Travelog for: Crawfish

It's raining outside...
So all I can do today is having a good breakfast.

MERRY CHRISTMAS MOM

Santa has been here. In Germany he brings the presents in the evening of 24th December. I've been a good girl so I also got a present. We found the presents under the Christmas tree. Everybody got it's own color of ribbon. We unpacked it and whoohooo look what I got... my own scarf!!!








I hope Santa doesn't need so much time from Germany to US so that you'll find some presents tomorrow morning. 

Love you Mom!

Crawfish

Hey Mum,

today I went to the KaDeWe. It is the most famous department store of Berlin and the largest department store on the European continent, famous above all for its gourmet food department on the sixth floor.


When I came out of the store it became dark outside. I decided to have a look around if there's anything else interesting. I found a nice building. It's the "Theater des Westens". This private theatre designed by Bernhard Sehring and constructed in 1896 is a well-preserved example of magnificent bourgeois architecture. The form language floats in eclectic quotations, a mixture of styles from the antiquity, and the medieval and renaissance ages.
They have a famous show inside: Dance of the vampires!


I also met this lovely guy. He's a Buddy Bear. There are so many all over Berlin and there exist also more than 140 country bears with most of the countries of the world. And these bears are travelling around the world. They are tall toyvoyagers!!!
Can you see me on his right shoulder?


And I found a huge snowman. WOW. Amazing!


Look, there's a Buddy Bear copy of the Quadriga, which is original placed on the top of the Brandenburg Gate.


That's all for now.

Yours, Crawfish

HAPPY NEW YEAR


Hello Mommy,

I hope you had a lot of fun last night!
At 6 pm we went out for dinner to a restaurant. It wasn't that special so we didn't take pictures.

At 8 pm we went to the Europe Center to watch a big firework!


Then we walked a little bit around and took a picture of the KaDeWe again. Sadly it was already closed.


So we went to the Christmas Market. Yeah, it was still opened. It was a little bit cold outside so we went into one of the cabins and enjoyed an original German Glühwein (hot spiced wine). It was really good to get warm.


At 10 pm we watched again a big firework at Europe Center!


Then we went to the Railway station to watch the big firework at midnight at Brandenburg gate! We didn't want to go to the party area.
Brandenburg gate is at the laser lights.


The firework at midnight was amazing! If you would have German channels on tv you could watch it!!! The party area is one of the biggest in Europe.


I'm still tired. Need more sleep!

Love, Crawfish

Hello Mum,

it is still raining outside  I don't like the weather at the moment.
But we had to go out and visit the Museum Island.

This is the Old National Gallery


My next stop was the Berlin Cathedral
Behind the Cathedral you can see the famous TV tower


This is Lustgarten behind me. And the blue box is called Humboldtbox.
The horse is not a real one. It's a statue in front of the Old Museum.


Once again Berlin Cathedral.


This is the Altes Museum (Old Museum) from the front.


My last stop was the Reichstag building.


Then I used the fastest way back "home". It was a little bit cold and wet!

Love, Crawfish

Hello Mommy,

today we welcomed a new tv. His name is Mr. Furrington. He arrived from England.

Joe opened the enveloped with a scissor.



Mr. Furrington gave all of us some sweets. Very tasty!


And he brought some cards with him and showed us his presents he got from Santa.




Lovely guy!

Love, Crawfish

Hello Mummy,

today Greeny left us! He'll go back home to Munich.

Joe, Mr. Furrington and I cuddled him a lot. It was really sad to say goodbye. Maybe I'll meet him again one day.



Yours, Crawfish

Hello Mommy!

Today it's Sunday and I had to get up at 4.30 am!!! Can you believe it?!?!? My host had to work and so she decided to take us with her.

Here you can see the famous Ku'damm (short form of Kurfürstendamm)! It is one of the most famous avenues in Berlin. The street takes its name from the former Kurfürsten (prince-electors) of Brandenburg. This very broad, long boulevard is full of shops, houses, hotels and restaurants. In particular, many fashion designers have their shops there! The avenue with four lines of plane trees runs for 3.5 km (2.2 mi) through the western Berlin. As you can see there isn't anybody on Sunday before 6 am except ME!


When my host finished work in the afternoon, the sun was shining and we did some sightseeing.
First we went to the Victory Column. It is a major tourist attraction to the city of Berlin. Berliners, with their fondness for giving nicknames to buildings, call the statue Goldelse, meaning something like "Golden Lizzy".


This is the Spree. It is the main river of Berlin. It is approximately 400 kilometres (250 mi) in length. First I wanted to jump into the water, but... it looked really cold, so I decided to stay on the bridge.


Here you can see the Haus der Kulturen der Welt ("House of the Cultures of the World" ). It is Germany's national centre for contemporary non-European art. It presents art exhibitions, theater and dance performances, concerts, author readings, films and academic conferences on non-European Visual Art and culture. This building is a gift from the United States, designed in 1957. John F. Kennedy spoke here during his June 1963 visit to West Berlin. To Berliners it is also known as the Schwangere Auster ("pregnant oyster" ).


