"Little Berlin"

While my mom was here we took a day trip to Modlareuth, a small town 1.5 hrs from here, also known as "little Berlin".  When the wall was put up in 1966 dividing East and West Germany, it was built right through the middle of town because it followed the political boundary between the states of Bavaria and Thuringian--a boundary that hadn't mattered much to the town prior to WWII.   

The town only had about 50 people to start with, and then neighbors didn't see each other for over 20 years.  

Today, Modlareuth is an open-air museum.  You can see what the border would have looked like during the Cold War, including the initial wood-type fence and the more permanent wall that followed.  There is a guard tower (relocated from elsewhere, and half as tall as the original.)  I should have written about this a few weeks ago when I remembered more, but basically all of the security was on the East Germany side, preventing people from leaving.  There were soldiers patrolling the West, but in a very different capacity.  The West side was more of a tourist attraction, even back then.

 This is the river that divides the two German states.  When Hyrum ran down below the bridge to pose, it reminded me of the story of the Billy Goats Gruff... and of course he had no clue what I was referring to.  Cultural differences!  I'll have to tell him the story one of these days

Tiago did not love being in the stroller this day, and was much happier once we let him run free. 

These are the fields on the West side of the wall.  The guards in the towers would have watched these for suspicious activity.  It also goes to show how rural this place is.

These striped poles marked the GDR boundary.

The museum also had an exhibit of vehicles, both American and German, from the Cold War era.  This jeep has the logo of the 2nd Cavalry Regiment because they were assigned to patrol the border.  That's Hyrum's current unit. 

10 Things about our trip to Berlin

Our most recent trip was to Berlin.  So in no particular order, here are 10 things about our trip.

1. It only added an hour to our drive to stop by the Freiberg temple on the way.  It's been a blessing to have two temples within 3 hours.  Frequently, we can combine a temple trip with another trip and avoid unnecessary driving time.

2.  A lot of the time we were in Berlin we were on the East German side, and there's not really a noticeable difference.  When we drive through Germany, I've always found it pretty obvious when we leave the cute Bavarian towns where we live and enter the former east side that's full of ugly concrete apartment buildings.  Berlin has done a great job of modernizing the whole city and restoring parts that were destroyed in the east.  We walked along the East Side Gallery, which is a mile-stretch of the wall that's still standing and has been turned into a street gallery.  

The wall was not very thick at all.

A little Colombian love.

Twice on Saturday we ran into our friends from church.  Small world.  

3. Berlin is full of several huge, ornate buildings.  An obvious one to visit was the Reichstag (the government building).  We also visited "Museum Island" which is a piece of land enclosed by a river on all sides.  It has several world class museums, which we weren't interested in entering, but enjoyed from the outside.  [I've reached a point where it takes a lot to get me inside a museum.  I didn't research enough beforehand to find one of particular interest, so we skipped them all.]  The architecture was great though.  Unfortunately, a lot of the area was under construction so it was a hassle to see what we wanted.  [Museum Island is in the east, and a lot of it was destroyed and looted after WWII, but it's all been restored and you'd never know any different.]

The Reichstag.

The Berliner Dom, on Museum Island.  It was built to be the German, Protestant version of St Peter's Basilica.

Altes Museum, Museum Island

Alte National Gallery, Museum Island

Bodemuseum, Museum Island

4. RAIN!  On Saturday it rained SO hard.  We've been rained on in London and Amsterdam, but not quite this bad.  We wrapped Tiago in Hyrum's raincoat and bought a second huge umbrella.  We managed to stay mostly dry, but it's definitely not as fun to walk around in the rain as it is when the sky is clear.  Fortunately, Sunday was much better.  In general, it was colder than what was forecasted.  Overall, I felt unprepared with what I packed... I hate when that happens!

Trying to stay dry at the Brandenburg Gate.

 5. Tiago travels well.  He didn't cry much in the car, and was pretty content in his stroller during the day.  He got out to play at a shopping mall (when it was raining) and at a few different parks.  Luckily Hyrum has the energy to run around and chase him, while I just sit on a bench and watch.  [Just as a note, Tiago does not travel well when it comes to sleep!  The first night when it took an hour to get him to sleep I told myself we were never traveling ever again.  The next two nights went better since he was so sleep deprived during the day.]

These two dressed alike on Friday night because Colombia was playing that night (soccer game).

One of the rare (short) naps in the stroller.

First time watching fish.  He was probably confused by the glass, water, animals, etc...

A entire apple slice shoved into his mouth--his choice, not mine.

There was a chalkboard wall at the mall, and Tiago had so much fun watching all the kids who were around.

6. We managed to cross off all the things on Hyrum's travel wish list: Colombian food and a soccer stadium.  We toured through Olympic Stadium where the historic games were held back in 1936 during the Nazi era.  The stadium has been updated, and the 2010 World Cup was also held there.  Seeing the huge green field doesn't excite me quite like it does Hyrum, but seeing the rest of the stadium was interesting.  Definitely older looking than most stadiums, in a historic (not decrepit) way.

Ajiaco, criole potatoes, and empanadas.  Plus, delicious fruit milkshake drinks.

That's the sign where you can see all the races Jesse Owens won.  

7. We saw the Brandenburg Gate on Saturday in the rain, and again on Sunday night.  Berlin was having a festival of lights, where they illuminate several buildings with changing artwork.  We hung around until dark and walked through the center and actually didn't see as many buildings as we'd expected.  (Shame on us for not getting a map.)  But the Gate was lit up.  This gate used to be just to the East of the wall, so basically inaccessible during the whole Cold War.

8. The ward we went to on Sunday was great.  Because it's such a diverse ward (covers all of central Berlin) they have translation into several languages.  It's always easier to enjoy a meeting when you understand what's being said.  Plus, they had their old free-standing church building just next to the Tiergarten, which we explored afterwards.  The Tiergarten is the Central Park of Berlin.  Right in the middle is the Siegessäule, or Victory Column, which is over 100 years old.  Hyrum climbed up to the top (I think nearly 300 steps), and I sat on the steps and waited.     

The Brandenburg Gate is right at the end of this road.

In the Tiergarten.

9.   We ate good food, so good that we didn't usually think to take a picture till it was gone.  I think because we're familiar with German food we were more adventurous in wanting to try other cuisines.  Berlin has plenty.  We stopped for Indian food, and ended up with good stuff despite not being able to read the menu.  Mangolassi is always a good idea.  One afternoon as we headed to the East Side Gallery we saw a crowd gathered around a burger stand.  Hyrum commented about that being a cool place to hang, but I recognized the name of the place from my restaurant research on TripAdvisor.  I think Burgermeister was in the top few "cheap" restaurants.  So we stopped for a burger.  It was good, but would have been better if we'd asked for 'no jalepenos!'  Hot!

10. There are two other places we visited that I'm lumping together into #10.  Checkpoint Charlie was interesting to see, but full of people and cars trying to run us over.  Very touristy.  And the Jewish Memorial was very different than most memorials I've seen--just concrete slabs in varying heights.  Again, it was pouring when we saw both of these, so we mostly just looked, and kept walking.

We left Monday after eating our hotel's breakfast... and were home within 4 hrs!