Last chance to explore Berlin with History Today!

The Politics and Art of 20th-Century Berlin

November 5th-10th, 2008

5 nights/6 days

November 9th has great significance in the history of Berlin and Germany. In 1918 the Kaiser abdicated; in 1938 Kristallnacht signalled an acceleration towards the Holocaust; in 1989 the Wall came down. It is therefore appropriate that our next History Today tour should lead a lucky group there on that very day. Tour leader and historian Neil Taylor will take us to where these events and many others took place, discuss the context and the results.

only £995 per person*
Price includes:
• Return scheduled flights (Heathrow/Berlin) & airport taxes
• 5 nights’ bed and breakfast accommodation at the 4-star Hotel Berlin
• Three dinners
• All entrance fees and coach transfers
• 2 x 3-day public transport passes per person
*single supplement is £160. Tour excluding flights £895.

Itinerary

Wednesday November 5th
Midday BA flight from Heathrow to Tegel. On the transfer from the airport we have an introductory tour of the Western part of the city. Dinner together in the hotel, the centrally located four star Hotel Berlin.

Thursday November 6th
Visit the Reichstag and view Berlin from the Norman Foster dome. Then walk to the Pariser Platz, now almost as it was in the 1930s, and continue to the Holocaust Memorial. After lunch, walk east along Unter den Linden, then see the model of Berlin in 1939 at ‘Berlin Story’. We visit the German History Museum then walk to the Schlossplatz, the site of the former royal palace and town centre until 1918.

Friday November 7th
We take a coach through the old East. Some areas were built to show the German Democratic Republic at its best, such as the Alexanderplatz and the former Stalinallee, now Frankfurter Allee. Visit Karlshorst, where a second surrender was arranged in May 1945: it is now a German-Russian Museum, on the eastern front and the battle for Berlin. Then drive to the Stasi Museum. The afternoon is free.

Saturday November 8th
We drive to the Bernauerstrasse where parts of the Wall have been rebuilt to see how it looked from the East, and visit the Berlin Wall Memorial Ensemble and the Documentation Centre. After lunch, we walk around the Potsdamer Platz. Visit the Film Museum to relive the very different Germanies of Leni Riefestahl and Marlene Dietrich, then continue to ‘The Story of Berlin’ where many centuries and aspects of life are portrayed.

Sunday November 9th
Coach to the Wannsee Villa, where the January 1942 Holocaust planning conference took place. We next visit Max Liebermann’s Villa, and the Brücke Museum. Free afternoon: perhaps visiting art museums nearby, or the Allies Museum, palaces or the Düppel Museum, a recreation of a 12th-century village.

Monday November 10th
Free morning before leaving for Tegel Airport and the return BA flight to Heathrow.

Enquiries to: Heritage Group Travel, Charlotte House, 12 Charlotte Street, Bath BA1 2NE
• Tel: 0044 (0)1225 466620 • Fax: 0044 (0)1225 482236 • Email: heritage@grouptravel.co.uk