More berlin

DAY 3

Our third day in Berlin pretty much started just like the second.  More waiting for the family to get ready.  More strudel from another German pastry shop.  More metro rides.  But this time the metro ride took us all the way to Potsdam (when I. Say metro in this case, I really mean the all encompassing light rail above and below ground that makes up the Berlin system). 

Well, Potsdam, besides being the upstate town in the middle of nowhere New York that my friend Maggie hails from, is also the home to all the Prussian kings' summer homes (read: palaces).

Now, these palaces are pretty much situated in various parks and gardens and are very spread out.  We started out in Sansouci Park and strolled around the royal grounds, passing gigantic Prussian buildings along the way, including Frederick the Great's  enormous and grand looking palace, the Orangerie, and arguably the most famous schloss in Potsdam (and most photogenic) this large, yellow palace with sprawling tiered gardens opening up below.

Hungry and exhausted from our many kilometer 

Sorry, as I type this I am on a train ride from Berlin to Prague and we are passing through this are with beautiful bluffs along a river dotted with what I think of as traditional German houses.  The scene is too picturesque.  It really is making writing this blog entry much more difficult.

... So yeah.  Many kilometers.  Well, let's see, where was I?  Hungry and exhausted we went into town which I am tempted to describe as quaint, but should really say it was touristy made to feel quaint.  Either way, we went to eat.  My mom luckily picked one of the only places that didn't have an English menu and the waiter only spoke German.  How neat!  Some of you may be thinking.  No.  Wrong.  This was not neat.  Let me put it this way.  I don't think an egg sandwich is exclusively German and I don't like egg.  Nor do I like bitter lemon drinks.
Disappointed with my lunch, my mom thought it was necessary to fix the situation with ice-cream.  It worked.

Satisfied, we went to Babelsberg, a town just to the east of Potsdam and walked in another park.  Meghan really wants to see castles while in Europe, and saw a castle like tower in the distance.  We walked toward it through fields and along the river up a hill to the tower, which was attached to this magnificent... it wasn't attached to anything actually.  In Meghan's opinion it was a "castle tease" but I can't imagine what she was expecting.  Not all castles are the fairy tale type with whole towns inside.  Yes, some are, but we probably aren't just goin to happen upon something like that.

Back in Berlin I bought my Interrail pass and we confirmed our reservations when something really awesome happened.  To skip some personal medical details, I ended up spending my last few waking hours in Berlin on a hospital getting treated for a really fun skin itch that I thought I handled in Spain a few weeks ago.  Luckily signs of my traveling are staring to show.  Sadly it's not in the form of being more cultured and worldly, but rather in the form of a very itchy rash.


On that note, I'm off to Prague for Easter weekend, hopefully without any more health problems.

One last thing.  I didn't get a currywurst in Berlin.  How upsetting.  Hopefully in Munich I can get one.

Last thing I swear.  I am getting really good at keeping up with my daily activities on this trip.  Yea for blogging the day of (or at least right away the following day)!