Berlin 2007

Thu 23 Aug to Fri 31 Aug. 233 Park Avenue South, New York, 10003. Mike Enav, Tour Director, 212-879-4588, info@ajcongresstravel.com. 2695 Land Only. American Jewish Congress International Travel Program - [events]

Berlin’s history is dark, not only as the headquarters of the National Socialist terror regime from 1933 to 1945, but also as the battleground of the Cold War. Few cities in the world, however, have done as much as Berlin to bring awareness of its past to current and future generations. While Berlin of today is living up to its reputation as a dynamic, exciting hub of activity as never before, it is not exactly escaping the past, testified by a rich list of museums, memorials and remembrance sites.

ITINERARY:

THURSDAY, DAY 1- EN ROUTE
Evening departure from New York to Berlin.

FRIDAY, DAY 2- BERLIN
Arrive in Berlin, Germany’s capital, reunited in 1989, and home to Germany’s largest Jewish community. Transfer to your luxury hotel. En route,our orientation of the city will show you some of the city’s highlights.. Welcome Shabbat Dinner celebrates your arrival. D

SATURDAY, DAY 3- BERLIN
For those who wish, attend services in the Pestalozzi Synaogogue, built in 1911 and one of the few synagogues not destroyed during “Kristallnacht”. The synagogue is famous for its organ and mixed choir and for continuing the tradition of German-Jewish liturgy, made famous by Louis Lewandowski. Our morning walk takes us to the Gendarmenmarkt,and the Brandenburg Gate, once the symbol of the divided city, along famous Unter Den Linden Boulevard. Visit the new government area including the Reichstag (Parliament) with its impressive new dome designed by Sir Norman Foster. Free time for lunch, followed by a walk through the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, on which 2,711 concrete stelae stand, was designed by New York architect Peter Eisenman. Visitors are permitted to walk through the field of stelae unrestricted at any time of the day or night. .Time to stroll along Friedrichstrasse, and its chic boutiques and department stores. Arrive to the Cold War’s Checkpoint Charlie, once the main thruway between East and West Berlin. This evening, perhaps you will want to attend an opera in one of Berlin’s three Opera Houses or a concert of the famous Berlin Philharmonic. B

SUNDAY, DAY 4 – BERLIN
This morning drive to Wannsee (Wann Lake) to visit the “Haus der Wannsee-Konferenz.” This was the site of the most notorious conferences in history; a meeting of Nazi bureaucrats and SS officials to plan the annihilation of European Jewry. The villa is now a memorial to the Holocaust and includes a selection of photographs of men, women and children who were sent to concentration camps. From here, we continue to the Liebermann Villa along the same lake. The summerhouse of the famous Jewish painter Max Liebermann serves today as a museum exhibiting a collection of artworks, documents and books by and about the artist. This afternoon, a cruise on a riverboat, down the “Spree”, Berlin’s main waterway. Evening at leisure. Your Tour Manager will make dinner suggestions. B

MONDAY, DAY 5- BERLIN
Start the day with a visit to the Jewish Museum, which has been among the most prominent institutions in the European museum landscape since it opened in 2001. The spectacular building by American architect Daniel Liebskind covers 3,000 square meters of floor space, presenting 2,000 years of German-Jewish history with interactive and multi-media components. Lunch on your own, perhaps, at the museum’s Liebermann Restaurant. Continue to Weissenstee, the largest cemetery in Europe, which was opened in 1880. It contains 110,000 graves of Berlin’s Jewish residents, many of them distinguished artists, musicians, scientists and religious leaders. For a change of pace and mood, we’ll take you to Potsdamer Platz, most of which was bombed during World War II; today, a controversial square of modern towers and shopping centers. B

TUESDAY, DAY 6- BERLIN
Today, we start at Museums Insel (Museum Island) where some of the most impressive museums of Berlin are located. The Old National Gallery, known for its collection of 19th century German and French impressionists, including the work of Max Leibermann, the Altes Museum, (Old Museum) designed by Karl Friedrich Schinkel in 1822, the city’s greatest architect, resembling a Greek Corinthian temple. End the afternoon at the Pergamon Museum with its impressive Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities and the Pergamon Altar (180-160 B.C.) and Ishtar Gate – the 2,500 year-old city gates of Babylon. Tonight, your Tour Manager will host dinner in a local restaurant. BD

WEDNESDAY, DAY 7- BERLIN
Today’s guided city tour will include Bayerischer Platz. Here, artists Renata Stih and Frider Schnock have put up 80 signs reflecting the anti-Jewish regulations and laws that were in place from 1933 to 1945. Time to stroll Kurfurstendamm with its lively shopping area; perhaps visit KaDeWae, a must-see department store, once owned by a prominent Jewish family; it was and still is Europe’s largest department store. This afternoon, visit the small, but impressive Berggruen Collection. This unusual private museum displays the awesome collection of respected art and antiques dealer, Heinz Berggruen. A native of Berlin who fled the Nazis in 1936, Berggruen later established a small empire of antiques dealerships in Paris and California before returning, with his collection, to his native home in 1996. Just across from the museum, enjoy a private tour of Charlottenburg Palace, one of the finest examples of baroque architecture in Germany, with its exquisite collections of art and porcelain and magnificently landscaped gardens. A special dinner and concert follows. BD

THURSDAY, DAY 8- BERLIN
Our last day in Berlin starts with a visit to the Picture Gallery, one of the world’s most important collections of European paintings from the 13th to 18th centuries. During the remainder of the day we shall take a walking tour of the old Jewish Quarter in the Spandauer Vorstadt, which has been a center of Jewish culture since the 17th century. Architecturally, the golden cupola of the New Synagogue on the Oranienburger Strasse dominates this quarter. Built in 1866 to seat 3,200 people, this synagogue was once the largest and most beautiful Jewish place of worship in Germany. Desecrated in 1938, it has been partially restored and today houses the Centrum Judaicum. Our walk now takes us past the Jewish Community Center Adass Jisroael, several stores for Jewish foods and ritual articles, the former Jewish Old Folks’ Home, which the Gestapo used as a detention camp. On the same street lies the Jewish Boys’ School, which now serves as a Jewish High School. Also to be found here is the Hachesches Hoftheater, a special forum for Yiddish music and theater. Tonight’s Farewell Dinner caps a memorable visit. BD

FRIDAY, DAY 9- EN ROUTE
Transfer to the airport for the return flight home. B

This is a sample itinerary – distribution of sites & leisure time is subject to change.

Meal Conditions: Buffet breakfast daily-– 4 dinners