Sightseeing tour in a taxi through Berlin City East

Our basic tour "City East - Berlin Mitte" takes you to the highlights of old Berlin in one hour.

Historical center of Berlin - from a private taxi SUV with a short exit (possible) e.g. Brandenburg Gate

Immerse yourself in Old Berlin - but don't be disappointed if you don't see much of the "very old" anymore. Not only has the war and post-war debris removal done a great job here, but Berlin has always reinvented itself in ancient times, at least in the last 150 years. The Empire wanted to develop with all its power and splendor in its capital (with the money from the wars it had won before it was founded); it couldn't be big and powerful enough. A lot of old things had to give way, not just Schinkel Cathedral. People were already aware of this; contemporaries argued about it a lot; It was not for nothing that a little bit of Old Berlin was recreated on the site of today's Treptower Park at the trade exhibition in 1896 (a kind of little sister to the big world exhibitions in London and Paris). This gradually disappeared, for new large administrative buildings (e.g. for the Gasag on the Jannowitz Bridge), for the new town hall (the extension to the Red Town Hall, which fell apart just a few decades after it opened). The old court arbor, from the Middle Ages, for example, was moved to the park of his crown prince and retirement home, Babelsberg Palace, as a gift from the city to the old emperor.

This work was to be continued in the 1920s, the narrow streets south of the town house disappeared, and sewage and fresh water had not yet fully arrived there. The New Mint came there, and the Nazis built the new Reichsbank in place of the old one. Today part of the Foreign Ministry, although the front is in the style of the 1990s with a modern extension. Because post-war Berlin now offered a suitable playground for the plans of the new planners from the previous decades: get rid of the old, smelly streets, the tenements with the narrow, lightless inner courtyards! More light, more air should be between the buildings. And living, working and supply should be nicely separated, with highways in between - this is how the major demolitions for the car-friendly city were created in the 1960s.

A path was also cut through East Berlin, from Potsdamer Platz (where the world ended because of the Wall) via the Leipzig, Getraudenbrücke, Molkenmarkt to Gruner Straße at Alexanderplatz, an extra-wide highway. The Mühlendamm Bridge, which was previously built on, also fell victim to this; today there is a path here, dividing north and south. But today's urban redevelopment is revisiting the streets and neighborhoods of old Berlin. In addition to the rebuilt Nikolaiviertel - a kind of compensation for the late GDR in the 1980s - archaeologists are digging through the remains of house foundations and cellars, some of which date back to the 12th century. Even the Petrikirche in the old fishing community of “Zöllen” on the southern Spree island is to be resurrected as a “one” place of worship for all three major world religions. Sign of reconciliation where there has been war and destruction. Healing also in the old city center, the "hinge" between Berlin on the eastern bank of the Spree, the fishing town to the south and the northern Museum Island, and the city expansions of Friedrichswerder, etc. to the west, with the reconstruction of the Berlin Palace. In 1945, after the end of the war, exhibitions on the reconstruction (or demolition) of the city, which was one third destroyed, were held here. It burned out unextinguished for 3 days, no more, no less. A masterpiece of the North German Baroque, as a secular building, is the unanimous opinion of the experts. Nevertheless, with months of demolitions, it was destroyed in a barbaric act in the early 1950s at the behest of the East German authorities. After the proclamation of the Republic in 1919, it was a fairly innocent museum and home for authorities and residents; even the Nazis couldn't do anything about it except for marches in the pleasure garden.

The only place with little damage: the Spandau suburb, also known as the Scheunenviertel. Built in front of the northern city gate of the medieval city, a certain Christian Count Hacke drained today's so-called market on behalf of the soldier king Friedrich-Wilhelm I, the father of Frederick the Great. In the 18th century, new town houses were built there instead of the previous suburban barns. Jews in particular came here, but mixed in with Protestants (the majority) and some Catholics from the newly acquired Silesian provinces. Tolerance at its best, the Protestant French Huguenots also found refuge in the growing Berlin and were even allowed to build their own church on the Gendarmenmarkt. As well as the Catholics a small cathedral. Hedwig's Cathedral, at the so-called Forum Fridericianum.

That was the idea of the young King Frederick II, to create a new quarter of a castle, entertainment (opera), science (library) and religion with a place of worship here within sight, but a little more west. The inspiration for this place was already around the pleasure garden with the Old Museum, the Berlin Cathedral and the castle and the armory, the arsenal. But then he didn't even live in the new castle, his younger brother Heinrich moved in there a few years after his death – the university, today named after the scholar Humboldt. And that's what the reconstruction of the castle will be called, Humboldt Forum, which also contains the collection of the well-travelled Alexander von Humboldt; He had come as far as South America. Add to that the ethnological collections from Dahlem, and they complement the European-minded Museum Island wonderfully.

You can immerse yourself in this world between Alexanderplatz to the Brandenburg Gate, Gendarmenmarkt to Nordbahnhof with the Wall Memorial, Mittemang Cathedral and Hackesche Höfe on our city tour. And experience history at every turn, from the old Prussians to the emperors, Hitler and Stalin to the here and now.

Prices start from €99 for 1.5 hours*, €10 more for an additional person, plus €20 for a guided tour in English. You won't get a city tour in a luxury car that lasts 90 minutes this cheaply; Here you can find the explanations live. The whole thing is wrapped up in charming anecdotes, and a lot of it from my own experience. If you wish, a short exit and tour included, for example at Hackescher Markt with a passage through the courtyards. Or Nikolaiviertel, around the church or in the interesting and original Haus Knoblauch (Biedermeier), or at the Gendarmenmarkt etc.

*Price deviations possible, prices are gross including taxi tariff fee and city tour