One day a few months back, my husband grabbed my hand and said 'we're going for a ride', a knowing smile on his lips. He was rather secretive about where he was taking me, letting on only that he and Bailey has discovered it on a walk awhile back. All three of us loaded into the car (the four-legged among us still terrified of public transport) and headed a short ways away, before parking next to an overgrown, forest-like green space.

As we headed into the park, we could see the sun getting lower through the trees and he urged us to go faster. We crossed fields, climbed stairs and scaled small hillsides as quickly as we could until... we reached the top just in time. The city was laid out before us, bathed in the golden light of sunset, with the background turning the most glorious colors. The juxtaposition of the harsh, jutting iron fence of the former WWII flak tower and vibrant graffiti against the painterly, pastel sky was pure perfection. It was clear this place was a new discovery only to us, with affectionate couples and small groups of friends already set out along the fence, some even bringing sustenance to enjoy the entire length of nature's show.

Between the oohing and ahhing and ample picture-taking, we managed a few moments of out own, holding each other in the warm glow of the day's end and overlooking this great city of ours.



Volkspark Humboldthain
Between Wiesenstraße and Brunnenstraße
13357 Berlin (Wedding)
S1/S2/S25 Humboldthain

I had been hearing about the merits of Grunewaldsee for some time, but it wasn't until überlin wrote this post that I made up my mind we had to go - and soon. So once the weather finally looked like* it might be amenable for such a trip, we packed into the car and headed across town with the hopes of giving Bailey something to replace the swimming pool and great big ocean we left behind in California.

After a brief rainstorm upon arrival that threatened our commitment to this outing, we headed into the forest under relatively clear skies in search of this oft-talked about dog lake. But first, we encountered a retriever hell-bent on retrieving - a 'stick' that was actually more of a small tree. We watched and laughed at his determination for awhile, Bailey thoroughly confused since in her mind sticks are made for whittling down to toothpicks rather than carrying proudly. After what we had just witnessed, we continued on, eager to see Bailey's excitement at this new place so clearly dominated by all that makes dogs happy.

Upon first seeing the beach, Bailey raced ahead of us, straight down to the water where a large group of dogs were already running, swimming and playing with each another. It was like a doggy playground, a secluded forest and lake just for them. Bailey eagerly resumed her favorite water game of fetching the stick - which she only does in water, on dry land, forget about it - her eyes gleaming in anticipation of every throw that meant she got to dive back out into the water.

In addition to watching our dog have the time of her life, Grunewald was a treat for us as well. Like so many other green spaces in Berlin, it's a place to get lost in the trees and the quiet, forgetting that the big city lay just outside of its borders. On a hot day, it's a paradise of shade and cool water for both its two-legged and four-legged visitors.



* This is almost always impossible, as Yahoo weather will say overcast while it's bright and sunny outside or even leaving one's apartment in decent weather doesn't guarantee that alternating rain, pounding hail and hot sunshine won't confound the weather report for the length of the journey, as it did for us the day of this outing. Oh, Berlin weather...

Having long since been a fan of those party-like pink blooms and the spectacular spring carpet they produce as their season draws to a close, I've never managed to see more than a few cherry blossom trees in one place. I always dreamed of visiting D.C. for its annual festivities dedicated to these lovely flowers, but I never made the trip. So when I heard that Berlin had its very own festival at the Gärten der Welt (Gardens of the World), I immediately envisioned getting lost in a forest of pink blossoms - and marked my calendar.

A bit late to the celebration last weekend after being seriously under the weather, I was rather surprised at what the festival entailed. Other than a tiny stage featuring a line-up of cultural dancers and drummers, a sprinkling of booths offering 'traditional' food and goods, there seemed to be little to the actual festivities beyond an excuse for young people to dress up like characters from various anime series. Frankly, most people in costume just looked painfully self conscious and spent the majority of the time tripping over their clothing or shoes, a few reveling in the confidence of being asked to have their photograph taken. Other than the cultural connection to Japan, I was confused at what this had to do with the celebration of one of spring's most spectacular displays in nature. Watching the food preparers rip open the same 35-cent packs of ramen I ate in college and dump it into their pots of 'authentic' cuisine and the peddling of mounds of stuffed Pikachus further pushed my first impression of this event as a bit of an overblown tourist trap.

Not wanting to let the initial feelings of commercialism and misplaced fanfare persevere, we pressed on to discover what this festival was really all about: the cherry blossoms. But again, my enthusiasm was thwarted by the lack of cherry blossoms themselves. Sure, there were a couple of trees in the Korean garden, as well as a sprinkling of them throughout the rest of the grounds, but there was no sprawling, spectacular display I had been building up in my imagination. There was no forest of pink dreamlike trees, ground carpeted in pink petals or any other explosion of natural color so intense it required sunglasses. Other than the sheer size of one tree on the whole of the park grounds, I found the rather meager ones lining the streets of our neighborhood to be just as impressive.

