Monday, January 28, 2013

History and Graffiti, Berlin

     Welcome to the capital of Germany, Berlin. If history, and melting culture is your thing, Berlin is the place to be. It's a huge city with over 150 museums, an incredible metro system, tons of bars, millions of people, great food, and great times. To make things all the more better, if you do Berlin right, it is the budget travelers dream! Here's how I got thru Berlin, spending a little bit of money, but creating memories that will last me forever.

  • For choosing where to stay, I went the hostel route, The One 80 Hostel was perfect for the budget traveler. It was around $15 USD per night, has a great happy hour daily, a pretty cheap breakfast, and is an incredible hub to go out and see Berlin. They also have a free photo booth to take stupid pics like mine below:
It gets broadcasted all over the hotel lobby, so behave yourself.

Brandenburg Gate

  • FREE HISTORY WALKING TOUR! It starts at the Brandenburg Gate everyday, and is a must do for tourists! You will learn about the history of Berlin in the last 100 years, from war and bad times to good times. The tour operators work for tips though, so make sure you tip them something, it was disappointing to see the guides give us great tours and some people ran away as soon as the tour was done.

  • Food: We ate at quite a few good places in Berlin, and price was never a second thought, amazing world cuisine and of course beer and German sausages! But for the budget traveler, the street pita's are the way to go! You will have no problem finding them!
  • Bars: If partying or drinking is your thing, Berlin is going to like you. Especially on the weekends, some bars open at 8pm Saturday night, and close... 11am Monday morning. I hope you like Red Bull and hang overs too! The party scene is pretty unique and plenty to choose from, the only issue is that there is no central area to hang out in, so do your research or find out what is good for that night before you head out. There are also arranged nightly bar crawl tours to meet people if you came solo. They start around Orianenburger Strausse, you can also meet a few hot single women there, just make sure you have plenty of money, and don't take pictures with them! It's the red light district.
  • FREE ALTERNATIVE CITY TOUR! This was probably my favorite part of Berlin, every city has it's alternative side, in Berlin they have opened the door to tourist to check it out. You will get a first hand look at popular graffiti art legal and illegal, walk past a tree house some guy has lived in for over 30 years, learn about how subways get graffiti bombed, visit the African village of Berlin (if it's still there), and much more. Oh yeah, the guides get paid by tips only again, so don't be cheap!

  • Museums: way too many to get into! Look into whatever interests you, for me the Holocaust history was pretty intense. Some idiot on our tour asked the Guide if Germany is denying the holocaust, "Yes idiot, that's why the Holocaust memorial is in the smack down in the center of the city, because they are denying it."

  • The last thing to mention, I sadly did not do... It was off season, but you can base jump here: http://www.parkinn-berlin.com/baseflying-en.html It's not sky diving, it's not bungy, it's the same stunt that movie stunt men do when they jump off a building for Hollywood flicks. The season runs April through October, I will do it next time I am in Germany or find somewhere to do it, if you do it before me I am jealous.

    Enjoy my video of Berlin in black and white:



Choose the continent!!!!

OR...

1 comment:

  1. Joe!! Let's plan a trip together! Your site's amazing! I want to explore!

    ~Monica (your ski lodge lunch buddy)

    ReplyDelete