Potsdamer Platz

Hi folks

A lot happened since Des’s blog yesterday, so here’s a brief summary.

Last night was the cruise gala dinner - five courses, each with wonderful flavours and attractive presentation. I won’t detail them all, but suffice to say that we started with an amazing cauliflower soup, and finished with a Bombe Alaska flambéed in front of us. Magic!

Today we had morning and afternoon bus tours, first to the immense (750 acres) garden at the Prussian King Frederick the Great’s summer palace, Sans Souci (“carefree”) and this afternoon to iconic locations in Berlin.

As we are the only native English speakers on board, we had our own guide, “JB”. He was excellent, and we never asked him a question that he didn’t have an answer for, chapter & verse.

We began at Sans Souci with a walk through the gardens immediately around the palace. Long leafy avenues of trees in the English style, a circular double colonnade on the approach to the palace entrance, and a vista of terraces receding down the hill.

Frederick II (known as “the Great”) is buried in a crypt under the lawn, and his favourite dogs, each with its own name stone, are with him!

Next we drove through the grounds to Cicilienhof, the last palace built by the Hohenzollern rulers between 1914 and 1918. This Elizabethan revival style house is important because it was the venue for the Potsdam Conference between Stalin, Churchill and Truman in July - August 1945, to make decisions on the future of defeated Germany.
We stood where they stood, and saw where the famous photo of the leaders sitting together was taken.

Back in the bus, we spent some time eating an ice cream in the Dutch Quarter of Potsdam. The back to the boat for lunch

In the afternoon the bus took us to several interesting features of Berlin:

* the Brandenburg Gate, with its 4-horse chariot (the “Quadriga”) on its roof;

* Humboldt University - Alexander von Humboldt was the most influential natural scientist of his time, who influenced Charles Darwin among many others. One of Des’s heroes;

* Checkpoint Charlie, one of the famous crossing points between East and West Berlin during the Cold War;

* the largest piece of the Berlin Wall still standing, now known as the East Gallery as it has been covered with artworks, not just graffiti; and

* several bears. The bear is the emblem of Berlin - “Bear-lin”!! - a green bear even tells you when to cross the road!

A long day, but very rewarding. Our last night on board tonight - a new phase of our holiday tomorrow.Baca selengkapnya