Day 5 - More Exploration: Mauerpark, Berliner Unterwelten, and Fussball!

The weather report for Wednesday called for rain. This provided the perfect opportunity to plan to attend the Berliner Unterwelten tour.  It was our last day with Sam, and we all agreed this would be a fun last activity together. 

The Berliner Unterwelten tours are an incredibly tangible way to put yourself in the mindset of a citizen whose country is definitely planning on helping its citizens survive World War III, which after World War II, certainly seemed a real possibility to European citizens. Here's a description of the tour we went on: Tour 3:

"This tour follows the traces of the Cold War in the underground. In West Berlin civil defence shelters were reactivated or newly built in preparation for a possible nuclear war. Particularly after the building of the Berlin Wall, the West German government and the West Berlin senate invested millions in these projects. Some of these were built as ‘multi-purpose structures’ and are currently used as underground stations, parking garages and storage facilities. By explaining the practical preparations made to help people survive, this tour attempts to make the realities and horrors of such conflict easy to comprehend.

First we visit the civil defence shelter – “Blochplatz”, an air raid shelter from WWII that was renovated in the early 1980s. In an emergency 1,318 people were to shelter here for up to 48 hours. Here, with the help of various objects and photos, we will deal with some related themes.
After a short ride via the U-Bahn to Pankstrasse station, we offer a glimpse into the workings of a 'modern' bunker, which was intended to protect the citizens of West Berlin in case of a full-blown nuclear war. This 'multi-purpose' facility, built in 1977 along with the northbound extension of the U8 Underground line, serves not only as an U-Bahn stop for commuters – in an emergency it could have sheltered 3,339 people for up to two weeks. Here, we try to give you an idea what it could have been like, had World War Three broken out."  -- Berliner Unterwelten tour site.

We would highly recommend attending one of these tours.  We plan to go on another one the next time we return to Berlin.

Before the tour, Josef and I walked around to get to see the surrounding area.  One park we'd wanted to see was Mauerpark, as it's the site of a famous flea market as well as lots of other activity, including a famous Sunday afternoon karaoke show. It was rather quiet on Wednesday morning but we were still able to appreciate this fun spot. The northern entrance to the park greeted us with some fun sculptures, lively birds, and lots of people watching.

 

We found the huge amphitheater, but no karaoke singers at the moment.

At the top of the amphitheater was a long wall, presumably the ever-changing canvas of graffiti artists.  There was even an artist working on his latest tag when we were there. 

Mauerpark had incredible wildflowers as well. 

We walked back to the train station to meet up with Sam. Here are some of the sights we passed along the way:

A huge bridge over the train tracks.

Lots of train tracks.  

Someone making the best situation after the discovery of a lost shoe?

We then met up with Sam and went on the tour, which sadly did not allow photography.  It lasted 90 minutes, included a train ride to another station, and we learned a lot from the wonderful tour guide.

Josef and I walked around the adjacent shopping center after we parted ways from Sam (he was off to explore another part of town) and made our way to a nearby park.  There are so very many parks here; it's so great to have many options of places to relax and enjoy nature for free.

Upon arrival back to our hotel, we were treated with truffles and wine!

 Evening time hear means, in addition to figuring out dinner, it's time to watch soccer/fussball!  Sam met up with us for a final beer before heading back to London.  It was great to get to spend so much time with him, and he really enjoyed Berlin, too.

We had met up at Charlie's, which is a beach bar, no where near an ocean!  This was the Denmark and Portugal match, and the crowd was definitely fired up about the game.

We bid Sam adieu and made our way out to see the highly anticipated Germany - Netherlands match.  To say the city was excited would be putting it lightly!  We enjoyed a nice (and very inexpensive!) Italian dinner during the first half of the game and headed toward the Spree River to catch the second half.  Thankfully, Germany won!

Here's a closing shot of an area we walked through last night on our way to the second half of the game.  It was a neat shot I couldn't resist capturing. The image has not been edited, by the way.

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