I had intended to not do anything except prepare for my tour and a few computer things today, expecting more rain and horrible weather. When the sun shone this morning and continued to do so, my aunt suggested we go into Potsdam again, since I'd expressed an interest in the recently renovated St Nicholas' Church.
We headed off around 10am and parked near Potsdam Central Station so that we could walk to the Freundschaftsinsel. This is a sort of botanic garden and surrounded by arms of the Havel river on both sides. There's also some nice views of the church from there:
From here we walked across the bridge and to the church itself. There's the Old City Hall, which is being renovated, right next to it on one side, as well as the Potsdam Palace which is being re-constructed on the site of the original Potsdam Palace, which was destroyed during WWII. So the church is surrounded by construction sites on both sides, having only recently finished being a construction site itself. But there's some beauty there nevertheless:
The church is pretty, though not extraordinary inside:
The view from the top costs 5 Euro and it's a bit of a pain going up there because you continually have to wait for people to come down or vice versa, because there's only one (set of) really narrow spiral staircase(s). And you better not lose your ticket, because you need it a few times! The views from the top were pretty nice, though not spectacular. Wait for my panoramas when I get home…:
We headed back to the car and then to do a spot of grocery shopping at the shops at Central Station:
Then we stopped at the Hans Otto Theatre on the lake:
and then, since the weather was still good, drove to the Glienicke Palace, situated next to the famous Glienicke Bridge where spies used to be exchanged during the cold war. This is only a small palace and gardens and was never part of East Germany, so hasn't been recently renovated. This gives it a bit of a romantic run-down air:
Afterwards, we headed off to Mutter Fourage near Wannsee. This is a cafe/art gallery/nursery/organic food store type of place. We had coffee and looked through the photography exhibition.....and took photos:
My aunt and uncle had their weekly gymnastics session after which we had a lovely farewell dinner.
I did all the computing and phone file transfers and installations and teaching that I'd been intending to do the whole time I was there after dinner and consequently had a very short night!
