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We took the train to Kutna hora to go see the “bone church" aka the Sedlec ossuary. It was really bizzare but also very cool. Our favorite part was the bone chandelier! After our visit, we walked to St. Barbara's church, which was a beautiful Gothic church (and a UNESCO world heritage site, of course). In the evening, we had some local cuisine: sweet and sour cabbage, potato pancakes, some sort of baked cheese, and breaded eggplant sprinkled with almonds- washed down with the original Czech pilsner Urquell (first produced in nearby Plzen in 1842).

We boarded a train from Berlin to Prague. The train traveled through Dresden and we thought about stopping there for a few hours to explore (I can thank Slaughterhouse Five for my desire to see Dresden). We decided we would rather get to Prague sooner, so we didn't stop. After getting settled, we had our laundry done at our hostel while we ate dinner across the street. We both had cheesy potato dishes (one with broccoli and the other with tomatoes and eggplant). The entrées were very tasty and ridiculously cheap ($4 each)! We had a beer at the hostel bar which was also super cheap ( two beers for $1.50 during happy hour) but everyone in the bar was smoking constantly so we didn't stay long. We realized that we have taken for granted the smoking ban in WI!

We started off the day by visiting Tier gardens (the former Royal Family's hunting grounds); the gardens were really bland in comparison to every other garden/park we have visited thus far. We spent the next few hours at the Topography of Terror exhibit which documented the history of Nazi Germany with many photographs and documents. The museum is located at the former site of the Gestapo and rubble from the destroyed building surrounds the museum. Afterwards, we returned to the hostel to rest/warm up/eat. We had an appointment to enter the Reichstag (parliament building) that evening (an appointment is necessary after a bomb threat was made a few years back), so we headed there to get a good view of the city. We ascended the dome, where we got a nice view, enhanced by the Festival of Lights. Afterwords, we checked out a few of the buildings and monuments involved in the festival; it was pretty neat! Here are a few pictures of the festival:

35 km outside of Berlin lies the first concentration camp - the camp the others were modeled after - Sachsenhausen. (And later in the war the location where the head office in charge of concentration camps was located.) We headed there today and spent most of the day exploring the camp and the exhibits. At the end of WW2 when the Soviets took control of Eastern Germany they turned around and used the same camp to house their prisoners of war and criminals. When done, they knocked down many of the original buildings, so almost all the buildings we saw were reconstructions, but they were still harrowing. The camp started by housing mainly political prisoners but it also held all of the other groups persecuted by the Nazi regime (Jews, Sinti, homosexuals, Gypsies, and the mentally or physically disabled). Over 100.000 people lost their lives in the camp - most of them during the years the camp was operated by the Nazis. 12.000 Soviet soldiers were executed there in one month alone. The foundations of the building where the executions were carried out remain, as well as parts of the crematorium ovens (see photo). It was hard to view. We headed back in the evening and planned on walking around to look at the Berlin buildings at night. There was a Festival of Lights going on while we were there and a lot of the famous buildings were lit up. We wound up staying inside and watching a documentary instead since it was raining pretty hard.

After the hostel breakfast we did a free 3.5 hour walking tour. It was a great introduction to the city; we saw things like the Brandenburg Tor, the Reichstag, the Luftwaffe SS building, the parking lot above where Hitler's bunker was, Checkpoint Charlie, museum island, and a small standing piece of the Berlin Wall. The wall was much smaller and thinner than we had expected (as the picture illustrates).  Afterwards we fulfilled a craving that had been growing in us ever since we started our trip - a craving for a burrito. We hung out in the hostel for a while as we planned our next few days. The dinner we bought in the hostel bar was actually quite good, and super cheap (€10 for 2 entrees and an appetizer.)

We had a nice breakfast with our hosts before saying our goodbyes. Our trains to Berlin went by quickly; it was nice to have reservations. Our hostel was out of double bed rooms so we got upgraded to an "apartment" room that came with a semiprivate bathroom (it only had one camera in it) and full kitchen. We got comfy, had an excellent meal at a nearby Thai restaurant and then bought a return ticket to sleepytown.

Waking up from a poor night of sleep on the night train (we really should pay extra for the sleeper car next time) we headed to Hillerød to meet up with Frank and Camilla. Once Camilla returned from some errands we had traditional Danish open sandwiches for lunch. For toppings we had: tuna, herring, mackerel, some sort of canned pork liver paste, as well as cheese and jam (which were eaten together). They told us that they never make sandwiches with two pieces of bread (because that would be too much bread). It makes sense as their bread is very thick and hearty. After lunch we went to see the Helsingør castle and the Fredensborg castle. At Fredensborg we saw the Prince of Denmark ride by on a horse drawn carriage. Ritzy! Helsingør slot was beautiful as well (+1 UNESCO) and if you lived there you could see Sweden from your house! We headed home to start making dinner. We had a soup made with pureed Jerusalem artichokes and potatoes. It was very good! We stayed up late talking-heading to bed about 1 am.

The night before we had made a solid day plan for how we should spend our last day. We got up early and had more Swedish pancakes ( this time with lingonberry jam).  We headed for the docks where we were planning on taking an archipelago tour. It turned out that they only run on the weekends after the month of September (their website failed to mention that). So we headed to the Stockholm TV tower where we ascended and got an excellent view of the city. Next we went to a local Swedish restaurant where we had some traditional Swedish dishes. We went home, took a nap, and then got pizza from a nearby kebab house and watched The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. We had had our absentee ballots sent to Becky's apartment and we filled them in and mailed them back today. Hurrah for democracy! We left around 21 in order to get on our night train to Copenhagen where we were going to spend another night with our previous hosts Frank and Camilla.

We had Swedish pancakes for breakfast; Becky served them with strawberries and apples. We did our laundry and then headed into town. We walked around Stockholm and stopped in a few museums. We stopped in an H&M (apparently it is a Swedish store...so is IKEA, we found out) so that I could get a new pair of pants (my old ones already have big holes). Jon was thrilled to get to spend some time in the mall ;) We went to a cafe to have coffee and we were going to try some Swedish pastry that Becky recommended, but the cafe was out of them. Next, we went to the grocery store to get ingredients for dinner. We made open faced sandwiches which were fantastic! Later, Becky took us to a bar where the drinks were really fancy. We had a drink and headed home.

We slept in a bit and then made our way to the Vasa museum. The Vasa was a 17th century warship commissioned by the Swedish crown. A majestic ship, designed to intimidate Sweden's enemies, (the Polish) she capsized and was lost less than 1km from where she was built. The brackish water of the Baltic combined with mud covered her for 333 years until she was rediscovered and salvaged. After extensive restoration efforts she was put on display in a museum built to house her. The ship survived incredibly well; over 95 percent of the wood of the ship survived. Besides housing the ship, the museum also had other artifacts on display which were salvaged from the ship wreck. It was pretty awesome. In the evening, we made Swedish meatballs and spinach pasta for dinner.