Berlin day 3

A renovator's delight. Wilhelm Kaiser Church. Once great Church, now a memorial to the stupidity of war

Looks like snow

Whoa, it was cold today, well if you call 4C cold. At one point the rain turned to hail. Rod will tell you that it started snowing, but it was really only hail. It was enough to turn the ground white for 30 minutes, so it looked like snow, and it certainly felt cold enough to snow.
We walked through the very large Tiergarten to have a closer lok at the Column of Victory, which was obviously not built in '45!
We also rook a look around the inside of the Charlottenburg castle (which was closed when we went there yesterday.
Home for an afternoon kip, (even though we can no longer blame jet lag).

Berlin Day 2

Berlin Cathedral

Our new Winter residence. Charlottenburg Castle

Well it was drizzling rain most of the day to day, which wasn't great, but wasn't too bad either. Cold isn't a problem, warm clothes take care of that, if anything it is stifling hot when you come in from outdoors to go inside a building or on the train station. Did lots and lots of walking today, and then lots and lots more walking. Some wonderful grand buildings in Berlin and you are left wondering how many more wonderful buildings there would have been but for the mass destruction during the war.

Berlin Day 1

In front of the Brandenburg Gate

Busy day of sightseeing today. The Reichstag Building where the German parliament sits, the Brandenburg gate, the Holocaust memorial which was quite moving as well as the Jewish museum. We also saw some of the remnants of the Berlin wall as well as the famous Checkpoint Charlie border crossing. We've returned to cool grey skies and a little drizzle this afternoon, 10C. The gloves, hat and scarves are getting a good workout.

Aufwiedersehen Frankfurt Guten Tag Berlin

On The train

We did our first train trip today, Frankfurt to Berlin. The train was great although it too a while to figure out the seating (some seats reserved others not). The hotel is quite a surprise, were expecting low budget room, but quite spacious and again very central.

Frankfurt Day 4

Rod and the garden ornaments at the Frankfurt Zoo

Today we spent the day wandering around the zoo, looking at the German tigers, the German lions and the German camels. They look very much like the animals we have at Melbourne zoo, 'though of course these ones speak German. Seriously though, Rod reckons the pigeons over here do make a different call from the ones we have at home.

We've been enjoying the German cuisine, ...last night we had Indian, the night before we had Italian and the first night we had Chinese. We also had some Thai for lunch one day.

Frankfurt Day 3

The Wurst stall in Frankfurt!

The Eschenheim Tower

Sunny blue skies today, although still a bit chilly 10C. Spent the day seeing more of the sights around Frankfurt including the tower in the photo above. This tower had a modern restaurant at ground level and Rod was certain that the whole thing had been built recently. he was pretty close as it turns out...it was built in 1428, that's fairly recent I guess!!
Doing lots and lots of walking but everything is quite close together. Maybe that's how Europe is, quite compact. Our catchphrase has become "Europe, everything's closer than you think"

Frankfurt Day 2

At the Palmgarten

It was another grey skies, damp misty Winter day in Frankfurt. Europe makes Winter look good though. After breakfast at the hotel we walked to the Palmgarten, a botanical garden with lots of glasshouses. Outside it was cold and wintery, but inside there were tropical plants growing quite healthily. They were also hosting a special exhibition butterfly collection. Outside the Spring bulbs were just starting to pop out and some of the early flowering bulbs were flowering. It should be even more beautiful in a couple of weeks.
We had lunch at a little cafe where Rod got a chance to practice his German as he ordered two schnitzel burgers. We nearly ended upp with four pork rolls! We are soooo on top of this language barrier!!
Jet lag catching up with us, so it was home for an afternoon kip, and now we're just having a pre-dinner drink. Bottles of wine are only a couple of euro over here, maybe its because the Germans mostly drink beer?!

Frankfurt Day 1

The Fountain of Justice in the Romer

Well we've arrived in our hotel in Frankfurt, just 5 minutes walk from the train station. We didn't get business class from Singapore to Frankfurt unfortunately. We did get three seats for the two of us, to spread out a little. Sleeping pills meant I got some sleep anyway.

Once we arrived at Frankfurt airport it only took us 30 minutes standing in front of the train ticket machine to figure out how to get a ticket to go two stops! Three trips to the lady at the information window and we were on our way into the city centre. That wasn't so hard!!!!!!!!!

On Our Way

At Canterbury railway station about to begin our journey

So here we are sitting in the First Class Qantas Lounge (its who you know not what you know), drinking Moet champagne and eating smoked salmon. So far I'm loving this holiday!!!!! We have some upstairs business class seats for the first leg to Singapore but we don't know about Singapore to Frankfurt yet. (A British Airways flight has been cancelled and they're all coming onto our flight...why can't they wait for their own plane!!!!!).