Swim Divisionals in Berlin

January 2007
The European Forces Swim League Divisionals for our division were in Berlin. Our family drove to Berlin ahead of the team so we could have some time to sightsee. We toured around on Friday and swam (or spectated as in Chris' and my case) Saturday and Sunday. Our drive over was quite cold and snowy..something we haven't seen much of in the Netherlands..even this January.

Berlin has these bears throughout the city, all painted with different themes. Sort of like the cows in Chicago and the gators in Gainesville. We only took a photo with one, as we were having camera battery issues the first part of our day. We think it was the very cold temperatures, because once the camera warmed up, we were good to go.

Berlin was very interesting. Our hotel was in the formerly occupied portion of the city. At first, I was perplexed, but it dawned on me that the buildings in that area are so modern because they are so new. The Berlin Wall has come down so recently, and the area was so depressed and run down for so long, most of it has been rebuilt from scratch. Another thing I learned was the the Berlin Wall circled West Berlin (the American, British & French Sectors), as it was part of West Germany...but in East Germany. History was never my strong suite, so I walked around most of the day mouth agape as Chris filled my addled mind with different facts about divided Germany.

Of note, we took all these photos with Sean's new digital camera. He bought it with his Christmas money, so he says thank you, it's exactly what he wanted!

Progress!! We found a Starbucks...our first Starbucks fix since we left the States!
















Checkpoint Charlie was very close to our hotel...walking distance. Almost an entire city block is now a museum with many cool facts and memorabilia about the wall.















An interesting display of portions of the Berlin Wall














Walking toward Potsdamer Platz and the Sony Center



















A cool pic Sean took looking straight up from the center of the Sony Center



















Will is very excited because we found a Tony Roma's for dinner!! Plus we were messing with the features on Sean's camera and Will made a good subject














The street heading toward the Brandenburg Gate




























Sean and Will get prepared for their upcoming events



















Sean, Stephanie and Chris find time for some fun between events