21st July 2007

Germany again

We're back in the land of wurst and beer. More specifically we're in Dresden. We've covered a lot of miles since the last entry. Oh, and summer arrived in the form of 40 degrees. From one extreme to another.

We spent 2 nights in Hameln, a lovely little town, which has made one particular fairy tale go a long way. Everywhere we looked there were statues, fountains, touristy tat commemorating the apocryphal tale of the Pied Piper.

From there we moved on to Potsdam, which we used as a base for exploring Berlin.The city of Berlin was absolutely incredible. We spent 2 full days trying to take in all the historic sights: Reichstag, Brandenburg Gate, Checkpoint Charlie, Kaiser Wilhem Gedachtniskirche and many many more. The blend of old & new in the city is extraordinary. And we felt that we had only scratched the surface of Berlin.

(Kaiser Wilhem Gedachtniskirche and Jon in a Trabant)

Potsdam tself was well worth exploring, we spent a full day in Sanssouci Park visiting the Palaces and other edifices.

We're now in Dresden, where we met up with our good friends Kalle & Rose. It was wonderful to see them again even though my head doesn't think so at the moment. Dresden was largely destroyed at the end of WWII but has been largely rebuilt & restored to its former baroque glory. It also has its fair share of ugly DDR era concrete monstrosities, which reminded us of Palmerston North!