Mr. J's Adventure in Germany
This page (forgive the amateur web designing) highlights selected photos from my adventure to Germany in June 2005. Enjoy!
Me on the River Spree...Berlin
One of the oddities we saw while walking around Berlin...this is a living sculpture at the "Dead Chickens Gallery"
The Berlin Dome, a cathedral...the Furnsehturm (TV tower) is to the right
The Chacellor's Office, affectionately referred to as "The Washing Machine"
The facade of the Reichstag, home to Germany's Parliament
Wow, they have a bar inside the Reichstag! Imagine our Congress folk liquoring up on the job!
Boy, the German people actually get to sit down and chat for a bit with their government representatives!
This is the glass dome on top of the Reichstag
A view of the Brandenburg Gate, from atop the Reichstag
As we cruise down the River Spree by boat, we see the Eastside Gallery, the largest still-standing portion of the Berlin Wall
As we cruise down the Landwehrkanal by boat, we pass a bridge where the last person, trying to escape East Berlin over the wall, was shot in 1988.
We await our train to Dresden at Zoo Station (yeah, just like the U2 song cause that's where they got it from) Berlin
A scenic view of historic Dresden
A church...right??? Wrong, it was a cigarette factory now a museum in Dresden!
We went to this Volkswagen plant in Dresden, the "Glass Factory", where you can see through the walls and watch cars being made by hand!
Ok, so Dresden was in East Germany, so we saw lots of these ugly Communist style apartment buildings
Beautiful old Frankfurt town square
In the old Frankfurt square there was a plaque reminding people of the tragedy of Nazi book burning
Outside the HQ of the European Union's bank was this Euro symbol thingie
We went to an apple farm outside of Frankfurt...I picked this mutant apple!
We drank many delicious kinds of apple wines like this, some with fresh strawberries dropped in for flavor!
The River Main, which flows through Frankfurt
Me on a bridge above the Main...a Lutheran Church looms in the background
Yeah, so when we got to Munster, there were bikes EVERYWHERE!
In this room in 1648, the Peace of Westphalia was successfully negotiated
A statue to Munster's founder, circa 805 AD, tucked nicely away from the elements
These cages hanging off of the tower of St. Lambert's Church were used only once to torture Anabaptist separatists who seized Munster in the Middle Ages
We visited a museum outside of Munster dedicated to the culture of Westphalia
Our museum guide, Wilhelm, sings us a tale about the slaughter of a horse
Our guide, Wilhelm, tells us about the art of schooling in Germany
Yeah, I stood in front of that map!
For some odd reason, everyone was so enchanted by me cutting my own slice of ham at a dinner provided by the museum
The Aasee Lake with Munster looming in the background
So yeah, we went to school while in Germany...here is a Geography lesson in progress
Hey look it's Bob the Builder...well, actually it's me at the BASF paint factory outside of Munster
We rode bikes a couple of times around Munster...LOOK MA, NO HANDS!
Susan's Afro Market...yeah, I know, why take a pic of that, but it was just one of those strange things we saw in Munster!
And back to Berlin we went...here I stand beneath the famous Brandenburg Gate
This is the world famous Adlon Hotel...made even more famous by Michael Jackson...yeah, I am cheesy, the blue circle is where he dangled his kid!
A stark memorial to victims of the Holocaust
So how often does one get to walk into the US Senate floor and just stand around? Well, in Germany, they let us into their Senate, the Bundesrat.
A famous mural on the Berlin Wall at Eastside Gallery. Brehznev kissing Hoenecker.
No, I didn't actually kiss the concrete...just making light of the mural!
A panaoramic view of the Berlin Wall, down the Eastside Gallery
Berlin means "Bear Land", so they have lots of these artsy bears all over the city.
They have a momument to the Soviets in Berlin...ah diplomacy!
A view down the Strasse Juni 17 towards the Victory Column...the Live 8 Berlin Stage is in the center of the pic!
These crosses were a memorial to people shot trying to cross the Berlin Wall..."were" because they were torn down not long after we left Germany!
A replica of Checkpoint Charlie on its original site on Fredrichstrasse.
I stand beneath a replica of the famous "You are now leaving the American Sector" sign at Checkpoint Charlie...and it wasn't long after this that we also left Germany!
THE END
This page is dedicated to my wife Nicole and daughter Makayla
See photos from Mr. J's 2000 trip to London (and other parts of),England
See photos from the 2007 Jeandell Family Vacation in Washington