Berlin: a journey in the footsteps of my grandfather!
I decided to effectively deal with the crisis - namely, simply "score" on it! And this is best done on vacation. Having an open "Schengen cartoon" until the summer, I decided not to miss the opportunity to visit Europe. The choice fell on Berlin. Firstly, I really wanted to compare Czech beer with German. Secondly, grandfather was a prisoner in Germany, he fought, which made an imprint - to go and see the places of his “military glory”.
The peculiarity of this trip was that everything - tickets, hotel, insurance - I arranged on my own, and the whole process took no more than an hour, thanks to the Internet and the Aeroflot website. A couple of months ago, a service for booking hotels, insurance, visas, etc. appeared there. And if I had not yet issued a visa through them, then I “risked” booking a hotel. I chose the Savvoy hotel (13.000 rubles came out for 3 days for two, however, without breakfast), bought tickets for 8.000 rubles round-trip per person, ordered a transfer, decided not to risk the development of public transport in an unfamiliar city. Everything was paid for with a credit card. In general, that's all. I undertake and swear to the reader to check the visa processing service and write in detail. For interest, I called several travel agencies, check the prices of the hotel. It turned out that they "cheat" the price from 20 to 50% !!! ! My number was offered for at least 20.000 “wooden” ones, and for some, the price was 25.000! It's not hard to calculate the savings on a two-week trip, given that the service offers "bookings" for 80.000 hotels worldwide.
April 9 at 6.30 am we were in Sheremetyevo-2. Everything was quiet and normal. The day was notable for the fact that on that day Aeroflot General Director Valery Okulov worked for the last day (although the pilots do not have the word “last”, there is the word “extreme”). In general, as a person who is not far from aviation, I will say that I respect this person for the highest professionalism and the deepest understanding of the problems of the industry, I sincerely regret his “replacement”, and I hope that with the arrival at the Ministry of Transport, the air transportation market will still “settle down” and will begin to develop steadily.
So, there was talk of his resignation all over the terminal that morning. In the meantime, we went through the registration through the automatic registration kiosk (a convenient thing, by the way, has been improved for 2 months already). As you probably noticed, I went with a partner. What I love about morning flights is the minimum number of passengers in the terminals. So it was then.
At 8:10 we took off. The Airbus 319 was fresh and comfortable, but the food suffers. And after 2.5 hours we "sat down" at the Schonefield airport in Berlin. Regular European carriers do not fly here, for them, incl. for Lufthansa, Tegel is intended, which was even an order of magnitude smaller in size. In general, airports in Germany are quite old, projects of the 70-80s, little has been built since then. So it was in Frankfurt a year ago, so it was now in Berlin. "Schonefield", as I noted, was larger, in size something in between Sheremetyevo 1 and 2
I was sincerely pleased with the armored car (yes, armored car), which met the planes on the airfield. At passport control, the "Russian" flight was interrogated with passion - they were interested in the purpose of the trip, the availability of money, as well as friends and relatives. Everything else went "standard".
We were met by the driver Maxim. He has been living in Germany for 11 years (the hotel specially sent him for Russian guests). He spoke about life in the city, about the features. Like many expats, he worked in tourism. At the hotel, I wrote down his phone number, I can send it to those who wish, if suddenly someone wants to independently arrange an excursion in Germany.
The hotel was located in the Zoological Garden, a major interchange station in Berlin. In principle, a bus runs from it to Schonefield, as well as an electric train. But let's talk about transport separately. So, the hotel is located in the center of West Berlin. It is interesting that when they say in Berlin: “To the center! ”, They always specify which one - western or eastern. I liked East Berlin more - there is some kind of “our” romance in it . "Savvoy" is made in a classic style, the rooms are spacious and comfortable. The only thing missing is a safe in the room. True, the presence of compliments from the hotel, a wide level of service, easily covers the described drawback. On the morning when we arrived, we immediately "rushed" to have breakfast. What a shame, it was not included in the price, although it was very worthy and varied. Had to pay 22 euros per person. We were not upset, we went there every day. And on the last day, I confess, they didn’t even pay, they forgot .
