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After what has been an extraordinarily busy last two weeks, we are ending our Berlin segment of the tour. We are still atop the carillon at the Langemarck-Halle at the western end of the Reichssportfeld. This is the Reuter West CHP Combined Heat and Power Station to the north east of the Olympiastadion site. Operated by Vattenfall Europe Warme, it is a coal fired station. One thing that the view from the tower emphasises is the amount of natural greenery there is around the outskirts of Berlin.
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Looking toward the east, we see by now familiar landmarks and the extent of the city's urban sprawl; at the extreme right we can see the French Dome in the Gendarmenmarkt, with the Siegessaule, moving left through the greenspace of the tiergarten we can make out the green roof of the Adlon Hotel and at the cluster at centre can be seen the Rotes Rathaus, Berliner Dom, Reichstag and the blocky World Trade Centre, with the Fernsehturm to its left. This image gives a good idea of just how big the Fernsehturm is and how much it dominates the skyscape. It looks magnificent.
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To the south is the former radar station at Teufelsberg. Built on a man-made hill next to the Grunewald forest, Teufelsberg, literally Devil's Hill, was constructed of rubble collected from ruins post WW2. It is on the site of a Nazi technical college, the Wehrtechnischen Facultet designed by Speer that was never completed. Some 75 million cubic metres of debris was collected and dumped on top of the enormous structure by Trummerfrauen, women who collected rubble from around the city's wasted buildings, then sorted and cleaned it. This was dumped on the incomplete technical school, because attempts to destroy it failed. The radar facility was initially American and was run by the NSA as a listening station throughout the '60s, but was in the British sector of the city and was taken over by No.26 Signals Unit, RAF in October 1972 until its closure in February 1992. Clearly abandoned now, there were many rumours about the station during the Cold War, including a theory that a tunnel to the ruins beneath the hill had been built and that a secret base was located underground, which might have been a submarine base (!) - oh the conspiracies... One peculiarity was that during certain times of the year, the signal strength increased and the operators were puzzled as to why; it was eventually worked out that a ferris wheel erected during the German-American Volksfest at Zehlendorf amplified the return signals, so it was left in place once this had been worked out. Today for a small fee, the site can be visited and guided tours can be taken, although vandals and grafitti artists have left their mark on it.
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Finally from the Reichssportfeld, Nazi architectural styling in these reliefs at the entrance to the Waldbuhne stadium. Designed by Adolf Wamper, this is Helenehrung, symbolising the Nationales Festspiele, with another flanking the entry gates symbolising the Musischen Festspiele. This unmistakable fascist style litters the Olympiastadion grounds.
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A couple of interesting sites on the way back to my friend's place; Another Speer lamp, this time on the Kaiserdamm; this stretch of road used to be Adolf Hitlerplatz and joins up with Strasse des 17 Juni, formerly the Ost-West Asche that runs through the Tiergarten and ends at the Brandenburg Gate. The picture's distorted owing to it being taken out the car window.
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And finally for this day, the Bornholmer Bridge, or Boesebrucke; we are crossing over from West to East as on the other side of the bridge was a checkpoint for crossing the border into East Berlin, exclusively for the use of West Berliners. Here was one of the first points where thousands of East Germans began gathering on the turbulent night of 9 November 1989, when the announcement was mistakenly made by the SED party that the borders were going to be opened. At 11:30pm, the Bornholmerstrasse checkpoint barrier arm was lifted and it became the first border crossing to be opened, which brought about the eventual collapse of the DDR. Historic indeed. Note the tramline running along the bridge's centre.
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So, that brings about the end of the Berlin chapter of my tour. There is more to come of course and the next day I caught a taxi to the poky Flughafen Tegel to fly to Brussels. High above the city we can see features so familiar to us; sliding beneath the wing is the former Stasi headquarters on Frankfurter Allee, the diagonal road running to the centre of the image; Tegel can be seen at the top and the Tiergarten the greenspace at top left. Goodbye Berlin; be seeing ya.
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Arriving in Brussels, I begin the third chapter of my tour; the focus being a three day road trip through Great War battlefields following the course taken by the New Zealand Division between 1916 and the end of the war, but first, two nights in the Belgian capital. This is the Brussels Central station, and a memorial to the fallen of both the Great War and WW2.
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Brussels is, of course home to the European Union and this is Le Berlaymont, the European Commission Headquarters on Rue de La Loi. Agh Boris! My eyes! They're burning!
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A short walk through Parc de Cinquantenaire and we reach the Triumphal Arch - there's a quadriga on top of this one too.
