Berlin

Mario, the dogs and I spent a quick weekend in Berlin. Mario and I have visited before but still needed to see a few more things so we decided to return. Berlin is about 6.5 hours from the house. ​

Prior to us leaving on our trip, our local farmers were protesting about the recent diesel tax, which meant they took their tractors and blocked traffic. This happened around Germany and France. So I was worried we would face major delays, but we lucked out and only ran into one tractor blockage but was able to go around them to get off our exit. 

Our hotel was located in the middle of the city, close to a few things we wanted to see. When checking in we were upgraded to a room with a view of the church. We had high hopes for this hotel due to the fact we we close to things we wanted to see and that they accepted dogs and a Hilton brand. The breakfast buffet was good size and full of yummy choices. Unforeseen to us, the hotel would host 2 major events which took over the lobby making it very crowded and almost impossible to enter and exit the hotel.  After dealing with this for two nights, we left a day earlier than planned. So in the future, we sadly won't be staying at this hotel.

The next morning, we walked about 20 minutes to see the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. It is a place of remembrance for the 6 million Jewish victims of the Holocaust. It was opened May 10, 2005. It consists of 2,710 columns which created a maze-like memorial. Admission is free and there is an underground exhibition room.

Next, we walked to the Brandenburg Tor (Gate) which is the symbol of German reunification. It is the  only surviving historical city gate. 

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From there we walked about 40 minutes to the Berlin Wall Memorial. The Berlin Wall was 155 kilometer long and cut through the middle of the city center from August 13, 1961 to November 9, 1989. The Wall was designed to prevent people from escaping to the West from East Berlin. 

Since it has started to sleet, we took the train back to the hotel and spend the rest of the night with the dogs. We departed the next morning, and since it was Sunday we hit no traffic.