Afternoon in Wannsee

Wansee is a small town located southwest of Berlin.  It sits on the edge of two lakes and was a popular vacation spot for German kaisers and their families, who built several castles along the shores of the lakes.  Like many places in the Berlin region, Wannsee is both a Nazi and a Cold War historic site.  In 1942, senior Nazi officials met in Wannsee and made plans for the Final Solution to murder all European Jews.  The Glienicke Bridge between Wannsee and Potsdam was one of the few crossing points between East and West Germany.  The bridge became famous when it served as an exchange point for captured spies and dissidents between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Today it is still a popular vacation spot; people come to Wannsee for the beaches and boating on the lakes.  The parks and castle gardens are reportedly beautiful in the spring and summer.  Unfortunately the gardens were still bare in mid-March, but I can imagine that it is lovely when everything is in bloom.  After walking across the bridge and through the gardens of Schloss Glienicke, we ate lunch in a beer garden.  I had sausages, rolls, spicy mustard, and a piece of cherry streusel cake.

Glienicke Bridge from Potsdam to Wannsee - "Bridge of Spies"

A castle on the lake

Schloss Glienicke, another castle, is decorated with original classical sculptures taken from Greece.