We spent a wild, rainy week in Berlin this April (which is not the ideal time if you plan to enjoy all the beer gardens and outside stuff...but it was still cool).
With only one week to cover a very large city, we kicked things off with a bus tour to get an overview of the various major landmarks and decide which ones we wanted to explore more in-depth.
Our top 3 most notable stops in Berlin:
East Side Gallery:
A section of the Berlin wall that was transformed into an open-air art gallery. Some of the pieces were really exceptional and we grabbed a couple of cappuccinos and spent about an hour walking it (it’s over 1 kilometer long — the longest continuous section of the Berlin Wall still in existence).
Topography of Terror:
This exhibit is a place of remembrance, actually located at the site of Nazi persecution and terror from 1933 to 1945. It was a very sobering, intense, and well put together account of Berlin during that time period.
At first you think “I learned about all of this in school already….” but then you get there and read through stories and hear accounts that were 100% not in textbooks or movies and it shakes you to your core.
The space includes both an indoor and outdoor exhibit (with a portion of the Berlin Wall right behind it).
Futurium:
A free museum all about THE FUTURE. This was crazy fun, even though the bottom line is that we’re basically killing the earth and going to go extinct if humans don’t start making some radical changes to the way we live, work, and consume things. But on the flip side, tons of conceptual mock ups of what more sustainable living COULD look like in the future, and how we can use technology and AI to live better, longer, healthier lives.
Just as we were winding down from museum hopping, Champ Superstar arrived in Berlin for a work trip (marking it the third country we’ve done together so far this year)!
We met up for happy hour and caught up over aperol spritzes before heading over to Wen Cheng for what Champ said were the BEST noodles in all of Berlin (and my god – they really were).
We had to wait like 40 minutes to get in, which was no problem because Champ thinks of everything and grabbed us “to go” beers while we waited.
After dinner and more drinks at Wen Cheng (I am still thinking about and craving those noodles), we made our way over to the Tipsy Bear for the queer karaoke experience of a lifetime. Everyone in the whole bar was singing at the top of their lungs and having the best time and being a part of that energy felt amazing.
You’d think the night ended there, but you’d be wrong, because you don’t know Champ.
We made our way to a fourth bar with VERY weird shots for what was idk maybe my 10th drink of the day at that point and that is when they broke me and I had to go back to the hotel.
100% worth it, 5 starts, would do again.
Next stop: PRAGUE!
