Bosch Alive

Wednesday was my last day in Berlin.  Most of my colleagues headed to Dessau, but I stayed to continue working in Berlin.  I had seen a sign for Hieronymus Bosch exhibit, so after work I decided to check it out.  I walked over to Alte Münze to see the Bosch Alive exhibit.  It was not like a traditional museum exhibit at all - it seemed more like a rave venue than a museum.  I had to walk around to the back of the building and go through a dark corridor to find the entrance (it was well signed at least).  After paying admission I headed inside.  There were a couple of dark rooms with benches and beanbag chairs in the center.

On all the walls, projections of The Garden of Earthly Delights was shown onto the walls, with the figures from the painting animated and set to music.  It was really cool - I've always loved Bosch and The Garden of Earthly Delights is my favorite work of art.

I watched through the animations and then left.  Afterwards, I headed to Tex-Mex Cantina for dinner and then walked past Museum Island.  It was late so I didn't have a chance to visit the museums, but the buildings were really nice.  The Bode Museum along the river was really scenic.

Heading back towards the hotel, I passed the Berlin Cathedral.

This has to be one of the most beautiful churches I've ever seen, with a nice fountain in front.

There was a service, so I wasn't able to check out the inside.  Then I started heading back towards the hotel, passing through Gendarmanmarkt one more time.

After a few pictures, I headed back to the hotel to pack up for a long flight home in the morning.

Jetlag in Berlin

I had to go to Berlin for work this week.  I was pretty jetlagged upon arrival on Monday and was struggling through meetings.  When they were finished, I walked to the Hilton and checked in.  After checking in, I went for a short walk around the city.  First, I headed to Checkpoint Charlie that was just a block or two from the hotel.

The former crossing point of the Berlin Wall between East and West Berlin is now a major tourist site.  Today, it's just a booth in the road, with museums, tour guides, and fast food restaurants.  With bright neon signs for MacDonalds and KFC, it was hard to picture this as the gateway to Communist East Germany.

After a couple pictures, I headed back towards the hotel and took a short walk around the Gendarmenmarkt, a beautiful square directly in front of the hotel.

There were three buildings here - the German Cathedral, or Deutscher Dom, was directly across from the Hilton.  It had been destroyed during WWII, but was rebuilt shortly after re-unification.

Across the square was the French Cathedral or Französischer Dom, which like the German one had been damaged in WWII, but subsequently repaired.

In between the two churches was the Konzerthaus or Concert Hall.

There were some interesting statues leading up to the Konzerthaus.

I milled around the area and got a few pictures and then headed back to the Hilton to try and sleep off the jetlag.

Layover in Munich

For our five-year anniversary, Sandy and I spent a week in beautiful Croatia.  We left on Saturday, September 17, our actual anniversary.  Unfortunately, we spent it in the airport.  From RDU, we flew to Washington Dulles and took an overnight flight to Munich.  We arrived in Munich at around 8 AM local time and didn’t fly out to Split until late afternoon.  With such a long layover and the start of Oktoberfest, we decided to leave the airport for a bit.  Knowing it would be a bit crazy in Munich, we took the 635 bus from the airport to Freising, a smaller town very close to the airport.

There was a light rain, but we enjoyed walking around this cute little German town. The little town had a lovely European small-town feel.  We walked part the St. George's Church to Marienplatz, a little square in the center of town.

They were setting up for a festival, so we decided to come back in a little while.  Next, we walked a nice little stretch of trail following a canal along the edge of the town.

It was Sunday, so many places were closed, but we did some window shopping walking by.  Then we headed back to Marienplatz where the Hops Fest was getting underway.  We got some lunch from the street vendors and ate that while watching dancers on stage with traditional polka music.

And of course, being a Hops Fest, we had to get some good German beer, since we didn't make it all the way into Munich for Oktoberfest.  Sandy picked up a couple airplane bottles of some delicious liquors from one of the vendors.

After lunch and some drinks, we headed back to the bus station and took the bus back to the airport and waited for our flight to Split.  Although there was some rain and storms, our flights were on time.  In Split, we caught a taxi from the airport to the Riva and made the short walk to our hotel – Kastel B&B Split.  The rain managed to hold off until we had checked in, but then there was quite a storm.  We were tired and jetlagged, so went to sleep shortly after checking in.