Berlin

Berlin is an amazing city! It was not the prettiest place we have visited in terms of scenery, but Berlin was beautiful in its own way. Here is my blog all about Berlin!

My group arrived into Berlin about 9pm local time on Thursday evening. Just for a point of reference,  Berlin is an hour ahead of Liverpool and 6 hours ahead of home. After we got off the plane and made it through customs, we were on our way! Getting to downtown Berlin was tricky. Unlike Barcelona where a majority of things were in English and Spanish, everything was in German. As a group though, we have become good at looking for certain landmarks or learning the first letter of where we need to go to help get us to where we need to go. Also, we have learned that hand gestures and pointing work when communiocating with non-English speakers. Once we checked into our hostel, we were all very tired.  We we decided to call it a night and start early in the morning.


On Friday, we woke up and got our early start! We began with a wonderful breakfast. It was an inexpensive but big breakfast we could purchased through our hostel. It was wonderful! We had yogurt, toast, cereal  cheese, salami, and many more things! It definitely filled us up and we were then on our way to Sachsenhausen concentration camp. We hopped on the train to take a 30 minute  ride to the concentration camp, then we walked 20 minutes to get there once we got off the train. It was an eerie feeling at the concentration camp. You could almost feel the sadness and horrible things which happened there. We spent about 3 hours in the camp just walking around and reading about everything that happened while the camp was in operation.

Where they use to do roll call several times a day. If someone was missing they would go find them, then start roll call over again.

The barracks where people were forced to live. 

Some people were locked up. 

The entrance to the camp.

After we visited the camp, we headed back to downtown Berlin and went to the Berlin Dome. The Berlin Dome is a beautiful cathedral! People still attend church there.  If you want to go up into the Dome it costs a little. We decided to go up! We climbed 287 stairs to get up there, but it was worth it because the view was so beautiful!

The view of the inside of the dome!

After the dome, we headed to an authentic German restaurant.  I had the best brat and sauerkraut of my life! It was served with potatoes and bacon.  It was a fantastic meal! We then headed back to the hostel, where we hung out and played games before we headed to bed. We turned in early to get ready for another fun packed day in Berlin.

On Saturday, we woke up and had the same great breakfast, then made our way to the Berlin Wall. The Berlin Wall was so cool because on one side there was artwork and on the other there was graffiti. It was definitely a cool site to visit. Below are pictures of some of the amazing artwork I found.

After the wall, we went to the Holocaust memorial and museum  Like the concentration camp, there are not words to describe what it is. You just have to go and feel those emotions yourself. It was definitely a great experience, and I am glad that I went. We then had a quick bite to eat, walked through the Brandenburg Gate and sat in the park for a few hours just to relax. Berlin was a wonderful trip, and I would definitely go back again someday. Next on the agenda is my first full week of teaching at Much Woolton, then off to Paris on Friday! Thank you to everyone reading my blog and following my trip! I really hope you are enjoying. Cheers until next time!