Day 6: Potsdam and the way to Prague

Thursday, August 12 2010

We woke up bright and early at 7 am. We saw our hostess briefly before she left for work. We had packed all of our stuff on Wednesday so that we wouldn't have to do that in the morning. We walked to Griebnitzsee station, and went with the S-bahn to Potsdam Hbf with our luggage. We left it there in the luggage boxes, cause there is no way we could've taken that with us to where we were headed. We had to get the biggest luggage box for the two of us. It was 4€. 

We started walking to Sansoucci. The center of Potsdam was very quiet, there were hardly any people around. I had imagined that it is a long walk to Sansoucci, but it wasn't. And I'd been there before but we'd gone there some other way the previous times. We arrived there around 10 am. On the way there we were stopped once again, and they asked us for directions, in German this time as well. We sure do look like locals then...

We walked around the park, saw the old palace, the new palace, the dogs' graves that the habitant had, I forgot his name already. Friedrich the Great I believe. I had told Brain about the potatoes that people bring to the graves, and she totally didn't believe me. But there they were, the potatoes. On the dogs' graves.

 

This is either the kitchen or the servants' house. It is by the New Palace. 

The Chinese Teahouse

Earlier we had asked for a tram & bus schedule from the security guards. They didn't really understand a lot of what we asked, I felt. The bus 695 goes every 10 minutes. When we were walking towards the bus stop we waw the bus leave. We waited for a 606 to S Hauptbahnhof. I was a little scared that would we make it to the regional train that was to take us to the Berlin Hbf where our train for Prague left.

We did make it. It was the 11.57 regional train. We had a little time to go buy water bottles from one of the shops in the main train station. The previous day we'd checked the platform where the train was going to leave from. It was platform 2. We then noticed that it was platform 2 on the big screens. Didn't think much of it, they had just changed it. There were a lot of other people too. We saw two Finnish InterRailers, I asked them if they were going to Prague, the whole platform change had confused us. There was an announcement, that the train for Prague leaves from platform 2 instead of the one we were on. All the people rush to platform 2, because the train was to leave any minute now.

We didn't have reserved seats, so we just had to find a free compartment. We didn't know which end of the train was reserved, and of course we started to walk that way that was reserved. All the compartments were becoming more and more reserved. I had my part of the tent attached to my bag horizontallly, so it was quite wide. I didn't know how else I would've attached it to my bag. So I kept getting stuck and hitting people with my tent when I was trying to walk in the train's small corridoors. People were coming towards me, and walking after me, trying to find their reserved compartments or free compartments, like we were.

We turn around and walk and walk and finally find a compartment where we weren't alone, but it wasn't packed either. We had two Spanish guys there too. They didn't talk to us. Except at one point, when they asked where we were from. Since we speak English together, it is confusing for other people. I don't think they really believed us when we said we were from Finland. They said they're from Spain. Like we hadn't figured that out. C'mon, it's easy to guess where they were from. We didn't tell them that.

The scenery in Bad Schandau was gorgeous! 

We got to Prague, got some money out from the ATM. We found our hostel  (Hostel Jednota) that was really close to the train station luckily. We went to check in, and soon left to go back to the train station to reserve spots from the night train to Budapest. We walked around Prague, and Vaclavske Namesti, had salads and huge beers in Cafe Amsterdam. Brain's post is more detailed about this night.

-Pinky

Day 5: Berlin

Wednesday, August 11 2010

We'd gone to bed really early the previous night and now woke up at 9. We started the day by washing some laundry. We didn't have too much clothing with, which meant we needed to wash clothes often.

At 11.37 we were at the train station and went with a Regional Train to Ostbahnhof. We wanted to see the East Side Gallery. It's a part of the wall that was dividing Berlin.

We walked back to the beginning of the wall where we started. Saw the O2-arena, and Sandsation from the outside. There were some holes in the fence that was supposed to prevent people from viewing the sand sculptures from the outside. We didn't want to pay the 5€ to get in, so we took pictures through the fence. Then a French girl asked us for directions on how to get to the Brandenburg gate, and we, the non-locals, told her which way to go. :)

The we spotted a beach bar and ordered Cuba Libres.

From Ostbahnhof we took a train to Westkreuz. There we changed to S41 ring S-bahn going to Westend. We walked to Schloss Charlottenburg. I'd never been there before, and now we just walked around it. We got asked that do we know something about the German phone cards, I guess we looked like locals, but we didn't. 

Eventually we walked back to Westend and went with a S42 to Westkreuz and then an S7 to Potsdam Hbf. At the Hbf we bought milkshakes from McDonald's because we needed some quick energy. It was more like a sunday, not really a milkshake though. 

We started walking towards Potsdam's center. On the way there we got asked for directions once, in German. We understood him and just replied in English. And then we did a little detour. From the Hbf you walk on a bridge and from there you can get to this park so we went there and sat around for a while. 

From the park we walked towards the Nikolaikirche, and then continued on towards the main street of Potsdam. There was this gate type thing and we walked through it, and turned to the right. We saw a building that I'd seen before. I'd actually been inside that building. My friend went to that school. Our hostesses daughter. 

We started walking back. On Brandenburger Str.s end we saw Potsdam's Brandenburg Gate. Then we noticed the time and had to rush back to Potsdam Hbf, we were meeting with our hostess and the other girl who was staying with them. We went to this Italian restaurant in Babelsberg, a part of Potsdam. I got lasagna. We walked back to our accommodation, our hostess was showing us places, where Harry Truman stayed during the Potsdam conference. And where he signed the papers that the USA can drop the atom bombs to Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In front of the house there was a monument, that had only been there for a month or so when we were there. The house is right by Griebnitzsee, the lake. Glienicker Brücke is the bridge with two colors: light and dark green. We continued on, and to the Babelsberg film studios, they had the sets from The Pianist there for example. The sets are Berliner Strasse. 

We got home, and our hostess said she hadn't received a reply from the camping site in Innsbruck. She called them and reserved us a place for our tent. For some reason the camping place asked for the language that we speak, I don't know why. We said English, because listing Finnish, English, Russian, German, Swedish and French would've been too difficult. "Well, we both speak Finnish and English. She speaks Russian and has studied French. I've studied Swedish, German and French..." No, thanks, English is good enough.

-Pinky