Monday, March 18, 2013

Hamburg

December 27, 2012

We woke up in Berlin, took the sBahn to Alexanderplatz for one last early lunch at Dolores (a burrito place) before our train. By the time we arrived in Hamburg, it was the early evening and it was already getting dark, so we didn't have much time to see anything. Though we did walk down the shopping street that ran from our hostel to the Rathaus (town hall). The Christmas market was still set up and there were people everywhere (I guess the day after second Christmas is a big shopping day in Germany?). It was immediately clear that Hamburg has a lot more money than Berlin.

December 28, 2012
The next morning we started out by walking around the various docks. Hamburg is very picturesque:




This is where the sun was at noon --- so yeah, we were pretty far North.
This is the Rathaus (town hall).


After we finished seeing the docks, we did some more wandering around the shops. There were all sorts of expensive stores: Mont Blanc, fancy antique book sellers, fancy purse sellers.

This was at the Apple store. The displays for the info about every item were iPads because rich. 

Tristan chases a duck friend.
Unfortunately, though it was sunnyish, it was pretty windy. So it was really cold. So we ended up heading back to the hostel.
That night we went out in Reeperbahn, which is the district of Hamburg that has a lot of bars and nightlife. And it is also the district where the Beetles first preformed.
Our favorite bar was "the sailor bar" which had slightly older clientele and played cool music and also claimed to be the place where the Beetles first performed.


December 29, 2012
The morning of the third day, we weren't really sure what to do. So after a lunch at Burger King, we went to IKEA and walked around.

Where this happened.  They say "Take me home, country roads" by John Denver. I don't know why, but it was fun.
After a nap and a bit more wandering around the city and eating dinner we went to Miniatur Wunderland  which was an AWESOME miniature railroad. 

This was their restaurant.
The crazy thing about it was that you could easily forget it was about a railroad. It was all so complex and amazing. They even had the cars rigged up to move in some areas. 


There were several "lands": Germany, Hamburg, Switzerland, USA, and Scandinavia and they plan to add a few in the future. The photos don't do it justice, but alas, that's all I have.

This was part of the Germany land, I think.
 Also, it becamenight every 15 minutes (if I remember correctly) and it would stay dark for a few minutes which gave you a chance to see the cool things that lit up.

This was part of Switzerland. The alps took up two floors of the building!
One of the most amazing parts of the exhibit was the Knuffigan Airport (which doesn't really exist), which had planes that actually took off! On schedule!
The accurate schedule
Minatur Wunderland: Modelbahn as a piece in the "Modelbahn" (miniature railroad)

America was a little disappointing because it was focused on the parts of America Europeans seem the most fascinated with: The deserts and westerns.

They had a bay filled with actual water and a remote control boat in Scandinavia

So as you can see, we were completely taken with the Minatur Railroad. I would definitely go back, and I would definitely place it as one of the coolest things to see in Europe. 

And then we saw Neuwachstein Castle.

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