Quick tour of Hamburg

So, what do I think of Hamburg? Well, it.s very liberal, that.s for sure.... It.s an ok town, not bad, but not enough character for me. Or maybe that.s just the vibe I get. I don.t need to come back, but I wouldn.t pass it up if I had not been here before and was convenient to get to. I wouldn.t want someone to take my advice and not come, and really miss something that they would like. So do some homework before coming here and then do it! Ok, that.s the politically correct post. Make your own decision, basically! I am FINALLY at an internet cafe that allowed me to download some pictures. I didn.t go overboard, but have posted pictures from the last week or so. Check them out, hope you all enjoy. (3 hours later: for some FUSDIAFUIOING reason my pictures are deleted from 3-4 days below. I.m pissed, so I will just wait until I get to Copenhagen when I have time, and it won.t cost money. I am SO pissed....)

The old Parliament building.

St. Michel cathedral. The most distinguished building in Hamburg, and very large in stature. Much larger than it appears here. A view inside the cathedral. There was a children.s choir practicing when I got here. They were very good and the audience applauded!
A view from the top of St. Michel. The Parliament is on the left, and St. Peter.s cathedral in the middle.

"We.re in the red light district!"-Outkast

I DID NOT find this last night, but girls were here working, motioning me to just come and talk, I.m sure!

"Girls, girls, girls."-Mötley Crüe More establishments of ill repute! Bring your Euros, they.ll gladly swap you for their tickets!

Two for one? No thanks!

I HAD to post this, it was too much, and I needed to see if my reservation was confirmed. It was not. But as soon as I got off the train at "the strip", I was propositioned. By TWO prostitutes! Since it was early, I was offered a buy one get one free for €60. It was so funny, I had to listen to their proposal. That, and they were draped on both arms, with my hands in my pockets. At first I thought they were gypsies, or somebody to take my wallet, but they had a "better" offer. Needless to say, they mentioned me being very nervous and said they would help me "relax". I finally said I wasn.t interested, but they kept persisting. "Oh, it.s only 20 meters to the "club" where we can relax and have a beer, then go upstairs....". Yada, yada, yada. Or in this case, bada bing, bada bing, bada bing! I might have needs, but not with them..... But, they were at least cute. But no thanks! The whole strip was either a bar or a strip club with about everything else in between! I had a few beers at the bar and took the train home, now I have to find a new home for tomorrow. Maybe the Ibis I.m at now, but I doubt they have a room available.... Your friendly reporter signing off for the night. Bartender?

Hamburg-er in paradise!

Hello all from Hamburg! I couldn.t decide where to go last night when Joanna and I were discussing my options, so I just decided to come here. It was nice having some margaritas, burritos, chips and salsa and swap stories for another few too many hours, and drinks! But I did get up early enough this morning to make it to breakfast and head out the door and on the train. I went to the Information Booth here at the train station and they said there weren.t any rooms for the 30-40 Euros that I try and stick to, she said 190 was the cheapest..... Whatever! I was able to do it in Berlin, so I figured I could here as well. Low and behold there was an inexpensive Pension right next to the Ibis. But, I only have it for one night so will be surfing to find one for the next night or two. I.m in a great location and hate to move, but such is life! It looks like this will be my last stop before going to Copenhagen. I have made my way so far north, I am pretty close now and don.t really have an idea what else I could/want to see. I actually want to get back on the bike, but I think I.ll wait until I get back to Denmark and go without my bags, baby!

Sorry nothing interesting to report, although my guidebook does say something about peep shows and other interesting places to visit in the red light district. Are these places everywhere and is this shit legal??? I know it.s the old profession, but never knew it was so readily available, not that I have checked them out. And Becky can vouch! Ciao guys and gals!

Last day in Berlin

I think I have walked at least 10k today, but my hip flexors have finally gotten used to walking! The bad thing is that my cycling legs are going to shit, and I have a big ride waiting on me in Colorado when I get back! OUCH! Oh well, hopefully years of biking will get me through 50 miles on the mountain bike each day. That, and I will have my Assos chamois cream!! Bry, you guys need to take it easy on me.....