After letting go of my perhaps unfairly high hopes for the day, we were free to explore the rest of the gardens in the park. Surprisingly, there were even more beautiful places than what the day's festivities were centered around. The relatively new Christian Garden, with its walkways encased in a massive gold-hued metal structure made up of words and symbols, both biblical and spiritual, was particularly impressive. The intricate wood-carved ceilings and colorful mosaic hallways of the Oriental Garden's interior space could only be matched by it's exotic flowers and dancing fountains outside. The most enjoyable part was simply walking the paths between the gardens, taking in the wide-open spaces, colorful flower beds and intermittent rays of warm sunshine.

While the underwhelming showing at this particular festival may have had more to do with the unrelated, overzealous costumes and lackluster cultural offerings than solely the unimpressive display of cherry blossom trees, I may reserve next spring's nature celebrations to perusing some of the neighborhoods of the best blooming trees with a cone from the closest ice cream shop. The Gardens of the World on its own is a really lovely location to bring a blanket, spend an afternoon in the sunshine and take in the nature around you.




Gärten der Welt
Eisenacher Strasse 99
12685 Berlin
S-Berlin-Marzahn / U-Cottbusser Platz
normal admission: 4€ (Apr-Oct) / special event admission: 6€

Only in Berlin would an overgrown and abandoned amusement park be one of the hottest tickets in town. Berlin has a thing for the old, the rundown and the graffiti-covered, and as a city with this much history, who can blame it? So much has been rebuilt here after the war, such rare relics of a positive influence in the GDR era are fought to be kept alive for future generations, remembering not everything must be new and shiny for progress to happen. The Spreepark (originally named Kulturpark Plänterwald in its first incarnation in 1969) has been one such place, boarded up for years since it's closure in 2002, providing eerie backdrops for a movie and music video, and serving as a tempting place for the brave to risk arrest for the unofficial tour. But all that has just changed.

After sitting vacant, with debts in the millions still owed in taxes and to banks - not to mention an eBay listing for its sale - the city apparently made a deal to buy the place a couple of weeks ago and is now offering official tours, no risk of guard dog attack necessary. But there's a catch: they are only being offered until the sale is finalized at the end of the month. After that, speculation is high that the city will do what it is working to do with much of Berlin's land: affordable housing. As a fairly new, non-German Berliner myself, I understand the impulse, but what a shame to dismantle something that has been a part of this city's history for so long. Furthermore, I dare any of these folks whining about affordable housing in Berlin to go find something 'affordable' where I'm from in the San Francisco Bay area. Take it from me, living in one of the greatest cities in the world could be a lot worse. I once saw a yurt - that's right, essentially a glorified tent - for sale in the Santa Cruz mountains for half a mil. No joke. But I digress...

On a very serendipitous outing last weekend while meandering Treptower Park for my park series, I happened upon the Spreepark's open gates and learned of its new status. With the rather uncertain air around the whole thing, not to mention the declining state of the weather forecast for the following week, we jumped on the opportunity and booked the tour for the very next day. Word travels fast in Berlin, because reserving a spot did little for massive line we had to wait in, pushing our tour time back by nearly an hour. At least there were beers and soft-serve to enjoy while you wait. Those Germans sure understand the important things in life.

When I first learned the guided tour was two hours long, I was skeptical at exactly how detailed this needed to be and pictured a dry, German guide, painstakingly recounting every date in the park's history and slapping our hands with sticks if we ventured off the path. But within the first few minutes of meeting our tour guide - the daughter of the park's last owner - and she started in on the stories of all her siblings being forced to dress up as park mascots, being talked into letting guys into the park during the closed winter season so they could take bets on who would jump into the slushy log ride pond in -10°C weather and oh yeah, that time her dad got caught trying to smuggle nearly 200 kilos of cocaine into the country in the now infamous and fittingly named magic carpet ride, I knew this wasn't going to be a stuffy, formal 'tour' after all. Sabrina continued to regale us with stories of growing up at the park, while letting us meander freely on the rides and around the grounds, giving us plenty of time to explore, take photos and just take in the sad place the Spreepark had become. Hearing her inside story (well, all of the German that I could understand, anyway) was worth the admission fee alone. Not having to constantly look over one's shoulder for fear of being pounced on by security or finally discover what cold handcuffs feel like were also major perks.

So if you live in Berlin, are planning a trip here, or just have an amusement park obsession, don't miss the twice-a-day weekend tours through the end of April. After that, it's likely this place will be as extinct as the fiberglass dinosaurs littering the park grounds.



Berliner Spreepark
Kiehnwerderallee 1
12437 Berlin
S Plänterwald