Day 7--Berlin

We began our Monday by returning the rental car and buying transport passes for the trains and buses. It was actually really easy to get around without a car, and I wouldn't want to have to find parking everywhere we went. We headed off to the Siegessaule (Triumphal Column) at the edge of the Tiergarten. This column was built to commemorate 3 Prussian victories in wars against Denmark, Austria, & France. It used to stand in front of the Reichstag, but was moved in 1938 by the Nazi government to its present location. I stayed on the first level looking at the mosaic frieze while the kids climbed up the stairs to the base of the gold statue of Victory. It was pretty windy and cold on this day, so at the top of the column, it was REALLY windy and cold (part of the reason I didn't go up!)

Maren, Aubrey, and I are near the bottom right corner

 Views from the top of the column

  

We walked over to the Tiergarten church, just so we could see where it was.

Aubrey in front of the Tiergarten church

Then we headed over to see the Gedachtnis-Kirche (Remembrance Church), but it's all covered in scaffolding while it's being reinforced. Here's a picture from Wikipedia of what it looked like in 2006.


And here's a picture from Wikipedia of what it looks like now (I don't know why we didn't get any pictures of it). If you really want to know more about this church you can look at the Wikipedia article here


This church is located on the Ku'damm, Berlin's main shopping street. We found a cool fountain there, along with this broken link sculpture (It's called Berlin and it was commissioned to celebrate the city's 750th anniversary. It symbolizes the broken link between West & East Berlin and is a reminder of the city's painful past). We decided we should document the soccer mania that was in Germany by taking a picture of one of the giant billboards there on the Ku'damm. I also decided we should document the giant pretzels that we ate so often while on this trip. I think it was Carson's favorite food of the whole trip :)

Yum! These are SO good!

Next we were on a quest to have some doner at one of Aubrey's favorite doner laden (shop), Balli Doner. It was somewhat near our next destination, so we had planned in advance to eat our lunch there. The food was pretty yummy, and the portions were large!

After filling our tummies, we headed over to the Germany Berlin Mission office to see President Pimentel and his wife. I have to say that my most favorite part of this trip was seeing Aubrey's face when he gave his president a big hug. I really wish I had had my camera out, but I didn't, so I will have to rely on memory. I know it's a real mom kind of favorite, but, I am a mom after all :)  We were able to spend a good chunk of time chatting with them. They were so gracious to let us visit when they were so busy getting ready to go home since their 3 years of service was up in just a few days.

After leaving the mission office (where Aubrey was able to talk to one of the missionaries he had trained), we  headed over to the part of town where Aubrey had lived the last part of his mission. While in the train station,  he was able to call Elder DuPaul for a few minutes. (This is the other missionary that he trained.)

Using the train station phone to call Elder DuPaul

At the door of his missionary apartment in Marzahn

Marzahn missionary apartment building

To end our day, we headed over to have dinner with one of Aubrey's investigators who had so graciously invited us to her apartment. She had made a ton of food, and it was all really delicious. None of the people there spoke too much English, so Aubrey had to translate for us. I'm sure we missed most of the conversation, but that's okay. While we were there, another former companion (Elder Pauli) was able to call and talk to him. It was a day full of good memories for Aubrey and the opportunity to make new memories for the rest of us.

Day 6--Sunday in Berlin and Potsdam

Aubrey wanted to attend church in the Marzahn ward, the last place he had served before coming home. Luckily for us, sacrament meeting wasn't until 10:50, so we didn't have to be up super early. We were there in plenty of time and Aubrey was able to talk to a couple of people who remembered him. After church we had been invited to lunch/dinner at a member family's home. They lived quite a ways out, so I'm glad we still had the rental car. We were able to enjoy a pleasant afternoon with the Gartner family and one of Aubrey's investigators who has since been baptized. The grilled sausages, chicken, kebabs, and all the fixings were so yummy!

Since we still had our rental car, we had planned to spend the evening in Potsdam at San Soucci (about 40 minutes outside of Berlin). We got there just in time for the rain to start, but it wasn't too cold, so we enjoyed as much of the grounds as we could before we decided we were just too wet. San Soucci is actually a large palace compound  (700 acres) that belonged to Frederick the Great. The Schloss, built in 1747, was his summer palace.

In front of the steps leading to the Schloss (palace)

With a little of the fountain

At the top of the steps, part of the palace

Leave it to Maren to find the animals wherever we go :)

The Orangerie, complete with statue of a naked bowman
 (we did discuss at length why you wouldn't want to be shooting a bow and arrow if you didn't have any clothes on...)

Statue of Frederick the Great himself

A copy of  Thorvaldsen's Christus
 located in the courtyard of the  Friedenskirche (Church of  Peace)

  

At the back of the palace you can look across the street
 and see this fountain and the fake ruins in the background

Don't you like my smiley face umbrella?

more gardens

another building, but I don't know which one anymore :)

Carson at the park gates

Maren at the park gates

Day 5--Lubeck Continued and Back to Berlin

After a tasty breakfast and checking out of the hotel, we headed back to the old town to do some sightseeing. We started out at the Niederegger marzipan store. Lubeck is famous for its marzipan and this is the biggest manufacturer of the tasty, but rich, sweet treat. On the third floor of their store they have a small museum that tells the history of marzipan in that area along with many figures made of marzipan.

Marzipan Holsten Tor

Largest marzipan figures in the world

almost look real, don't they?

We did quite a bit of shopping in this part of town. We bought scarves, soccer memorabilia, shoes, a tie, and presents for friends at home. We also bought some fresh strawberries from a produce stand and were they yummy! It was strawberry season, so they were for sale everywhere we went on this trip. This was the only time we bought some, and they were pretty darn tasty :)

We walked by the Marienkirche but couldn't go in since there was some sort of meeting going on. We stopped by the devil statue outside for a quick photo before moving on to the Heiligen-Geist-Hospital. The Holy Ghost Hospital is supposedly the best preserved medieval building of its type in central Europe.

Marienkirche

The boys outside the Marienkirche with the devil statue

Heiligen-Geist Hospital

Window inside the hospital

The outer section that is a church

The inner section that was the hospital/hospice
Each door opens to a tiny cubicle for each resident

We needed to get back to our car (the parking meter was nearly up), so we opted for a quick lunch at McDonald's. I know it sounds like a cop-out to some, but Carson has a goal to eat at McDonald's in every country he visits, so that's where we ate that day. After leaving the old town, we set off to find Aubrey's missionary apartment, Walderseestrasse 55. Then we swung by the church, which happened to be open with someone there. We stepped in for a few minutes before heading northeast to the beach.

Missionary apartment on 2nd floor

ahh, the memories :)

Lubeck Chapel

The beach is on Lubeck Bay, which is a bay of the Baltic Sea. We didn't really park that close to where we wanted to be, so we had quite a walk. It was a nice walk, and since it was Saturday, there were lots of people out strolling with their dogs and kids. Once again we were in a time crunch because of parking, but we did see the water and the kids ventured further along and actually got on the beach and touched the sea. We also had yummy Magnum ice cream bars on the way back to the car :)

The Baltic Sea

We had a couple hours of daylight left when we got back to Berlin and the sky was clear (something that wasn't in the weather forecast for the rest of the time we were there), so we decided to go to the television tower (Fernsehturm). It's kind of pricey to go up the tower, but you can see all over Berlin from up there. At 1197 feet high, it's the city's tallest structure. It was close to sunset, so we waited around a while to get some sunset pictures before going down to find an interesting fountain just off Alexanderplatz. Then we headed home for bed, cuz it had been another full day and we were tired!

TV Tower

It's a turtle!