Big Adventures, Little World

We got up early again for breakfast in the restaurant which was a nice change from having to do it all ourselves under the cook tent. A nice buffet breakfast before we headed off to the heart of Berlin to start our Third Reich walking tour with a local guide. We started off at the Reichstag building and went from there through the city stopping at a number of places and getting a lot of history from our guide. The walk went for about 3 hours and was really good, visiting the memorial to the Jewish people killed during the war, the Brandenburg Gate, the hotel where Michael Jackson held his baby out the window (and also where the penthouse suite costs 20000 Euro a night, but does come with its own chauffer which makes it worthwhile), different parts of the Berlin Wall that are still standing, the site of where Hitler’s underground bunker was, and Checkpoint Charlie. The city is so full of history, even though it is quite a young city compared to some of the other places we visited throughout Europe and I could have easily spent another couple of days there seeing the sights and learning the history.

After the walking tour we decided to go to the Berlin Zoo. Danny, Anita, Ando and I went off to find it, and figured it couldn’t be too far to walk to. About half an hour or so later we finally found it. The zoo was huge so we just started wandering. We all had a few things that we wanted to see so made sure we saw all of them. We saw elephants, rhinos, hippos, bears, polar bears, a panda, gorillas, kangaroos, cows, monkeys, seals, giraffes, lions and jaguars, as well as a few more animals we weren’t really sure what they were. It was amazing, such a great place and so glad we went there. The polar bears were my favourite, they were just playing around in the water, grabbing each other and pulling them under water, then biting each other on the neck or hitting them in the face. We watched them for a long time, they were so cool. I want one as a pet. We even saw the famous one, Knut, which was born in the zoo and raised by the zoo keepers.

After the zoo it was back to the meeting point for us to all get on the bus then go get some dinner before starting our pub crawl. A few people went to a restaurant for dinner and a few of us went to this little Chinese place where we got a massive serve or fried rice and chicken for 3 Euros, then headed to the supermarket to grab a few beers before the pub crawl started.

The pub crawl was so much fun. There was another couple of TopDeck crews also doing it so it was quite big with about 100 people or so. Before it even started we were all given a beer so we all stood around in the street drinking it and after we had finished we went off to the first pub for cheap drinks. As well as drink specials everywhere we went, we also got at least 2 free shots from the pub crawl organisers which made for a cheap night. It was a Monday night and everywhere we went the places were packed, people everywhere, the music pumping and everyone dancing. We had an awesome time, drinking and dancing with the whole crew, before heading back to the campsite and sitting around the courtyard with a few more drinks until about 5.30 in the morning before finally deciding that sleep was needed.