Category Germany

Ich Liebe Berlin

Our last day – and still so many choices.  We will leave Berlin with another week’s worth of things to see and do should we return.  The Pergamon Museum was one of my must-sees.  We read about 2-hour queues, so we got there (relatively) early, and waited 45 minutes.  It is a very inefficient entry […]

Joining the Dots

It was time to join the tourist crowds and visit the main sights of the central city, as well as a few miscellaneous things on our list.  First, we returned to the Reichstag and Brandenburg Tor in daylight, both still massively impressive.  We couldn’t climb the glass dome of the Reichstag, as you have to […]

Buses and Trains, Ferries and Planes

Originally we planned a visit to Potsdam and Sans Souci, but we’re pretty palaced-out.  Instead we took the train to Wannsee, right on the edge of Zone B, where our rail passes finish.  Wannsee is situated on a lake, and has its own beach which is very popular on warm days.  Today was overcast so […]

Saturday in Berlin

We are staying in Charlottenburg, in the heart of what was West Berlin.  Being a warm sunny Saturday, we decided to join the Berliners for a stroll through the local park.  Which just so happens to have a Palace in it.  Charlottenburg Schloss is one of the two most significant Prussian palaces in Berlin.  It […]

Following the Berlin Wall

The first item on most people’s Berlin bucket list is of course the Wall.  For the first 30 years of my life, Berlin, Germany and Europe were divided into East and West.  I never knew anything different; we just accepted it as an unfortunate fact of life.  I vaguely knew that it had something to […]

Ian’s Gluten Free Blog Part 1 – Germany (Hamburg and the Northern Coast)

There are two approaches to traveling gluten free (gf) in foreign lands.  Either approach will require a degree of flexibility – and sometimes you need to employ a bit of both. Approach 1 I call the “5-star” method.  You stay in hotels, travel with organised tours and eat mostly in restaurants.  You have to negotiate […]

Last Days At Sea

The final day at sea is for trying out all those new things you haven’t yet got around to. Breakfast – porridge and pancakes.  The man sitting next to me ate SIX Danish pastries, then told his wife he was going back to the cabin for a nap. Don’t think we’ll be bumping into him […]

Choices Choices Choices

After 24 hours we have gone from cruise newbies to cruise experts.  What we have learned so far is that cruising is not unlike orienteering – choices and decisions need to be made at every turn.  The only difference is that at orienteering, they don’t ply you with continuous food and drinks. Let’s back track […]

Neubrandenburg, City of Four Gates

Today we decided to drive to Neubrandenburg, about 100 kms south.  Number one attraction is the completely intact medieval wall, and the four city gates.  Another plus was that we could take the A20 autobahn and finally get onto dual carriageway!  We quickly learned autobahn etiquette – stay to the right unless you are overtaking.  […]

Peenemunde and Poland

Peenemunde is a small seaside town on Usedom Island, about 90 kms southeast of Stralsund.  The name means “river mouth”.  Its claim to fame, and reason for our visit, is its role in the development of modern rocketry, in particular the V1 and V2 rockets.  The Army Research Center was founded in 1937 as a […]