We arrived in Wolfsburg, Germany after lunch on Tuesday 4 June. As we were driving through town to the caravan park, I noticed there were a lot more VW's driving around than any other car and at one stage we had 11 in a row drive past us. Not surprising considering 40% of the town works at the VW factory.

The caravan park was situated beside a lake and not far from the AutoStadt (the VW complex). Camped just down from us were two Swiss guys with 2 fully restored T1 & T2 Volkswagon Combis. Loche got chatting to them and had a few beers with them that night. Loche also managed to break one of their chairs, they fixed it but we bought them a new one anyway. They were so pleased that they took a photo of Loche holding up the new chair.

The following day we went to the AutoStadt where you can do a tour of the factory and there are also different pavilions and museums. The factory tour was quite good but all in all we were disappointed with rest. There were different pavilions for Porsche, Lamborghini, Skoda, Audi and a few others but there was not much history on the cars or the company. It came across as a bit gimmicky with not much substance.

Back at the caravan park Loche's new friends (who had visited the Autostadt the same day) asked him what he thought of it. When he said he wasn't too impressed, they agreed and were very disappointed themselves, they were planning on staying for a week, but ended up leaving the next day.

The next day we did a bit of shopping and bought Cara her birthday present - a new bike. We decided to give it to her early so we could go for a ride around the lake. I think it was a bit ambitious; Cara loved riding her new bike, but did get very tired towards the end.

The following day, Friday 7 June, we left Wolfsburg and headed to Berlin. We had quite a good getaway, which meant we arrived in Berlin just before lunch. The caravan park was in a lovely setting on river with boat moorings, a large playground and restaurant.

The following day was Cara's birthday so we went to a pool complex about an hours drive away. It was quite a large complex with 3 heated pools, 2 spas and 2 slippery slides. We spent the day there and Cara didn't want to leave!

We spent a week at this caravan park, about 30km southeast of Berlin. We caught the train into the city one day and then hopped on the open-top buses, we've found these are the best way for us to see the main sights of cities with commentary in English and not a lot of walking for Cara. If we find something interesting we hop off and have a look around.

Our first stop off was the Brandenburg Gate - built in the late 1700's during the Prussian reign, this was an original gate to the city. After World War II when Germany was divided up between the allies, and the Berlin Wall was erected, the Gate was isolated with the wall running right next to it.

We had a look around the gate and took some photos and then walked up the road a bit to the 'Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe'. This memorial takes up a full city block and is made up of grey stone blocks of varying heights set out in a grid. There is a museum underneath, but the line was pretty long and we didn't end up going in.

Our next stop was at Checkpoint Charlie - a well known border crossing between East and West Berlin during the Cold War. Originally called Checkpoint C, it was nicknamed Checkpoint Charlie by the Western Allies. It was quite crowded here and they have two guards (or paid actors) standing outside it with American flags - everyone is taking photos of them. There's a McDonalds opposite it if you want a Big Mac while you're there. We went into the nearby Checkpoint Charlie Museum, which had heaps of information on the famous crossing and outlined some successful and not-so-successful escape attempts.

We headed back home after this, though there was still a bit more I wanted to see Loche had seen enough. So he stayed with Cara the next day and I went into Berlin myself. There is so much recent, tumultuous history in this city and I wanted to find out a bit more about it. My first stop was to the Jewish Museum, which showcased over 2000 years of Jewish history with Germany.

There were personal items of Jewish families who had been killed in concentration camps and there was an exhibition of Bedrich Fritta. Bedrich Fritta was a graphic artist and he was taken to the Theresienstadt Ghetto (near Prague). The Ghetto is where many Jews were interned before being sent to the death camps. During his time in Theresienstadt Fritta was required to produce propaganda material showing how 'normal' life was in the Ghetto. He also produced secret drawings depicting how hard life actually was. When the Nazis discovered these pictures Fritta was sent to Auswich to his death. More than 100 drawings remained in hiding and were eventually handed back to Fritta's son Tommy. When Fritta was sent to Theresienstadt Tommy was only just one year old and Fritta's brother ended up adopting him.

My next stop was the Topographies of Terror, this museum is located where the old German SS and Gestapo headquarters were - the original buildings were mostly destroyed during World War II. There is also a section of the original wall here that was never demolished. I had a walk through the open-air section that outlined the history of repression under the Nazis.

After that I caught the train back and Loche and Cara picked me up. We headed back to the caravan park and started packing up. We had decided to leave the following day for Poland.