Leaving the excess in the room, taking a map and a guide at the "reception", we set off to watch Berlin. As an "experienced pilot", I immediately decided to master the cheapest way to travel - public transport. And you know, in which subway you have not traveled, but the Berlin one caused a certain bewilderment. I'll try to explain why. Firstly, there are 2 types of metro in Berlin - "U-Ban" and "S-Ban". The first is similar to the Moscow metro, it usually goes underground, the exits are marked with blue square signs with the inscription "U". The second rides on top, on a special flyover. The distances between stations are longer, but the train will have to wait a couple of minutes longer. The exits are marked with green signs with the letter "S". Parallel to this metro there is a branch of high-speed trains that run not only throughout Germany, but also throughout Europe. It is easy to navigate the metro map - look at the name of the line (indicated by a letter and number) and the end station, compare with the signs at the station, and choose the transition according to where you need to go. Actually, such a scheme is presented in many European cities, for example, in Paris.
Another thing was embarrassing - the complete absence of turnstiles and information desks. There are only a few ticket machines in the subway, the interface of which is not well thought out (it takes a very long time to choose, failures often occur, many accept only coins and credit cards, they do not accept paper bills). Most importantly, many people just walk into the station, go, and also just get off. I hope the reader remembers our adventures in the metro of Paris, when we were almost put in the local "detention center". Taught by the experience of paying fabulous fines in Europe, we still did not dare to go without tickets. It turns out that tickets can also be bought at some subway grocery stores. At the entrance to such a store there is a sign "Tickets". True, not all stations have such shops. I recommend buying "Day Tickets" (tickets for the day). In Berlin, there are 3 subtypes of tickets: categories A, B and C. To travel on tickets on all modes of transport in all areas, buy an ABC ticket. For reference: it costs 6.2 euros, while a single ticket costs 3 euros. The benefit is obvious. True, after riding in Berlin for a couple of days, they nevertheless remembered their student youth and rode the tram without tickets.
Although the subway is poor. I recommend traveling by bus, and in East Berlin - also by tram (there are no trams in the west, because when the city was divided, they realized that all the depots remained in the eastern part). The best routes are 100 and 200. They pass specially through the main sights of the city, departing, by the way, from the Zoological Garden station. One day I did not buy a Day Ticket, I decided to pay for the ticket from the driver. His ticket office was broken, and he himself suggested that we go as a "hare" . And the trams will show you the true romance of East Berlin. By the way, there are practically no traffic jams in the city. Taxis are also inexpensive, the trip costs 10-15 euros, depending on the distance.
Now about what to see. I will not describe in detail all the sights, so that anyone can find information about them in sufficient quantities on the network. Start from the Brandenburg Gate, and go along the street "Under Den Linden" to the Berlin Cathedral, looking at the building of the Russian Embassy, the office of "Aeroflot" (for some reason, foreigners like to take pictures next to it), the equestrian monument to Frederick the Great, go to Gendarmenmarkt Square, and next to see the Henwigsdom Cathedral. And then go across the bridge to the monument to Marx and Engels to the television tower. We also took a ride on the river tram (at the Berlin Cathedral, flights are operated by a Ukrainian company). Interestingly, all the churches in Berlin are closed to the public (for 4 days we didn’t get into one, although we really wanted to).
The entrance to the tower is carried out not from the side of the monument, but from the side of Alexanderplatz. Nearby, by the way, there is an excellent shopping center "Alex", the locals praise it very much, and there is something for it: it presents a wide selection of collections at very affordable prices. In the building of the tower there is a queue at the ticket office (for 20-30 minutes), it goes from left to right. If you go from right to left, then you will come to the first window, which does not notice the queue (there is a very narrow tape to the cashier, that is, the queue goes to the third window, then to the second, and does not reach the first one). We did just that and bought tickets out of turn. Next, the most interesting thing is that there are TVs everywhere, which show the intervals of tickets, as well as the approximate time when this ticket passes. I got ticket 1839, and I bought it at 13.00. At this time, tickets of the 1300-1350 series, purchased 4 hours before, passed. We did not wait, but went on to walk around the city. When we returned 4 hours later, our turn was over. It's okay, latecomers are let in first: to do this, you need to climb the central staircase to the second floor, there will be a queue for the elevator on the right, go to the left, security skips out of turn. Food and drink bottles are not allowed to be brought upstairs.
From a height of 207 meters offers an excellent view of the city. It is interesting to compare the architecture of the western and eastern parts of the city. And five meters above is a restaurant on a revolving platform: you are relaxing, while inspecting Berlin from above.