I wish I could post pictures, this is getting frustrating. But all of the internet cafes won.t let me.... Oh well, I know next week when I get back to Copenhagen I will be able to then, so stay tuned. Instead of talking about where I walked and what I saw today, I will just wait until I can post pics. But tonight I will be having dinner with Joanna again, and she says she can point me in the right direction to head next! I have 3 days to use on my Eurorail pass, and since they aren.t refundable if I don.t use them, I better do it. So that means I won.t be riding the rest of the way, and I really did want to roll over 3000 km before I left. I only came up with that idea recently, oh well, guess I.ll have to come back and accomplish that goal!

I have got to sign off, my vision is getting blurry for some reason. I think it.s just from staring at the screen for a while now. But to reveal the facts behind the myth........... You exchange Euros for tickets at the "adult entertainment" clubs. I will leave it at that, and your imagination. Also, what Chris Rock says about the Champagne Room is NOT true in Berlin. You figure it out..... ;) Or so I heard..... Signing off as your faithful, investigative reporter, Clark Kent.

P.S.- I added a Guestbook (on the right side of the screen) that everyone can sign, just so I know who is following along with me. Thanks!

Schloss Charlottenburg

It's the German version of Versailles, but on a much smaller scale.

The Memorial Church, with the roof still blown off from WWII.

Reichstag, the current Parliament building.

This was a two block long infomercial on past to current history about the Wall. Very interesting.

Nazi Concentration Camp

Today I went with the Sandemans New Europe Tour to Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp Memorial Tour. This is the Free Tour company I have mentioned from Munich and yesterday here in Berlin. They actually started out here 3 years ago and have made a STRONG presence since then and are in other cities like Amsterdam, London and Paris. Check them out if you are coming to Europe at http://www.neweuropetours.eu/ . It REALLY is worth checking out. They work on tips, but I recommend 8-12 Euros per person, depending on your budget and gratitude. Today.s tour was 14 Euro up front, along with paying for the 1 hour train ride to get there and back. I think the actual touring of the concentration camp was ok, nothing special, but the guide and her information was what made it worth it. You can go out there and do an audio tour, but it takes longer and would probably just bore me. Again, I won.t go into the history lesson, but I will say that there is a difference between the concentration camps and execution/holocaust camps. Although MANY people were killed or died in the concentration camps, they were supposed to be work detail prisons. But along the way people were killed for fun, demonstration, suicide, attempt to escape, stopping a work detail, looking at someone wrong, you name it. And beyond what I thought before coming to Germany, it wasn.t just Jews that were killed but many other groups. Basically anyone that posed a threat to the Nazi party whether they be political, social or homosexual. It didn.t matter, only that you were not part of their "party" and beliefs.

Tonight I plan on painting the town, and getting up really late. I haven.t made it to breakfast this week.....! Today I just was sleeping really well, and lovin it! Tonight I plan on finding the answer to my "research" question from a few weeks ago. I.ll let you all know what the answer is soon enough! Ciao.

This was the entrance to the courtyard where the prisoners were brought to begin being beat down by the guards. This is also where the large heavy machine gun was positioned so that it could look down the rows of barracks to watch for prisoners escaping. The gun was never fired.Originally designed for 150 prisoners, these buildings would house up to 400 during the heyday of the early 1940.s
The wall constructed shows where the barracks began. You can see the outline depicting the shape of each, fanned out so the guards could look down from above. This is where roll call was performed each morning and evening. If there was a miscount, they would start over again. The longest time it took for this was 15 hours, with many people dieing because of falling over from exhaustion, then shot.

Der Keiser in Berlin

Uggghhh, I.m tired. Sorry I don.t have much energy today to report, so I.ll keep it brief. Yesterday.s train ride from Prague was uneventful and only about 5.5 hours. So I was able to take advantage of my 1st class ticket this time and sit in the comfy seats! After arriving, I checked into my hotel and called Joanna. She.s a friend of Becky Grant and lives here in Berlin. We met for sushi (first time I.ve had any on the trip and was CRAVING it!) and sat, talked, gorged, drank, and talked some more until the wee hours. I had a great time getting to know her and it was fun cutting up with someone who has a similar personality! Thanks Joanna, hopefully I can repay you soon!

