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 Claudia Fenner is a writer, photographer and travel enthusiast from Dix Hills. She loves to plan her family’s vacations as well as help her relatives and friends with theirs. Have any travel questions you would like answered? Email her at travelingclaudia@gmail.com. Happy Travels! |
| Two days in Amsterdam had passed quickly and we were ready for part 2 of our, “A to B” adventure. We decided to take the train between the two cities. Even though it was a six hour ride, it seemed more relaxing than flying. I booked direct train tickets ahead of time and reserved 2nd class seats at www.bahn.com/en, which is the German rail site. If you’re more flexible about your travel days and times, you can buy tickets at the railway station the day of travel. Our train arrived about an hour late into Berlin Hauptbahnhof– which is Berlin’s main railway station. Since the train was delayed, they handed out papers for a 25% cash refund on the tickets, which we claimed when we arrived at the main ticket office. The total for one-way fare, not including the discount, was $262 for three people. Fares vary depending upon how much in advance you buy them, the class of service and whether you reserve seats or not. After seven hours on the train, we were ready to stretch our legs and walked half an hour to the hotel with our rolling luggage. It was a thrill to pass by the Brandenburg Gate as well as the Reichstag on the way– two icons that I had only seen in history books. The Hilton Berlin was a great choice; fantastic location and reasonably priced compared to other European capital’s. The next day, we spent a few hours on two different routes of the double decker hop-on/hop-off bus for an overview of the city. We did get off at the East Side Gallery, which is the world’s largest open-air art gallery; there are 101 large murals painted directly on the remnants of the wall that once divided East and West. For more info, visit www.eastsidegallery-berlin.com. Lastly, we visited the fascinating Berlin Museum of Medical History and also the New Synagogue, which is now a museum. Just the facade remains as the original Synagogue– which was destroyed during the war. We also paid tribute to the victims of the Holocaust at the outdoor Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. Built in 2003, it’s a site which covers almost 5-acres with 2,700 concrete slabs of differing sizes as well as an underground information center. Their website is www.stiftung-denkmal.de/en. Our “A to B” trip was coming to an end…and soon we would be heading back to our original point, “A” or America that is! |
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