we both wanted to eat a little bit before we left the room.
Brandenburg Gate
We left right on time and stopped at the Kamps Backstube eatery and Stephanie ordered two mini croissants and I had an apple filled pastry. We got them to go, and ate them as we headed to the Hackescher Markt Station to catch the S-Bahn train. We took the S2 train to Friedrich Strasse Station and then changed to the S25 train to the Brandenburger Tor Station, which placed us near the Brandenburg Gate. We stopped there to take some photos of the Brandenburg Gate since we had been there in the late afternoon on Monday when we visited before, and the sun was almost directly behind the gate, making for poor photos. There were also less people there today, so it was nice to be able to get better photos of the gate.
The Reichstag Building
After we finished with the photos, we headed to the Reichstag, which is the Parliament building for Germany. It was an old building built in the late 1800’s, and severely damaged by bombings during WWII. It was virtually abandoned until it was restored in 1999, to be used as the Parliament building for the now unified Germany. The signature addition was the replacement of the original stone dome, damaged during the bombings, with a glass dome, which has walkways inside it that go to the top. That was what we were doing today, touring the dome at our appointed time of 10:45 AM.
We were there a little early, so we went to a gift shop and purchased a small plastic arch that had a piece of the original Berlin Wall inside, or so it claimed. We will convert this to a Christmas ornament when we get home. We joked around a little, wondering if it was a real piece of the wall, or just a concrete chunk with a little paint on it. Our standing joke on souvenir validity is from Murano near Venice. Almost all of the glass around Venice says “Made in Murano” on a sticker placed on the glassware, we just always wondered if they were really made in China, with a sticker for “authenticity”. Like this, we just had to believe it was real, or at least real to us.
We still had a few minutes, so we walked around the grounds outside of Reichstag taking some photos. We arrived at the security station at 10:30 AM, which was the recommended time for our 10:45 AM appointment. We headed in and showed our passports, which they verified against the information we had given them on Monday when we only had our passport color copies. Once through the verification of identification we had our backpacks scanned, and went through a metal detection gate just like airport security. I had to be scanned and frisked, my belt, watch and necklace set of the metal detector when I walked through, so obviously, it was set to a very sensitive detection level.
Inside the Reichstag Dome
Once through security, we headed inside the building and waited in another line to take the large elevator up to the top of the roof to access the dome. The elevator probably held 25 people at a time. Once we arrived at the roof level, we each received audio guides for the dome walk. They are GPS activated, based on your location on the walkways. I needed to use the WC, and even it was somewhat secured, they would only let two people at a time go into the restroom, which only had only two. Mine stall only had a urinal in it, so I assume the other contained a toilet, but who knows.
Sunlight Reflectors Inside the Reichstag Dome
We headed outside to the roof level, which was quite large. We could see some rain storms approaching, so we decided to go into the dome while it was sunny to get better photos. we started up the circular ramp and stopped periodically, as directed by the audio guide, to get information on the buildings around the Berlin skyline. What had appeared to be rain in the distance, now turned into a heavy snowfall. It had been really cold this morning, and was still cold enough to produce snow, but not cold enough for it to stick to the ground. It was really heavy at times, and then the sun would appear, and then it was cloudy again with more snow.
The entire experience in the dome was fantastic, it is an engineering marvel. The top was open for ventilation, and there was a rotating sunscreen to keep the sun from being too bright in the Parliament chambers that were below the dome. There were also mirrors in the middle to direct sunlight into the parliament chambers below for lighting.
Top Of The Dome is Open For Ventilation
Several times, we had really heavy snow as we toured the dome. There were separate ramps for upward bound and downward bound travelers, and by the time we were heading downward, the upward side was really crowded, most likely from large tour groups that had entered.
Once we got back to the roof level, it was still snowing, and we went outside to take some pictures in the snow showers. About ten minutes later, it was sunny and we also got some really good pictures in the sunshine.
The Reichstag Dome
We took the elevator down, and left the Reichstag Building, it had been a really great tour, and the best part was that it was free. We were now heading to the Jewish Memorial, which we could see from the dome, and that Stephanie had read about in the Rick Steve’s guidebook. It was located a few blocks from the Reichstag, and was directly behind the US Embassy. Most all of the embassies are near the Reichstag, and we could see the various embassy flags flying from atop their respective buildings when we were in the dome.
