April 3, 2019
To start today, I have to tell one story about my airport experience at the Stansted Airport in London. Getting through security was interesting. At one point, Ilene had 3 people working on her stuff. Everyone of us had a bag pulled to be checked. The thing about me was that when they went to check my bag, they could not find the image of it when it went through the scanner. Apparently it points to the items that are in question. So since she could not find an image, she said I could put my bag through again (and I had been waiting 10 minutes to be manually checked) or she could go thorough through my suitcase...which turned out to basically un pack it. Now, I tell you this because upon opening my bag, these are the words that she said, “This is a really well organized bag!’. It made me smile. I was a proud packer.
This morning, I was not sure if we were going to try and go to the Jewish Museum and out to the Sachsenhausen Memorial (Concentration Camp) or just one of them. By the time we got ready, did some clothes washing and stuff, we did not leave until around 10 AM. So we decided to just go out to the concentration camp. I had that planned on how to do it.....take the RE5 train out and get on the 804 bus. Well, we bought full day transportation tickets and then headed to the train platform. I quickly began to notice people talking and pointing to the train monitor. There was a banner going by that made me feel like something was wrong. It turns out that train was not going to be able to stop at that stop. So we punted. I began scrambling using Movit to determine how to get out there. And boy that turned into quite an adventure. We took a train to another main hub and then caught the S1 out there. But this train, as it turns out, was stopping about 3 stops short of where we needed to go. Talking to people, they said they would have a bus there. So we get there...and yes there was a bus there. But was it the right bus? We did not get on. I then asked other folks, who don’t speak much English, if another bus was coming. They all said yes. So we waited. A bus finally came that had S1 on it. So I knew I was good. We took it to the train station we wanted to go to originally. Once there, we had to get on another bus (804). That was the one to take us to the camp, which it did. We arrived at 1:30 PM. We had hoped to be there by 11:30 AM. But while waiting for bus 804, we were able to stumble on a nice sandwich shop that sold Doner’s....a triangle shaped bread filled with sliced meats with lots of salad like veggies in it. It is almost like a gyro. They were yummy. Denise and I shared one.
The concentration camp was a somber place. It reminded me of the feelings had when at Auschwitz Poland. The grounds for this place was quite large. There were a few buildings standing. We spent a good 2 hours touring it. I hope pictures tell the tale.
Coming back to Berlin, we did get on the RE5 which was a nice train that took us to a stop where we got on the U8. We wanted to go find the eatery a friend suggested. It turned out...it was a sandwich shop that servers Doner’s too. I got one for myself this time. But the winner, winner, chicken dinner was Denise’s Schnitzel! Man, it was covered in a creamy mushroom sauce to die for. So good that Ilene bought a bowl full to go with her Pizza she had them cook. Really great food!
After dinner, my challenge was to find transportation that dropped us off at the doorstep of our apartment. And low and behold, a bus went by there that did that. We jumped on it and within 20 minutes we were in our apartment. It was about 6 or a little after.
We are at the mid-point of our trip...hard to believe. We feel like we’ve walked all over Europe. It has been lots of fun. We’ve now taken in the highlights of two cities...London and Berlin. Tomorrow we will grab a rental car and head to Bremen, a nice little town about half way between Berlin and Amsterdam. It will be about a 4 hour drive. I’ll be glad when I’m out of the city and on the highway!
Pictures:
The security fence at the camp....
The entry gate at the camp...
The camp monument....
A frustrated Movit user....
Waiting for a train....
Tim pestering a passenger on the train to validate we were not going to Moscow, fussing
Bunk beds in the camp....
Gelato....can’t pass that up!
The shooting zone...for humans.
The audio tour devices....
Schnitzel covered in a mushroom sauce with chips and salad.
The camp toilets....
This is where they tested shoes. They would walk around the camp for 40 kilometers per day.
My lunch and dinner...a Doner. So yummy!
One of the train stations....
They did not cook pizzas here...
Yum!
This is how they slid bodies into the crematorium....
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