Day 13 - Berlin, Deutschland

In the morning we had a walking tour through Berlin of the major third reich sites. We began at the german Reichstag (parliament) and while we were there it started raining. Some smart members of the group rain across the road to buy umbrellas and and raincoats, but we didn't want to miss anything so just put up with the rain. We moved on to a memorial for people who died trying to get across the Berlin wall in the post-war communist era.

Next stop was the Brandenburg gate. Hitler had a big parade here, and the gate was isolated in no-mans-land during the communist-wall era for 28 years. The most expensive hotel in Berlin is also there, €17,000 per night for the top suite, which is the top two floors. This is where Michael jackson dangled his baby out the window.

Next stop was the memorial for the Jews murdered during the war. This was an awesome memorial but we didn't get much time to explore it because of the rain. About 100m from this was hitlers house. His house is gone now and his garden is a car park. They tried do destroy the bunkers underneath where he killed himself, but they were to thick so just filled them up as much as possible.

We moved on to the one remaining nazi building in Berlin to see how the nazis liked to build big imposing buildings. Hitler wanted to make Berlin the capital city of the world and build a building big enough to fit 20,000 inside. We heard stories about the nutty people that were the top ranking people at the time.

Last stop was checkpoint Charlie, where people holding western passports could pass in and out of the area of west Germany cordoned by the Berlin wall. By this time we i was soaking wet! The tour was great and I would definitely recommend anyone visiting Berlin to do one. It is just a pity it was so wet!

We tried to get train tickets to get home and change, but we only had notes, so we stopped in a nearby Starbucks for change and a hot drink. They had the hugest drinks we have ever seen!

After our quick chAnge of clothes we returned to checkpoint Charlie, got some photos and had lunch - currywurst and bratwurst - German sausage specialties. The currywurst is chopped up sausage with runny tomato sauce and curry powder. The bratwurst is a long sausage in a teeny tiny bun.

After a spot of souvenir shopping a looking around the area we caught a train to a five storey department store -for more souvenirs - and found our way home for an afternoon nap. Berlin was an awesome city, but because there is so much to see and it is so big that you cannot simply walk between places we were unable to make the most of our time there.

In the evening we had a pub crawl organized with our tour group and another tour group, about 70 in total. We had beers as we walked up the street. The first pub was empty until we arrived, played bad music and was small and hot. The second was slightly better but still played bad music. The third was much better and we had fun dancing and had a few drinks. There was a random lady selling paper outside the toilet. I thought it was toilet paper and figured I'd just go without. Luckily there was toilet paper in the loo. When I came out she tried to sell me the paper again, turns out it was paper towels!

The last place was a club in a seedy dirty street near our hostel. Most of our tour group was either lost, or looking for lost people, so we gave up and went home.

Sorry not many pictures today because it was too rainy for the iPhone and we were shopping!