For our first real journey since arriving in Europe we decided to jump right in and take a 5-day adventure through Germany
and down into the Czech Republic, spending two days in both Berlin and Prague,
and one day in Hamburg. Additionally, much of the trip – about 22 hours in all
– was spent on the trains taking us from city to city.
While all of the cities we visited were very different,
the overall trip was characterized by beautiful architecture, a rich history, and
great beer!
Berlin
After arriving in Copenhagen, the trip started with a
7-hour train to Berlin, where we arrived at 9:00pm. Our hostel was right next
to the station, so it was just a short walk with our luggage before we settled
down into our room for the night, but not before taking a pit-stop at the
hostel bar to try our first truly German beers – Mackenzie and I both got Franziskaner,
a wheat beer, and loved it.
Saturday was our full day of Berlin travel, and we stuck
to the historic Mitte district. We woke early and began with a short
walk to the Reichstag, Germany’s Parliament building. The building was massive,
and most uniquely characterized by the large glass dome on its roof. Tourists
and locals alike can even take a tour to the top of the roof to gaze down on
the desks of Parliament members directly below. With a history of corrupt
German leadership, the German people have taken a hard stance against any future corruption by increasing government transparency, and the literal glass
Parliament roof has become a symbol of this transparency.
Reichstag Parliament Building as the sun rises
From the Reichstag, it was a short walk to the
Brandenburg Gate, a beautiful set of five arches in the middle of Mitte.
Historically, all the German leaders would march their armies through the gate
following their war victories. From Napoleon to Hitler, countless generals have
led their armies through this popular gate.
Brandenburg Gate
We continued past the Brandenburg Gate to the Memorial to
the Murdered Jews of Europe, a brutally named Holocaust memorial that included
an adjoining underground museum. The memorial was a large square block in the
middle of Berlin filled only with rows of rectangular stone columns of
differing heights; it was meant to represent a supposedly ordered system that
has lost touch with reality. We grabbed some quick breakfast before descending
into the museum. Filled with informational signs that painstakingly described
the atrocities of the Holocaust, as well as letters and other belongings of
Holocaust victims, most of whom didn’t survive the camps, the museum was both
moving and educational.
Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe
We walked on towards Potsdamer Platz, a newer part of
Berlin filled with huge glass skyscrapers. In contrast to the modern buildings,
however, were small sections of the Berlin Wall, still standing right in the
middle of the plaza. Even where old parts of the wall didn’t stand, you could
still see where the wall had once ran by a stone path in the ground –
it was astounding to see how it ran so directly through the middle of the city, passing right through busy roads and huge buildings alike, all of which must
have been constructed since its fall.
Tracks of where the Berlin Wall once stood,
running through the middle of busy street
From Potsdamer Platz we walked towards Topography of
Terror, another WWII memorial, this time dedicated to describing the Nazi
leaders of the war. The location of the memorial was exactly where the Nazi
headquarters once stood, and much of the old building’s foundation was still
intact. It was both fascinating and a little scary to know that we were
standing right where Hitler, Himmler, Goebbels and so many more Nazi leaders
had once theorized and put into action their plans. We spent a long time here,
once again reading through tons of WWII history and viewing memorabilia from
the age.
From the Topography of Terror we walked to Checkpoint
Charlie, a slightly underwhelming site in the middle of Berlin which used to
serve as the US entry point from West Germany to East Germany during the Cold
War. It was now just a small building in the middle of the street, occupied by
a couple German men masquerading as American soldiers for photos and abounding
beggars and other tourist traps.
After Checkpoint Charlie, we grabbed a quick lunch (I had
currywurst – a German classic -- it was okay), and headed to Gerdarmenmarkt,
one of my favorite spots in Berlin. It was a beautiful square framed by two
churches and a concert hall. We were able to walk to the top of one of the
church towers, which provided both a great view over all of Berlin and a really
amazing set of bells, which we were able to hear ring, as we were lucky enough
to get to the top of the tower just a few minutes before the hour.
Gerdarmenmarkt; buildings are French Cathedral,
Berlin Concert House, and German Cathedral
We finished the day of exploration with a very long and
cold walk back to our hostel, where we took a quick break before jumping on the
nearby S-Bahn (metro) and heading towards Kreuzberg, the hipster part of town.
