Up and off to explore Potsdam, West Berlin and Parliament. Cold 10 degrees, and fine so far.
Tym our local guide, cute with a sharp sense of humour!
Interesting - you have to pay to use the toilets in these parts - czech and germany, even at the service stations!
We just paid A70c for a wee! Didn't budget for that!
Back to the 'spend a penny' era. You can imagine how Roger is managing to re-train his bladder!
87% of Berliners rent their accommodation, most living within the city limits. The law is stacked on the side of the tennants not the landlords, several live in the same place for their lifetime, once contract is signed and you pay the rent regularly you cannot be evicted.
Visited Sansoucci gardens/castle, home of Frederick the Great.
Next stop - Cecilienhof Castle, Potsdam, where the Potsdam Conferences took place in July/August 1945. The purpose of these conferences was for Starlin, Rosevelt & Churchill to divy up Germany so to speak. By the time the final conference 17 June 1945 (2 weeks), Roosevelt had died (replaced by Truman) and Churchill had lost to Attlee.
Truman had also decided to put an end to the Japanese fighting and discussed the dropping of the bombs on Ngisaki and Hiroshima.
This conference also heralded the begining of the cold war.
Dropped at one of the largest shopping centre in Berlin. Basically the same as DJs, has a nice lunch in the glass top restaurant.
There are so many Baby ErdS here, more than MercS I think!
Poor Germans pay 52% tax. To us it appears the country may be rich but the people aren't.
Berlin has a very flat terrain. So many people ride bikes and they have right of way on the streets it seems'
Went to Reichstag this pm (Parliament), not as nice as our Parliament House!
'Eva Braun' confiscated Roger's torch would you believe! Lucky they decided to give it back as we left......
Walked back to the hotel via the Brandenburg Gate and via the new Jewish memorial - very fitting reminder. It is only since late 1960s that Germans have openingly acknowledged the persecusion of so many people by Hitler, and this generation apparently feel very ashamed of these acts.
Very interesting day.......off to the Marriot ( next door) for dinner.
Lovely dinner, dined with Peter, Pru, David and Wendy - fun people from Sydney , brothers and their wives.
We had a little Anzac Service at 5am Australian time , lead of course by a scout leader who is on the trip- nice touch.

Roger's added thoughts on the day.....

Had a lovely lunch at the top of the tower overlooking Berlin.
Walked past where the bunker used to be where Hitler shot himself!
Got them on the paying for the toilet 'thing'..... I reckon I used $4 soap, $8 paper and $6 water!.
Lovely cake and coffee at Parliament.