It felt a bit strange to return to a foreign city just one month later, but also comforting to already know my way around parts of the city.

Leandra’s primary mission on this trip to Berlin was to visit the Pergamon Museum, home to the Ishtar Gate and the Pergamon Altar, so we headed there on rainy Monday morning.

just a Roman city gate… inside the museum

  

Pergamon detail

the fantastic gate of Ishtar

temple ceiling carved out of wood

parrot mosaic

an impressive door

We enjoyed the antiquities, but the busy-ness of the packed museum made it harder to enjoy the place, plus some parts were closed for renovation. From here we walked over to the Radisson Blu, to quickly check out the world’s largest cylindrical aquarium.

  

sights along the way

And the Three Girls and a Boy statues along the Spree river.

Just a few blocks away is the large Weihenstephaner beer garden; given the damp weather, we enjoyed our beer and pretzels inside.

Leandra’s foot was feeling ok, so I took her to the street art area near Warschauer Street U-Bahn stop. Unlike my trip in July, this time I had more time to explore, and saw quite a few new murals.

 

 

see more photos in our gallery

Later that evening we re-visited the Brandenburg Gate and the Holocaust Memorial.

From there the metro took us to the Gendarmenmarkt, where we enjoyed the Deutscher Dom and Französische Friedrichstadtkirche as the lights came on in the twilight.

Deutscher Dom

Friedrichstadtkirche

Konzerthaus Berlin

We finished our Berlin adventure with dinner at Das Meisterstück, then back to our hotel to pack up for our return to the US the next morning.