Adventures on the Canals of France ,Netherlands and Germany: Germany 7

POTSDAM
The first bridge we passed under was the Glienicker Bridge made famous as the border of East and West Germany was half way across the Havel and therefore halfway across the bridge. Even now the bridge is painted two shades of green to show the midpoint where spies from the two sides of the Cold War were exchanged.

Potsdam in modern times suffered devastating bombardment in 1945 as The Third Reich collapsed and the Schloss Cecilienhof was the venue for the Postdam Conference when Truman, Churchill and Stalin decided the future of Germany. The red star planted with Geraniums is a reminder of the conference.

We had been told about the community marina which is hidden at the end of a small lake right in town, it is not well advertised and it was very quiet, 1 euro a metre with electric and water and not far from the town.

600 hectares of Potsdam are declared UNESCO World Heritage Sites. There are a dozen palaces and many more historical buildings in Potsdam’s parks. Our time here was spent riding our bicycles around the huge parks both sides of the river. On one side of the river the castles and mediaeval parks are very romantic because Kaiser William liked the Age of the Knights.

It was here we walked through a field of Bluebells and other wild flowers. It was quite exciting as when I was a child all my books were about English children and England even though we lived in Australia and the heroines always walked through the woods picking Bluebells. So here I am.

On the other side of the river is the town which is a mixture of old architecture and new. While on the hill opposite we took this photo of a tourist boat shaped like a whale coming into the town harbour.

While on this side of the river, we came across an area called Klein Glienicker. In the times of the DDR it was a few streets of houses entirely inside West Germany but was controlled by the DDR. We wondered was it just that someone highup didn’t want to shift houses when they drew up the boundaries. What a strange world it must have been.

Next day we cycled around the Sanssouci Park which has a dozen or so palaces and pavilions from the time of Friedrich 11 and his successors. The Sanssouci Palace has only 12 rooms but is a work of art. Leading up to the Palace are terraces of vines and statues.

The Neues Palais has more statues that you can imagine. Standing in one place we counted 105 and that was just on a corner of the palace.

The statues were magnificent.

Then there was the Marble Palace and Roman Ruins, also the Orangerie and the Chinese Pavilion.

This was surrounded by Chinese urns in the park and Chinese trees over 250 years old, obviously money was not a problem every whim was granted.

After a walk through the old town, coffee and apple cake, we passed what we thought was a mosque but on reading the sign it was a building to house the steam pumps for the fountain at Sanssouci. It was built as a whim so it did not look like a pump house.

We left Potdam, castled out, and looking for the more natural surroundings of the lakes.

We followed the Potsdam via the Potsdamer Havel through the Templinersee(lake), the Grosser Zernsee and as we got into the Kliener Zernsee we thought we should spend one more night on the lakes before we left them for the rivers and canals going back West. It was a beautiful calm evening and warm enough for a swim. I decided I would chance a swim and the climb up the ladder, so down I went after Kevin,

He is always the optimist saying it was no problem getting back on the boat. The water was lovely though not as clear as the lakes up north and the reflections were magic on the still water.

All of this calmness was soon broken when it was time for me to get back on the boat. The little ladder kept going under the boat everytime I tried to climb up it. Eventually after much laughter it was getting serious, I couldn’t get the ladder to stay still and my artificial knee was not much help. Kevin eventually climbed up the ladder and with the only knot he knows how to tie, a bowline, he put the rope over my body and kept me upright on the ladder until I climbed onto the side of the deck after a lot of the Australian vernacular like the good old Bugger!!. Needless to say we do not have a photo of all this BUT IMAGINE A BEACHED WHALE IN PINK PANTIES AND BRA.

The hot shower was welcome and after I calmed down, we sat on the deck having a drink and just then a hot air balloon floated by. What a perfect evening after all of the ups and downs.

As the sun set the Swans went to sleep quite happily just near the boat.

From here we passed through Brandenburg and onto the Elbe Havel Canal and to the Schleuse Hoenwarthe which has a fall of 19 Metres and the Madenburg CanalBridge almost a kilometre long over the Elbe River. This Schleuse and the bridge canal completed in 2003 have taken the place of the many locks used to get over the Elbe and the flood plain and up onto the Mitteland canal. We stayed the night by the Schleusen ready for an early start over the bridge canal so we could get some good photos.