Potsdam in Germany

Potsdam in Germany

My friends and I took a trip down to Potsdam together with the New Berlin Free Tour's tour guide, and she showed us around Potsdam with a bunch of very interesting and intrepid travellers.

Potsdam was more cultural than Berlin, in many ways, and felt very much like a German city, even though there were many people from all around the world here at Potsdam. Apparently Potsdam was historically a place of immigration where all the French, Russians and Dutch people emigrated to when there was trouble in their countries. In addition, there were many beautiful palaces and parks around Potsdam, revealing a sort of imperial past here in magnificent Potsdam under the Prussians and under Frederick the Great.

The places that we visited while here in Potsdam were:

the Sansoucci (it is a giant park that houses a giant palace called the Sansoucci Palace),

the Charlottenhof Palace,

The Old Market Square, which is Potsdam's historical centre,

the Potsdam Brandenburg Gate, which is much smaller and looks similar to the other Brandenburg Gate in Berlin,

the New Garden, which was very beautiful, and which housed some very important building... Cecilienhof, where the Potsdam Conference was held in 1945.

I have some little comments on this very interesting and historical place, the Cecilienhof. Firstly, my friend Cecilia might be glad to know that the place has now become a high end hotel, so there is a hotel named after her! Cecilia has a hotel in Germany named just for her, and that should be nice and easy to remember. (Cecilienhof is, of course, named after Cecilia in German.)

Secondly, there is a gigantic red star of flowers and grass in the middle of Cecilienhof, and this was to signify the power of the Soviets, because if you know your history, this site was the important area where discussions about the fate of the world and the new world order were held. Joseph Stalin, of course, wanted his way, and besides the Red Army were doing most of the fighting in Berlin at the end of the Second World War. In fact, as an aside, without the Red Army, the Allies would have been hard pressed to win against the powerful Hitler, actually, and it was only with massive losses by the Soviets that the Allies eventually prevailed in Europe.

All in all, it was a great experience visiting Potsdam for a day and after that, due to the long duration to get back to Berlin, that was the reason why I was late for the Bundestag tour in the evening in Berlin. Pictures of cultural, historical and beautiful Berlin and Potsdam to come in the next few posts here on my travel blog!

PS There were also many small and interesting novelty and specialty shops in Potsdam which I visited and looked in, but I cannot sadly remember what they were called individually - well, who can remember the small proprietors, especially when dealing with a huge country like Germany? There was a little book shop selling Kindergarten Books and a small kebab shop. Hmmm, and a nice cafe which I visited, ate at and drank tea. Haha ... :)

Tour and see the world with me! :)