On the short walk to dinner, we were able to pass by the East Side Gallery, a
long remaining portion of the wall, which graffiti artists have taken over and
beautified since its fall. We chose to have dinner at a Berlin legend:
Burgermeister. The tiny restaurant was originally converted from a public
bathroom, and lies in the median between two streets and directly under the
S-Bahn (so it gets a little shaky in there whenever a train goes overtop).
While the burger and fries were good and the man who took our order was
friendly (something that we came to not expect in Berlin), the novelty of the
restaurant was really what earned it its status. It was a fun, cheap, and tasty
dinner for the two of us. After some debate on what bar to go to (as there
wasn’t the variety of choices we expected), we settled for a Mexican place
called Que Pasa. In fact, the only reason why we chose Que Pasa was because
they advertised “4€ Cocktails”, but after sitting down and ordering we looked
out the window to the restaurant across the street to see a makeshift “3.90€
Cocktails” sign – oops! We ordered some chips and salsa to get Mack her fix,
grabbed a couple crappy cocktails, and called it a night.
Segment of East Side Gallery
Day 2 in Berlin was much shorter, as we had a 1:00 train
to catch to Prague, so we filled it by going to Museum
Island, an island near Mitte filled with five different museums, all with a
slightly different taste to them. The first museum that we visited was
the Neues Museum, which focused on ancient history, especially Egyptian. The most popular exhibit is the 3300-year-old bust
of Nefertiti, an Egyptian Queen, which has been preserved in near-perfect
condition. While the Nefertiti bust was incredible, both Mackenzie and I agreed
that the most interesting things in the museum were the old Christian texts.
The museum housed the first few pages of Isaiah, many of Peter’s psalms, and a
short excerpt from Exodus. While we’ve been familiar with the texts all our
lives (and certainly couldn’t read the ancient ones in front of us), it was
still really shocking to see the original versions. We stayed at Neues for a
while, so only had time for a quick run-through at our next museum.
We chose to check out the Alte Nationalgalerie, a beautiful Roman-style
building filled with European paintings from the 1800’s. The paintings were
beautiful, but neither Mackenzie nor I are too fascinated by paintings, so we
only stayed a short bit before taking the S-Bahn back to our hostel and
grabbing our things.
Our posted train time was 1:04, so when we were walking
up to the platform at 1:01 (after taking our time in the station and grabbing
some lunch), we saw the train already waiting and sauntered on. Therefore, when
the train doors closed literally seconds after we got on, we were amazed at how
close we were to missing it. This was a fortunate lesson-learned that the
trains leave the station at the
posted times, not arrive!
Prague
Not only were we fortunate enough to get on the train to
Prague, but we were also introduced to the luxury of compartment rooms!
Mackenzie and I were able to snag a 6-person compartment on the entire 5-hour
direct train to Prague, which made the already-scenic trip through the Alps
surrounding the Czech Republic even more comfortable.
We arrived in Prague at 5:30, took a short walk to our
cute hostel, and then headed to our reserved dinner at Lokal, a popular
restaurant near the middle of the Old Town known for serving up some of the
best traditional Czech food and drink in Prague. I got the svíčková, Czech’s
most popular dish (similar to a beef stew), and Mack got some Czech chicken and
potatoes. The favorite part (or at least the part with the greatest novelty)
was the beer: Pilsner Urquell. Not only was this the original pilsner
(originally brewed in Pilsen, Czech Republic), but Lokal is one of the few
places in the world where you can get the beer directly out of the tank where
it was brewed, as opposed to just out of a keg. This resulted in a super good
and supremely fresh pilsner. To note the affordability of Prague, a .5L
beer cost about $1! A fun experience!
From dinner, we headed a short distance to the Old Town
Square, where we met up with our group for the famous Prague Pub Crawl. Despite
being a Sunday night in January, there were still about 15 of us determined
souls willing to brave the cold to get some exposure to the fun bar scene of
Prague. For the next few hours, we jumped from pub to pub, seeing the variety
of nightlife that Prague has to offer and meeting some new friends along the
way. Everyone on the tour was young, and we ended up befriending some like-minded
individuals from Brazil, Israel, India, Switzerland, and Ireland! It was a fun
way to start off the trip, and by talking to the guide and the other crawlers
who had already been in Prague for a couple days, we were able to get some
valuable insight into the must-sees of the city.
