Another wonderful breakfast with Anna this morning, Wolf was already at work. Anna then dropped Keith and I off at the U Bahn station on her way to work and we were on our way.
The U Bahn really is a wonderful system, and very straightforward to figure out. Even the automatic ticket machine gives you a selection of languages. We hopped on and were in the heart of downtown in minutes.
We started at the famous Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, which has been left in its bombed out state as a memorial. They built a new church beside it which is very different. Then we bought tickets for the hop on hop off bus and headed to KaDeWe, Berlin's famous department store. Each floor is huge. We went straight to the sixth floor where the food is. Wine, cheeses, seafood, fresh meats, breads, pastries, and my favourite part, sausages. Lots and lots of sausages. I think they said 2000 different kinds of cold meats and 1800 cheeses. There are a mere 1400 kinds of bread. The scale of this oversized deli is hard to describe.
Back on the bus we hopped off at Checkpoint Charlie where there was another exhibit about the fall of the Berlin Wall. We then walked over to a piece of the wall that remains standing...there is very little of it left. Here we found an exhibit about the Warsaw uprising, and the total destruction of Warsaw during WW 2. We were so riveted by it we spent at least two hours there. Very moving, many people taking it in, and absolutely silent. We learned a great deal.
We had lunch with a lovely young couple from France in a nearby cafe, and then walked to Gendarmmarktplatz. We did a quick tour of one of the museums and were given an English book about German history. An unexpected gift. We will be reading it. We then jumped back on the bus to head to the Dom. We hadn't realized how late it was. It was already 5:30 PM, so once more we decided to save the Dom for the next day.
We found the nearest U Bahn station, texted Wolf and he picked us up at the station closest to the house. Anna was waiting with dinner and she had a surprise for Keith...kartoffelpuffers...the spelling may be wrong! He has been talking about them since our last visit. Yum, yum. I think we will be able to reproduce them at home now. Anna explained how. So after a delicious dinner, lots of wine and a wedding (we watched parts of their daughter Kathi's wedding to Christian, it was great) we were ready for bed. More Berlin tomorrow. You could come for a month and just get started.
Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church. All that is left is this bombed out spire.