This morning I didn.t get up too early, 11:00 to be specific.... But I was still able to down a Tylenol and make it to the plaza to meet the walking Free Tour guide that departed at 1:00. It was informative, but maybe not as much as the one in Munich. Of course like all tours, it depends on the tour guide. But we did get to see the highlights and some history as well. I won.t bore you with those details this time! But the tour is designed to just give you an overview in 4 hours, not show you everything and try to cram hundreds of years of history into the same time frame. Tomorrow I will either go to the concentration camp north of here, or a castle near by. My cousin Jeff gave me some other pointers, and I did not see all of them today, so I may try and take some of those off the list. I am already leaning towards staying until Friday, I like this town!

Brandenburg Gate, the most famous landmark in Berlin and where the Wall once stood.

Does this look familiar? Jacko (aka Michael Jackson) dangled his child off of this balcony...

A Jewish memorial. These are concrete "tombs", but there are many interpretations of the meaning.

Although the tombs appear to rise only slightly, the ground actually drops dramatically and the concrete tombs rise, giving them a lot of depth.

What is left of the Wall from 1989.

The American checkpoint Charlie. This is a mock-up of the original, which was 10 lanes wide.

The Dom and TV antenna tower to it's right. Why they built these antenna's and thought of them as "art", I will never know.

Inside of the Dom.

Touring Prague

Now I get to report on touring Prague for the past two days. The Prague tourist information website says you should see Prague in 3 days, and I think that is more than suffice, or even just two. But if you take it easy and don't power walk the whole thing like we did, then you can drag it out over 3 days no problem. It is a big city, but not too big. We literally only took two subway trains, one to get into the city, and one to get out. But you can easily get around under or above ground. So we went to the Old Town square to view the astronomical clock and tower then toured virtually all of the church's in the surrounding area. Petra and I both love going into these old churches, and neither are big on museums and artsy fartsy stuff. So we were perfect together as a sight seeing "couple". From the Old Town we crossed the Charles Bridge towards the Royal Palace and Cathedral. I wasn't overly impressed with the bridge and wasn't really sure why it was so famous.... It wasn't ugly by any means, just appeared to be a bridge with some statues on it. Petra looked amazed and said, "Because it has been there so LONG". It was finished being built in the early 1500's and is said that the mortar is mixed with egg yolk, which is why the bridge is so strong. Ok, I'll go for that, but there were many tourists and street "vendors" and "musicians" (beggars) along the bridge. Ok, I guess I change my mind a little about it! But on to a few more churches, an authentic Czech lunch (goulash and dumplings), then the Royal Palace. You can get a pretty good view of the city from the Palace, but there is an even better one if you go to Petrin view tower. It looks like the Eiffel, but smaller. We did not go on the funicular because of too many people, but could be worth a visit another time. From the Palace we strolled to the New Town and really just walked and took in the sights and sounds. It was really nice discussing culture, our thoughts on history, and what the mean of love and life are all about! I had such a great tour guide and an even better conversation companion, thanks Petra!!! But after dinner we strolled back across the Charles Bridge to view everything at night and it was worth the trip. I know I didn't get to bed until 12:30 and am sure it was late for her too. But a great day none the less!

Today we met and went to tour the Jewish Synagogue and "compound". There were about 6 different buildings in the old Jewish community to tour. We saw a VERY long list of city, family name, then given name, then date of birth and death written in an entire building. It was very sad to see so many Jewish names and how each had died in either 1941, '42, or '43. Why are so many wars fought for religion? And why does it still go on today? I think I agree that religion and politics should stay separate, but not to forget the principals of the other. At least from a Christian's perspective that is.... Any why was Hitler so against the Jews? Because they are smarter? Have more money? Mad because they killed Jesus? If so, then Hitler would have to be a Christian himself, or so it would seem. But his actions speak out against that fact.

Ok, enough of that too. But you can see that it was informational, thought provoking and I'm glad we got to see it. I look forward to going to Berlin tomorrow and learning more about the Holocaust there too. I will try not to get so deep in thought next time! And I hope to be able to post pics soon, this cafe won't let me download, they must be Internet Nazi's!

The graves were stacked one on top of the other, and the grave stones are the only evidence of what is buried beneath.