360° view of Prague's Old Town Square
Our full day in Prague was packed-full of walking from
site to site. Unlike Berlin, however, there wasn’t a street in Prague that
wasn’t incredibly scenic in its own right, regardless of any lack of tourist
destinations. Every street in the expansive downtown district
was defined by beautiful architecture, pastel buildings, and cobblestone roads.
We started the day by walking from our hostel 20 minutes to the Old Town
Square, the center of Prague. There, we met up with Zach, an American who
originally came to Europe with the intention to backpack for a couple
months, only to end up staying in Prague for years. Along with a few other small groups, we followed and listened to Zach for the next 3 hours as we walked through the Old Town district, Wenceslas Square, the Jewish
Quarter, and up to the shore of the Vltava River. The tour was fantastic and
dense with history and fun facts that we never would have known – from the epic Jan Žižka who led
the Hussites to an undefeated record in battles while completely blind to the fact
that Mick Jagger himself completely financed the lights that now illuminate
Prague Castle at night. The tour was definitely worth the price of a tip and we
will look to do more in future cities!
Famous Astrological Clock in the Old Town Square
From the tour, we headed to our guide’s suggestion of Krčma, another traditional Czech restaurant which
boasted one of the coolest interiors I’ve ever seen. I got goulash, the second most popular Czech dish, and felt that I had
succeeded in exploring Czech cuisine. After lunch, we walked to Charles Bridge,
where construction had started in the 14th century, and climbed
to the top of one of the towers at the end of the bridge, which afforded us a
beautiful view over the top of the city. We finished the day by walking to Lennon Wall, a John Lennon-inspired wall covered in
motivational graffiti. A street performer played classic Beatles songs in front
of the wall, which created a really neat atmosphere for reading the uplifting
graffiti. We stayed here for a while to take in the ambiance.
John Lennon Wall with some fitting entertainment!
Finally, we finished the night with a departure from
Czech cuisine and a walk back into familiar territory: some pasta at a yummy
Italian place near Old Town Center which had some delicious bread and olive oil
(we all know that’s all Mackenzie needs to love an Italian restaurant)!
An early night allowed us to start the day strong on
Tuesday, and we headed out across town via the metro to visit Prague Castle,
the largest and one of the oldest castle complexes in Europe. It had snowed a lot overnight, which created a still beautiful but very different feel for the city. From the metro
was a short walk to the top of the hill for the castle, during which we wound
up having to talk a Prague cop down from a nearly $100 ticket to a measly $4. I
was left with about 20 cents after paying the fine with the change I had in my
pocket (we were ATM-bound), and I have a feeling the cop wasn’t going to accept
card. Always pay attention to street signs! Woops!
Snowy view over Prague from atop Castle hill
With construction starting in the 9th century,
the Prague Castle complex was filled with beautiful churches, towers, alleys,
and other historic sites. We picked up some all-access tickets at the gate, and
first visited the stunning St. Vitus Cathedral. Definitely the most
breath-taking of all the churches we visited over the trip, St. Vitus Cathedral
was filled not only with incredible paintings, life-like statues, and stained
glass windows, but it also served as the burial site for some of Prague’s most
influential figures, including Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV and Prague’s Patron Saint Wenceslas.
After St. Vitus, we went into the Old Royal Palace, a beautiful palace dating back to Charles IV filled with grandiose dining halls and ornate furniture. Our favorite part of the palace was that we were able to see the exact window were the Second Defenestration of Prague happened, when three men were tossed from a window, beginning the 30 Years War. From there, we viewed a less-than-amazing Basilica of St. George and a couple small museums about the history of the castle.
Lastly was the Golden Lane, a tiny cobblestone street on the outskirts of the complex adorned with shoebox-sized houses, where the castle attendants used to live when the castle was still occupied. The upstairs of the houses had been converted into a gallery of Czech medieval armor from the various wars, and the bottoms had turned into replicas of what the houses may have looked like during the Middle Ages. Surprisingly, despite some of the houses never getting running water, the Golden Lane was continuously occupied until the 1950’s, and Franz Kafka actually lived and wrote in one of the tiny houses during much of his life!
View of the colossal St. Vitus Cathedral
After St. Vitus, we went into the Old Royal Palace, a beautiful palace dating back to Charles IV filled with grandiose dining halls and ornate furniture. Our favorite part of the palace was that we were able to see the exact window were the Second Defenestration of Prague happened, when three men were tossed from a window, beginning the 30 Years War. From there, we viewed a less-than-amazing Basilica of St. George and a couple small museums about the history of the castle.