On the way to the memorial, it really started to snow hard. We got out our umbrellas, mainly to keep our backpacks dry, but the wind was blowing so hard, we had to put them away. The snow was really coming down hard, but luckily, it was still too warm to stick to the ground.
Stephanie At The Jewish Memorial
The Jewish Memorial was interesting, it was completed in 2004, and there were 2,711 concrete rectangles on 4.7 acres of land, and cost Euro 25 million. The concrete rectangles are in grid rows, and are all the same length and width, but both the height of the concrete and the ground they sit on varies in elevation. Even more interesting was that the memorial was built at the sight that once was on and/or near the home of Joseph Goebbels, the NAZI propaganda minister, and a leading Nazi General. There was an secrete emergency escape bunker for him and his family found at the site during construction of the memorial. It was interesting, but there are certainly issues with the memorial, and it affords interesting reading online about the politics and construction deficiencies of the memorial.
Jewish Memorial
We walked over to the Brandenburg Gate area and found a restaurant to eat some lunch. We had Panini’s at the Backer Wiedemann eatery. I had ham, and Stephanie had salami. We stopped just in time, about five minutes after we sat down, it started snowing really hard again. It was already full inside the small restaurant, but when the snowfall started, people were really flocking in to get out of the weather.
By the time we finished, the sun was out again. We decided to head to the Pergamon Museum at Museum Island, so we got back on the S-Bahn, and headed to the Friedrichstrasse Station, and them back to Hackescher Markt for the short walk to the museum. On the walk from Hackescher Markt, we had some more heavy snowfall.
Babylonian Ishtar Gate
Once we arrived at the museum, we had to wait about 45 minutes to enter, and it was quite a chilly wait. They were letting groups of about 30 inside at a time, and we got caught as numbers 31 and 32, we were the cut off for the people ahead of us. Once inside, we used our Berlin Welcome Card tickets as admission, and got our free audio guide. We placed our backpacks and jackets inside lockers, and headed inside. It was an interesting museum, although the centerpiece of the museum, the Pergamon Altar, is under renovation. The museum held several large exhibits from the Babylonian era and from Islamic Art.
Reconstructed Ruins Inside The Pergamon Museum
We finished the museum about 4:00 PM, and headed back to the hotel, first stopping at the nearby grocery for some Ginger Ale, wine and bottled water. It is really interesting in the store, they have an automated bottle deposit return system, and it scans glass and plastic bottles to read their bar codes to determine the deposit refund amount. In general, plastic water bottles have a 0.25 deposit on them, and the machine gives a credit voucher based on how many bottles are scanned. Then, you take the printed voucher to the check out for reimbursement in money. For aluminum cans it appeared to automatically read the weight for a reimbursement.
We headed back to the room for a relaxing refreshment before dinner, and taking a break felt good. We are tired from all of the walking, even though we try to use public transportation as much as possible.
Sausages For My Dinner
After our break, we headed out to Hackescher Markt for dinner. We looked at various menus, but we ended up going back to the Barist Restaurant once again, the same place we had dinner last night. Most of the other places seemed higher in price, and no one was eating at them. The Barist was packed again, just like last night, so the food must be good, and the prices reasonable. In addition, they have an extensive menu, so there are many different things to order.
Schnitzel For Stephanie
Tonight, I had the grilled sausages with warm potato salad and a side salad, and Stephanie had the Schnitzel, also served with warm potato salad and a large side salad. The Schnitzel was almost too much to eat it was so large, and very good, and my sausages were excellent. Of course, we had to sample more German Beer, Stephanie had a Pilsner, and I had a Duckstein. It was almost more than we could eat, and I had to help Stephanie finish her Schnitzel.
Creepy Cat Food Cans – Do You Know Felix?
After dinner, we walked around a bit and found another grocery store, so we headed in to see what they had. We ended up buying another lime, and a couple of other items, but had fun looking at their pet foods, the labels were hilarious.
We headed back to the hotel and turned in for the night, relaxing a little and working on the blog for today. Hopefully, I will be able to add pictures to the blogs soon, but in the meantime, I will add photos to the photo albums, it is a little quicker.
Luckily, Stephanie is feeling better tonight, and I am taking AirBorne as a preventative. Tomorrow we are heading to Potsdam to see some palaces, and are looking forward to the forecast of sunny weather. Oh wait, that was also the forecast for today, there was no mention of snow last night or this morning. I guess we will wait and see what happens with the weather as it unfolds tomorrow.