The day after the marathon involved packing up and switching hotels. If you’ve ever spent more than one night, let alone one week, in a hotel room with a 19 month old, you know that packing is not an easy thing! Angus loves inspecting everything in hotel rooms and would be on the phone with the front desk and room service constantly if we didn’t unplug the phones! Remote controls were found, countertops and rugs cleaned after nights of Spaghetti Bolognese…but I wasn’t able to get the chocolate out of the nice white duvet cover! I’m going to blame that on the Radisson—who leaves chocolates each day in a room with a 19 month old and white sheets!?

Angus, Greg, Emily and I moved over to the hotel where Paige’s parents were staying. This hotel ended up being just one block from where the Berlin Wall used to stand. There is a brick trail throughout the city indicating where the Wall stood; it is fascinating and mind-boggling to think of the recent history in this city. I wish we had had time to explore more of it. Next time…

After a nap and some playground time, the four of us headed out to dinner. We found a fun restaurant that handed us the first children’s menu we’ve seen in Germany, plus they had these great bibs for Greg and Emily so they didn’t get any fajitas on their shirts (but they didn’t have a bib for Angus!). Greg then took us across the street to a beautiful square called Gendarmenmarkt, where we listened to beautiful live music as day turned to dusk and admired the beautiful buildings: the Schauspielhaus or Konzerthaus (home of the Berlin Symphony Orchestra); the Französischer Dom (French Cathedral); and the Deutscher Dom (German Cathedral). The interesting thing about these two cathedrals is that they have matching front towers. But one was built for the Huguenot community, and one for the German Protestant-Reformed community.

Down the street from Gendarmenmarkt and a few blocks from our hotel was Checkpoint Charlie. Another amazing historical site though now a bit tricked out with tourist stuff (notice “Snack Point Charlie” which sits next to Check Point Charlie)! And finally, the best find of the night—the Deutsch Currywurst Museum! Who knows what you’ll find when meandering down the streets of Berlin!