Lastly was the Golden Lane, a tiny cobblestone street on the outskirts of the complex adorned with shoebox-sized houses, where the castle attendants used to live when the castle was still occupied. The upstairs of the houses had been converted into a gallery of Czech medieval armor from the various wars, and the bottoms had turned into replicas of what the houses may have looked like during the Middle Ages. Surprisingly, despite some of the houses never getting running water, the Golden Lane was continuously occupied until the 1950’s, and Franz Kafka actually lived and wrote in one of the tiny houses during much of his life!
Franz Kafka's tiny house on the Golden Lane
After the castle, it was time to head back to the train
station to say goodbye to Prague, and we managed to pick up a couple small
paintings along the way to remember the trip.
Hamburg
From Prague we took a 7-hour long direct train to
Hamburg. Thankfully, we were able to jump on the train right as it arrived at
the station and strategically found another compartment that we could use. This
made the trip so much better, as it was easy (for Mackenzie) to nap, watch
movies, and sprawl out in the compartment without affecting anyone else. The
seven hours back through the snow-covered foothills of the Alps went by
smoothly.
Video showing the ride from Berlin to Prague; we followed
the same route back up to Hamburg
the same route back up to Hamburg
We arrived in Hamburg around 9:30, and walked the very
short distance to our hostel, dropped off our stuff, and asked the hostel
concierge for some directions to somewhere to grab a couple drinks. She
suggested Sternschanze as the best spot for young people, so we headed out via
metro and grabbed some beers in a couple cozy bars before heading back to the
hostel for the night.
Our last day of travelling was a short one – only 6
hours! – and thankfully we spent it in Hamburg, as that’s about how long it
takes to see most of the city. Despite being the second largest
city in Germany, Hamburg isn’t nearly as dense with destinations as Berlin or
Prague, so we found ourselves a little underwhelmed. Regardless, like the other cities, we spent the day walking from
attraction to attraction, with an emphasis on the churches and government
buildings.
View of Hamburg's sprawling harbor from
the top of the new Philharmonic
The most unique aspect of Hamburg was its status as the largest German port city. This resulted in a pretty harbor
district, which was our first walking destination on Wednesday. We walked about
20 minutes from our hostel to the very new Hamburg Philharmonic, a modern
building which allows free tickets to the top for a great view of the harbor
and downtown in the distance. The harbor was huge and incredibly industrial,
with tons of cranes and other large machines scattered throughout (think of
Wilmington’s port times 100!). From the harbor we continued our march to St.
Michael’s Church, Hamburg’s oldest and most beautiful church. Despite being a
little desensitized to the beauty of churches after spending so much time in
some of Europe’s best over the past few days, St. Michael’s still managed to
impress, and had an especially ornate organ and fantastic stained-glass
windows.
Grandiose organ from St. Michael's Cathedral
We next walked towards the center of downtown to visit
Rathaus, Hamburg’s intricately designed government building with a
beautiful water fountain in the middle. From there we visited two
more beautiful churches, St. Paul and St. Jacobi, the second of which had an
organist performing while we toured the church, making for a much more
enjoyable experience. Lastly, we took a short detour to the incredibly lame
Chile Haus, an “iconic impressionist brick building”, which we ended up staying
at for about 30 seconds to make sure we weren’t missing anything.
Central fountain in Hamburg's Rauthus
And finally we headed back to the hostel, grabbed our things
and some food from a nearby grocery store, and jumped onto our last set of
trains back to Copenhagen! We weren’t lucky enough to get a train that had
compartments, but we still managed to have an easy ride back, filled with Harry
Potter, naps, and typing this up! We arrived in Copenhagen at 10:00.
As I write this, I’m currently crossing the Ørestad Bridge on the final train from
Copenhagen to Lund. The trip has been incredibly fun and fulfilling. To rank
the cities, Prague takes a clear lead, while Berlin and Hamburg fall behind,
with Berlin’s many tourist destinations edging it out over Hamburg. It
will be difficult to beat Prague over the course of the semester!
For this upcoming weekend (which starts tomorrow!), the
plan is likely to take it easy, with a day trip on Saturday to Stockholm. We
both cannot wait to see what the city on islands has in store for us!
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