Only 5 minutes walking for our Miniloft Kreuzberg, you can start this tour through the Cold war in Checkpoint Charlie, the best-known Berlin Wall crossing point between East Berlin and West Berlin during the Cold War (1947–1991). You can take the typical photo with the Soviet and the American soldiers and flags but, do you know why this place is also so important? Well, exactly in this point, the beginning of a 3rd. World War could have happened. You can read more about this here: Stand off at Checkpoint Charlie.
To continue this "trip" to the past, we recommend you to visit the Mauermuseum - Museum Haus am Checkpoint Charlie, private initiative from Dr. Rainer Hildebrandt in 1962 as a protest against the wall and to provide assistance to the persons seeking help. Gradually the museum increased its exhibition space and contributed to the fall of the Wall. Unlike most of museums, this one is not closing at 6 pm, but at 10 pm from 9 am so, keep that in mind to organize your visits!
Leaving the museum, taking the Zimmerstr. to your right, you can see the Memorial to Peter Fechter, normally with a crown of flowers. The 18 years old Peter, was the victim number 27 (as far as we know) to die at the Berlin Wall. His death was specially remembered as he was shot while trying to cross over to West Berlin and during more than one hour was bleeding to death in front of East and West Berliners, who were not able to help him.
Taking the Zimmerstr. to the left, passing the "DIE MAUER- Asisi Panorama", the "Trabi Museum" and "Die Welt" hot air balloon, we can see in front of Topographie des Terrors (former Gestapo and SS headquarters, currently an outdoor and indoor history museum about the Nazi regime's period), the Remains of the Berlin Wall, where you can also read about its history, maybe while eating a "Currywurst" from the quiosk on the street.
If you feel like to walk more, you can also visit the ruins of the former station "Anhalter Bahnhof", that used to be the biggest one in Europe and one of the ghost stations of Berlin. Also, not because of its history, but because of its proximity to the "Anhalter Banhnhof", we recommend you to go to the Liquidrom and enjoy its saunas and swimming pool to finish the day in a relaxing way.
Click here to see all the tour in Google Maps.