Nearby is the famous Museum Island, home to the Old and New Museums, the Old National Gallery, the Pergamon Museum and the Bode Museum.
We visited the first, fourth and fifth. Let me just say, it's boring. There are no Russian-speaking guides, there are no audio guides in Russian either, the expositions mainly consist of objects from ancient Rome and ancient Egypt. Everything looks sparse and poor. If you still decide, go to the Old Museum (it is the very first one on the square in front of the Berlin Cathedral). there are practically no queues, take a “day ticket”. The Pergamon Museum has the longest line, with a “day ticket” you will bypass, saving 30 minutes or more. There are no queues at the Bode Museum. In general, we recommend visiting the Natural History Museum (U-Ban, Zinnowitzer Strabe station, bus 245 runs from the Zoological Garden station), - very good expositions, the museum is much richer and more beautiful than the Paris one. Be sure to eat sausage in the diner before entering and drink Krusovice - everything is very tasty! And nearby, in the building of the Hamburg railway station, is the largest collection of modern paintings in Europe.
Now let's return to our area, to western Berlin. Be sure to visit the zoo, where many species of animals are represented, the symbol of which is the panda. Before there were two, now there is only one. It is better to visit the zoo in the morning, after lunch there is always a large influx of tourists (the station, you guessed it, is the Zoological Garden). The aquarium exhibits are interesting. A combined ticket for an adult costs 19 euros.
Nearby is the "Europe-Center", though it looks rather poor, inside there is a weak assortment. In the center of the square is the dilapidated Gedechtniskirche church, which has remained since the 2nd World War. Perhaps this is one of the few sights of Berlin, represented by the "natural", everything else, as a rule, is a well-restored copy. A lot was destroyed during the war. To the left of the church went Tauentzien street, on the right side of which there was a large department store Ka-De-Ve. I advise you to look there too. And if you go to the right from the department store (corner building), you will find yourself on the street of Russian shops. It was very nice to go into something called "Beryozka" and buy "Baltika troika or a can of stew". And there are several stores.
The issue of nutrition was not accidental, since one of the main goals of the trip was to compare German beer with Czech beer. You know, Czech was better. Germans drink Berliner beer. Having tried the entire “lineup”, I realized that only Berliner Crystal beer is normal, the rest, to put it mildly, is similar to our beer from the lower price category. In restaurants, too, you will understand not immediately. Many "German" restaurants do not prepare traditional German dishes - shank, sausages, Berlin-style liver, etc. Unfortunately, we stumbled upon a couple of such establishments. And the "ideal" was very close to our hotel, again at the station "Zoological Garden" - restaurant-beer "Joe's". I highly recommend the unfiltered Franciscainer, as well as the steamed knuckle and liver. I was pleased with the Russian-speaking waiter and the menu in their native language. In general, the locals praise the beer "Prater", which is at the "U-Bahn" station "Eberswalder Strasse".
A few words about entertainment in the city. . If daytime Berlin hasn't worn you out, you can visit nighttime - take the risk of mastering several clubs. The first - fashion - is called Kit Kat. Many young Europeans look to him as an icon. A very serious "dress code" for Europe. By Russian (and especially Moscow) standards, it is quite possible to slip through. The address of the club is Kopenicker Strasse 76. The second one is less well-known, but, in my opinion, is in no way inferior to the first one - the Soda club. It is located on the territory of the former brewery, where the entertainment complex is now Kulturbrauerei, in the Kollwitzplatz area. By the way, on weekends, the largest flea market in the city opens there. And nearby is the African restaurant "Savannah", which is on Sredzki Strasse, 26. Be sure to try the beer "Doo-doo", no worse than German.
On the penultimate day, April 11, when I was sitting in the Joe's restaurant and drinking another mug of beer - I received tragic news - my grandfather, a front-line soldier, whose youth had passed, incl. and in Germany. And the news was so unexpected that I didn’t even believe it at first. Here are the laws of fate in your face - he was gone when I ended up in Berlin. Although I really wanted to go to the "old people" for May and share my impressions...
The return trip was easy for us. We got to the airport on the S-bann, along the S9 line. The procedures at Schonnefield went quickly and without surprises. And Sheremetyevo-2, as always, met us with wet weather and a huge chaotic queue at passport control.
I will definitely return to Germany, however, I don’t know now and when... Times are hard... But it’s okay, we’ll fight!