Tue, 02 Sep 2003

author Tim	location Hotel Remter, Berlin, Deutschland
posted 08:22 CEST 03/09/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Deutschland/Deutschland 2 ( all photos )

The End of Berlin ( 26 photos )
After a nice buffet breakfast in the hotel, we got ourselves organised and went out for a wander.
We were looking for an Internet café and found plenty, but none who would let us plug in. Very strange indeed for such a large city. We found a Starbucks with wireless but they wanted 7 euros to get online. Ouch. Perhaps we will have more luck in Czech.
Mid afternoon a call came in about Rosie which we decyphered to mean that they had driven her around for a long time and eventually replaced a fuel pump, filter or both. It was ready to collect, but we had already told the hotel we would stay another night, intending to head off early in the morning.
We eventually decided to go check out the Spanish / Portugese restaurant just across the road from the hotel for an early dinner, which turned out to be a good move. I had Paella for the first time ever while Liz enjoyed her trout. We both enjoyed that someone else was paying :)
After dinner, we decided that a visit to Berlin's top tourist attraction was most probably worth it - the re-constructed glass dome on top of the Reichstag building. A bus and a walk got us there, via a huge travelling circle of painted ceraming teddy bears, one from each of 132 countries around the world.
We queued for a long time outside the Reichstag, but apparently less than average. After the metal detector and a big lift, we were up the top and there it was! The original dome was destroyed long ago, and this re-design is proving quite popular. We could see down into the parliament (only one "house" in Deutschland), but there was nothing going on there this late at night - everyone seemed to be a floor or two up, just below us, at a rather swanky looking ball. They may have been having nice food and drink, but they were in the fishbowl and we were looking in!
We wandered up the spiral ramp to the top of the dome, but the central part was closed for renovation, so we had to come down the same way. The views were great, but it's funny how some architectural things just work and others don't. This one did, and the dome itself stole the show.
After returning to the bottom of the dome, we spent half an hour or so wandering around in a circle, viewing the history of the building which is very interestingly displayed all around.
We'd had our fill, so we walked out, looking for a coffee shop. We hadn't gone far when we heard a voice say "are you guys from Australia?" Perhaps the huge aussie flag on my backpack gave it away, but there we were, talking to Jacqui from Aus. After whittling it down, it turns out that she is from Carss Park, Carwar Ave, right opposite the bowling club. Grew up about 200 metres away from me and here we are, meeting for the first time on the other side of the world! Also, her best friend is Pandora Zahar, who lives two doors up from our old house in Erang Street.
We chatted for a while over a coffee on Unter Den Linden, said "It's a small world" a few times, then agreed to try and meet up through Pandora at some stage in a year or two.

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