On the Road to Hook of Holland...25th July.

An early start to make sure I make the early afternoon ferry. An hour driving through the countryside before tackling the autobahn..

The next hour of travel on the German autobahns without speed limits with cars flying down the 'fast lane' gave way to the more measured speed limits through the Netherlands.  
Going through boarders without controls with changes in the design of road signs the only real visual sign this has taken Europe a long time to get to but how good it is to move seamlessly through Europe's boarders.  

Also the hottest day of my journey.. 39C..

Driving past a convoy of British army trucks and land Rovers, I caught up with them again while we both drove round in circles looking for the car terminal, not the truck terminal.. finally to judge your instincts and drive to another part of the port.. A good reason to leave enough time at the start of the day...

Finally on the ferry.. looking across the busy waterway at the mouth of the Port of Rotterdam.. 

I arrived back to the UK, docking at 9pm at Harwich, in the middle of an electrical storm.. After an age getting off the ferry and passing through customs, driving away on roads that are as bad as any I have driven on during the last 5500 miles of travel.. dreadful and what a welcome to visitors to the UK..

Finally back in Bisley at 1am... the end of the journey.. 

Time for reflection........

On the Road to Munster...24th July..

Reluctantly leaving Berlin early... A long drive west towards the Hook of Holland. 
After packing up I decide to stop at Munster and break the journey. 

Putting everything back in the car, or as I thought. I left the keys on the table in the hall, closed the door behind me and immediately realised that I had left a pair of (suede) Chelsea boots still in the hall.. There was nothing I could do.. I hope to be able to get them back.. I bought them after recovering from my foot operation and they are big enough to have my molded foot pads fit inside, so hopefully I will get both back at the same time...

Road works again and one road completely closed.. The only way to stop 'Julie' returning back to the same closed road was to drive directly north for 15 kilometres and then turn to the west.. along country roads with trundling tractors and open fields of maize gently swaying in the afternoon breeze.. 

Finally in the late evening I arrived in the centre of Munster (North Rhine-Westfalia).  I have never experienced so many bikes parked or on the move. According to Wikipedia. there are approximately 60,000 students in an overall population of 500,000.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Münster

I had no time to explore, just to find a cafe in old city for a late supper and then back to the hotel before and early start in the morning.. 

I will need to return and see the city properly.. 

Berlin...23rd July..

Sunny! Berlin, as do other cities, looks so much better in the sun....
Back to the James Simon Galerie..
This is essentially a building that links both the Neues Museum with the Pergamon Museum and provides an entrance to both; the Pergamon on the upper ground floor and the Neues in a new basement link..
The Pergamon Museum has been under a comprehensive re-construction project since 2014. Originally the work was meant to be completed at the end of 2019, now the anticipated opening date is 2023 with the corresponding increase in costs. Only one wing of the original museum is open. The intention is to create a fourth wing, with new underground links to the other museums on the island. 

Stair down to the Neues lower ground floor entrance..

I decided to visit the Neues Galerie first (due to the Pergamon entrance queue). 
Arriving at the new lower ground floor entrance, staff are ready to scan your entrance ticket.. Looking for the ticket in my wallet, I ended up presenting the BMW museum entrance ticket, forgetting that the oversized ticket was kept elsewhere.. The staff member looked very confused, scanned the barcode and let me through. At the time I hadn't realised that I had offered the wrong ticket. 
So now you know, the BMW museum ticket works in the Neues too......

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neues_Museum

I have been to the Neues before, but the visit was interrupted by calls from clients and the office. Now no such disruption. David Chipperfield won the open competition with the concept of retaining as much of the remaining building as possible, expressing new fabric insertions with a simple palette of materials. It is a remarkable building that retains galleries that survived the destruction and links these with the new... Opened by Angela Merkel in November 2009. 

This approach was not with criticism.. many people felt the museum should be re-constructed as a copy of the original museum..

https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/iAIyOD6OJpqqKA?hl=en

Fragments of the original wall paintings of the Egyptian Court...

The main entrance stair hall.. 

Original top floor galleries.. The cases are also original but would have housed different artifacts. 

I always wanted a Greek helmet when young...

Late Bronze Age ceremonial hat.. 1000 - 800BCE.. an astronomical calendar 

 Reconstructed galleries where sufficient structure and materials could be re-used.

It is not allowed to take photos of Nefertiti in the room and even of the room itself.. You have to stay outside behind a line so have to wait until other visitors have moved away. 
This is really where a proper camera, rather than your phone camera, would come into its own. 

 The Nefertiti room occupies a cupola gallery to one end of the building. Most of the coffered structure remains; it is a shame that photos aren't allowed in the room...

https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/ZQKiSnxV4cRAIw?hl=en
Next door to Nefertiti...

The cupola gallery on the opposite end of the museum didn't survive the construction. Chipperfield has re-interpreted the coffered cupola as a brick dome..

The cupola in the 1980's...

Leaving the museum and walking back to the James Simon Galerie and the entrance to the Pergamon Museum..

This time trying to use the BMW museum ticket didn't work.. flustered by the line waiting to enter behind, I found the correct ticket....

Designed to house the expanding collection of artifacts excavated by German archaeologists, worked commenced in 1910 and finished in 1930. It is an interesting study of how archaeology, and particular German archaeology, removed whole buildings from the lands they were excavating.. As we have a continuous debate on whether the Elgin marbles should be returned to Athens, does Germany have similar debates over the treasures located in the Pergamon and the Neues?

One wing of the museum is currently open..  The ancient near east and the museum of Islamic art. 

The processional street of Babylon..

Model of the original processional street. 

A mixture of original and 'new' tiles...

The street leads onto the Miletus Gate..

The room that houses the Pergamon Alter is not open to the public...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pergamon_Altar

Other Assyrian exhibits....

For the benefit of visitors in the 1930's the archaeological sites were painted to provide a atmospheric backdrop to the exhibits...

The Museum of Islamic Art...

The future.... 

The Aleppo room.. all the walls from a Christian house painted around the 1600's 

Out into the sunshine to walk to the Reichstag for my 15.30 afternoon appointment..
but stopped to see this building close to the Neues Museum.. The Hungarian College in Berlin..

https://www.flickr.com/photos/collegiumhungaricumberlin/albums/72157685854495715

....and then to the Bundestag.. important to arrive on time...

These are the other visitors in my group, most queuing with me yesterday for a ticket....

The view back from the steps...

The outer reception hall.... waiting for the large lift to take us to the roof...

Looking down into one of the courtyards..

The open top... the whole of the glass dome is essentially open to the elements. 

 Walking up the ramp.....

While it is open at the top with gaps at the base of the roof to create a heat stack, it was really hot...

Waiting for the lift to take us back down, an alarm went off.. looking around a staff member rushed up.. and took my audio link off me. I had forgotten to give it back.. oops..

Back down... time is limited on the roof.. I looked into the assembly. All the chairs were missing.. obviously summer recess..

Once down I decided to visited a area of Berlin, in the eastern part of the city where the MCM travel guru, Ellen who can put Lonely Planet and other travel guides to shame..  had advised me to visit and look for a particular cafe..  The Hackescher Markt area... 

Some wonderful renovated buildings now the home of small specialist shops and restaurants...

I found the cafe suggested.... Oxymoron...

I sat in the courtyard with the sun setting having a wonderful meal, watching people watching us diners..

Reality, in the form of work, had barged into my travels while travelling through Germany and I needed to cut short my stay in Berlin and northern Germany and return back to the UK before the end of the week.. A long journey back beckoned....