We end the day and in fact our visit to Berlin with an exploration of the Tiergarten, a huge park right next to Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag. As so often is the case for these oases of green in the middle of cities in Europe the Tiergarten was the hunting area for the Brandenburg Elector which led to it being protected from urbanization for centuries. In the 19th centuries it finally was made open to the public and it covers now an impressive 210 hectares (520 acres). As we leave the Reichstag we first pass by some more recent addition like the Carillon the and the Soviet World War 2 memorial.
The memorial guarded by tanks and guns, not active of course, was erected in 1945 a few months after the city was captured. Through the Cold War Soviet honor guards were sent to stand watch at the memorial even though it was in West Berlin.
But what we enjoy most is just wandering the wide alleys through the trees looking for any interesting birds and mammals. And we see some mammals along the way mostly rabbits though.
Right through the middle of the park crosses the busy street between Brandenburg Gate and The Victory column. To our surprise there are no pedestrian crosses nearby forcing us to make a run from one side of the other. Of course we pause a while in the middle to take photos in both directions as the views are quite impressive.
On the other side we hit a small river where on a tree sits an eagle eating something it caught from nearby. Unfortunately we have to avoid most of the grass as it is quite wet and we do not want to get our clothes and especially shoes wet.
However that goes out of window when we hear an unknown bird song. A quick check confirm it is a nightingale, something we have never seen nor heard. So next we stake out multiple areas and wait and finally find it in the open as it is quite skulky. Quite an unexpected lifer!!
Afterwards we continue exploring the park starting to turn towards our hotel but still getting lost while trying to avoid any wet paths.
However we become orientated again when we reach the Monument to Queen Louise and the surrounding garden. It is a beautiful area and we spend some time here just enjoying the place before leaving in the now certain direction of our hotel.
The area that we pass now is more developed versus the more wild feel of the previous section. There are more alleys, more people and more monument including a golden column memorial to the Jehova’s Witnesses killed by the Nazis.
The last attraction before we exit the park is the Global Stone Project where we hope to find a cache and fail miserably. The project itself is less interesting than we hoped based on the description. It consists of ten stone groups with five groups being placed in the five continents of origin and the other five groups are placed in a circle in Berlin. And then supposedly once a year on the 21 st of June the light of the sun connects all ten groups by reflection, not sure how exactly. Anyway when we visit the rocks are occupied so we move on to the hotel to pack and order breakfast for the next day as we have a long day ahead of us as we relocate to Leipzig.
