Since the travel restrictions are still in place, we thought that we would take a quick trip to Potsdam. We jumped on the S-Bahn from the Berlin Hauptbahnhof and 40 minutes later we arrived in Potsdam.
To be honest, our day started a bit later than we had planned so we jumped on the first bus to “Schloss Sanssouci”. Luckily from the Potsdam Hauptbahnhof, there is a direct bus (695) that took us directly to the Sanssouci Palace.
We spent a few minutes trying to figure out how to enter the palace but since it was already a bit late in the afternoon we decided to skip waiting line to go in and just wander the park instead.
Sanssouci Park is 300 hectares of gardens, fountains, palaces, and lawns that became a UNESCO world heritage site in 1990. Like every other trip that Cris and I take, we had no plan and basically just picked a direction and started walking. The park is beautiful, I highly recommend checking out the statue of Apollo the Archer and the fountains in front of the Orangienburg Palace Museum, as well as the Chinese House.
We eventually found ourselves staring at the impressive Neues Palais (New Palace). The Neues Palais was completed in 1769 to celebrate Prussia’s successes in the Seven Years’ War. It is substantially larger than the Sanssouci Palace and was mostly used for celebrations and events. We couldn’t stop talking about the number of statues on the exterior, they are everywhere. The lampposts were my favorite by far. Behind the Neues Palais is the Communs, and equally impressive set of buildings that were the utility buildings for the Palace. These housed the Kitchens, Gardners, Palace Guards, and the Palace servants and connects to the main Palace through an underground tunnel. We decided that we would be more than happy to move in, Cris could commute to the office in Berlin and I would have a royal kitchen to cook in!
After Sanssouci Park, we were hungry so we headed back toward the old town of Potsdam. We stopped for a bite at Cradock Burger and Cocktail Bar and carried on to the Dutch Quarter. The Dutch Quarter is an interesting section of Potsdam that was built in the 18th century for Dutch immigrants. It is 134 Dutch-style brick houses and is the largest Dutch-only neighborhood outside of the Netherlands. We wandered around and listened to some street performers busking as the evening dinner crowd filled the cafes.
Lastly, we decided to find a good place to have a beer and watch the evening settle in, we chose the Brauerei Meierei. We ended up walking to the Brauerei from the Dutch Quarter, which is a nice walk through a beautiful neighborhood but it was also a bit longer than we realized. Thirty minutes later we were parched, but unfortunately due to the Corona restrictions, we still had to wait another 15 minutes to get a table. Once we were seated we had a perfect view of the Jungfernsee (Virgin Lake), and finally rewarded our long day of walking with a refreshing beer.
There is many more things to see in Potsdam, and since it is now only about an hour from our house, I’m sure we will be back soon. All in all it was a pretty great unplanned trip!
