Munich

This is only a summer castle for the famous King Ludwig. The German king nearly spent the entire royal fortune on lavish, extravagant castles before he was ousted. A few days later, he and his physician were found drowned in the Lake Starnberg. Whether it had been suicidal or accidental remains a mystery.

This is just one of King Ludwig's many fine, gold-gilded coaches.

Whenever King Ludwig saw a beautiful young girl on his travels, he would order to have her portrait painted for him. He then had these portraits hung splendidly in his summer castle, in the "Gallery of Beauties."

Dachau

Dachau is only one of the many historical concentration camps in Europe. The Jewish community has put forth a tremendous effort to preserve the concentration camps. A museum was built in Dachau to document the terrible time in history and educate others about the many horrors that occured at that site as well as at many others.

The concrete plots that lie behind Teddy mark the sites where long cabins used to stand, enslaving the Jewish race.

This is one of the four cremation ovens at Dachau. At first, the Jewish were quickly killed and cremated to destroy the evidence. Yet, as the number of Jewish people killed climbed, the poor victims were just thrown into mass graves.

Punishment involved tying the prisoners' hands behind their backs, and then hanging them from the posts in this picture. The wall, alongside the posts, was used by the firing squad for disposing of prisoners.

Berlin

Most of West Berlin was under massive construction during our trip. The government was in the process of moving the capital back to Berlin from Bonn, and new shiny glass buildings were being erected everywhere. Teddy said it looked very different from the last time he was there, in 1991.

There was very little of the Berlin wall left in Germany. This is a small piece that we stumbled upon.

There were a few more select pieces of the Wall at a local museum. The museum interestingly documented the various escapees of East Berlin, including those who had paddled off in a kayak or dug a tunnel under a building. At the souvenir store, I bought a tiny piece of the Wall, attached to a postcard, for a dollar.

Checkpoint Charlie was a famous checkpoint between the Communist-controlled East Berlin and the American-controlled West Berlin. The Berlin Wall, the grassy expanse, the directed machine guns... none of those remain except for the two poster signs and a guardpost tower on the side already walled off for destruction.

I guess time really does move on - hopefully for the better. The best thing that anyone can do is enjoy life as it comes, and eat German sausages with your loved ones.

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