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The reason why I'm here? The Musée Royal de l'Armée et de l'Histoire Militaire; one of the biggest fully enclosed military museums in Europe. This is the frontage of the Grand Hall, of which in the next post we shall see in all its grandeur.
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Looking toward the east, we see by now familiar landmarks and the extent of the city's urban sprawl; at the extreme right we can see the French Dome in the Gendarmenmarkt, with the Siegessaule, moving left through the greenspace of the tiergarten we can make out the green roof of the Adlon Hotel and at the cluster at centre can be seen the Rotes Rathaus, Berliner Dom, Reichstag and the blocky World Trade Centre, with the Fernsehturm to its left. This image gives a good idea of just how big the Fernsehturm is and how much it dominates the skyscape. It looks magnificent.
To the south is the former radar station at Teufelsberg. Built on a man-made hill next to the Grunewald forest, Teufelsberg, literally Devil's Hill, was constructed of rubble collected from ruins post WW2. It is on the site of a Nazi technical college, the Wehrtechnischen Facultet designed by Speer that was never completed. Some 75 million cubic metres of debris was collected and dumped on top of the enormous structure by Trummerfrauen, women who collected rubble from around the city's wasted buildings, then sorted and cleaned it. This was dumped on the incomplete technical school, because attempts to destroy it failed. The radar facility was initially American and was run by the NSA as a listening station throughout the '60s, but was in the British sector of the city and was taken over by No.26 Signals Unit, RAF in October 1972 until its closure in February 1992. Clearly abandoned now, there were many rumours about the station during the Cold War, including a theory that a tunnel to the ruins beneath the hill had been built and that a secret base was located underground, which might have been a submarine base (!) - oh the conspiracies... One peculiarity was that during certain times of the year, the signal strength increased and the operators were puzzled as to why; it was eventually worked out that a ferris wheel erected during the German-American Volksfest at Zehlendorf amplified the return signals, so it was left in place once this had been worked out. Today for a small fee, the site can be visited and guided tours can be taken, although vandals and grafitti artists have left their mark on it.
Finally from the Reichssportfeld, Nazi architectural styling in these reliefs at the entrance to the Waldbuhne stadium. Designed by Adolf Wamper, this is Helenehrung, symbolising the Nationales Festspiele, with another flanking the entry gates symbolising the Musischen Festspiele. This unmistakable fascist style litters the Olympiastadion grounds.
A couple of interesting sites on the way back to my friend's place; Another Speer lamp, this time on the Kaiserdamm; this stretch of road used to be Adolf Hitlerplatz and joins up with Strasse des 17 Juni, formerly the Ost-West Asche that runs through the Tiergarten and ends at the Brandenburg Gate. The picture's distorted owing to it being taken out the car window.
And finally for this day, the Bornholmer Bridge, or Boesebrucke; we are crossing over from West to East as on the other side of the bridge was a checkpoint for crossing the border into East Berlin, exclusively for the use of West Berliners. Here was one of the first points where thousands of East Germans began gathering on the turbulent night of 9 November 1989, when the announcement was mistakenly made by the SED party that the borders were going to be opened. At 11:30pm, the Bornholmerstrasse checkpoint barrier arm was lifted and it became the first border crossing to be opened, which brought about the eventual collapse of the DDR. Historic indeed. Note the tramline running along the bridge's centre.
So, that brings about the end of the Berlin chapter of my tour. There is more to come of course and the next day I caught a taxi to the poky Flughafen Tegel to fly to Brussels. High above the city we can see features so familiar to us; sliding beneath the wing is the former Stasi headquarters on Frankfurter Allee, the diagonal road running to the centre of the image; Tegel can be seen at the top and the Tiergarten the greenspace at top left. Goodbye Berlin; be seeing ya.
Arriving in Brussels, I begin the third chapter of my tour; the focus being a three day road trip through Great War battlefields following the course taken by the New Zealand Division between 1916 and the end of the war, but first, two nights in the Belgian capital. This is the Brussels Central station, and a memorial to the fallen of both the Great War and WW2.
Brussels is, of course home to the European Union and this is Le Berlaymont, the European Commission Headquarters on Rue de La Loi. Agh Boris! My eyes! They're burning!
A short walk through Parc de Cinquantenaire and we reach the Triumphal Arch - there's a quadriga on top of this one too.
The reason why I'm here? The Musée Royal de l'Armée et de l'Histoire Militaire; one of the biggest fully enclosed military museums in Europe. This is the frontage of the Grand Hall, of which in the next post we shall see in all its grandeur.
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