This freestanding tower behind me is called "Carillon". It is built face to face with the Reichstag building and next to the house of the Cultures of the World. Most of the tourists don't see it, but I did. It is a large, manually played concert instrument, comprising 68 bells weighing a total of 48 metric tonnes (almost 106,000 lbs.) connected to a keyboard spanning 5½ fully chromatic octaves; the largest bell weighs 7.8 tonnes (almost 17,200 lbs.). It is one of the largest instruments of its kind in Europe and approximately the fourth largest (by number of bells) in the world.
And I also saw a new animal, I didn't know before. Can you see the bird on my picture?


Behind the Carillon we found some statues made of stone. They look really strange!



Then I walked to the German Bundestag which is located in the Reichstag Building. I've been here before few days ago.


I also fullfilled a part of my missions. Here I'm posing in front of the German flag. It is a tricolour consisting of three equal horizontal bands displaying the national colours of Germany: black, red, and gold (not yellow!). It represents German unity and freedom, not only the freedom of Germany, but also the personal freedom of the German people.
The colors have a simple meaning! They were used for uniforms of the warriors: black suit with golden buttons and red emblems for the soldiers.


This is the Soviet War Memorial in the Tiergartenpark. It is one of several war memorials in Berlin erected by the Soviet Union to commemorate its war dead, particularly the 80,000 soldiers of the Soviet Armed Forces who died during the Battle of Berlin in April and May 1945.


I also stopped at the Brandenburg Gate. It is one of the most well-known landmarks of Berlin and Germany.


And look, what I found next to that gate! The embassy of the United States of America! I felt a little bit home.


As you already know, I'm going on a big adventure soon!

Yours happy Crawfishiiiiiii

Hey Mommy,

Joe left us today. I think I'll miss him a little bit. We had so much fun together. Maybe we'll meet again some day!



Yours, Crawfish

Hey Mommy,

today we did a short stopover in Frankfurt/Main. Frankfurt is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a population of 688,000 inhabitants. It is the financial and transportation centre of Germany and the largest financial centre in continental Europe.
It was raining the whole day.



Love, Crawfish

Today we woke up on a virtual fireplace in our hotel.


My host got a message that one of the guys from our trip is ill, so everything is cancelled now.

So my host decided to do a one day trip to one of the cities we wanted to visit. 

Hello Mommy,

we stopped in a city called Cologne (German: Köln). It is Germany's fourth-largest city and is the largest city in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia. The city is located on both sides of the Rhine River.

First we visited the famous Cologne Cathedral. It is a Roman Catholic church and it is the seat of the Archbishop of Cologne and the administration of the Archdiocese of Cologne. It is renowned monument of German Catholicism and Gothic architecture and is a World Heritage Site. It is Germany's most visited landmark, attracting an average of 20,000 people a day!
The cathedral was built between 1248 and 1880. It is 144.5 metres (474 ft) long, 86.5 m (284 ft) wide and its towers are approximately 157 m (515 ft) tall. The cathedral is the largest Gothic church in Northern Europe and has the second-tallest spire and largest façade of any church in the world. The choir has the largest height to width ratio of any medieval church.



We also saw the Rhine river. It is one of the longest and most important rivers in Europe, at about 1,233 km (766 mi). Here you can see the view above the river and a part of Cologne taken from the Hohenzollern Bridge.


This bridge is famous for its love padlocks! There were so many! WOW!


Most of the day it was raining. I hope to see some snow these days instead of rain.

Love, Crawfish

This is all I collected on my trip. A ticket for Frankfurt and a ticket for Cologne. A candy from the hotel we stayed in and a flyer of the musician we wanted to see in concert.

Hey Mum,

today we baked a cake.
First we needed some butter.


Mr. Furrington added all the flour and sugar.


We added some eggs and I also added some cocoa.


Then everything had to be mixed.


We also needed some cherries.


We put the dough into a spring form and put the cherries on top.


It took about 1 hour until we could take the cake out of the oven.


Ouhhh it looks tasty, but it was still really hot.


At least we added some frosting on the top of the cake. Hmmm delicious!


I would send you some cake, Mom, but I'm sorry, me and Mr. Furrington ate all the cake!

Yours Crawfish

Hey Mommy,

today it was beautiful weather outside! No rain and lots of sun! But it was coooo-brrrrrr-ooold!
I walked around the small village. As you can see it is winter outside - without snow.


The ground was frozen!


I stopped next to a solar power station. Looks interesting.


There was a way to one of the lakes. The sign says something like rowing club. As I know, they need water to do their sports. Ok, so it was the correct way!


Have a look to that lake. It's huge. The official name of the lake is "Abandoned quarry Golpa II" but everybody just calls it "Gurke" (eng: Cucumber). I heard that there are lots of people go swimming here in summer, but now, there was nobody!





I can walk on water - whooohooo!!! First I was afraid to fall into the water, but nothing happened.




Hmm that sign says that the area could be slippery in case of algaes, but I think nothing is more slippery than the ice on the water!


Now I'm back where it is warm! I still can't feel my feet. I think I'll take a hot shower!

Love, Crawfish