Carrying on with my current love interest – Berlin – it seems only natural to provide you with a little ‘getting around on a bicycle’ perspective from one whom occasionally dabbles in such, back on the home front.

Background – I like cycling, but not exerting, so I’m not one to deliver on speed, however can happily peddle for hours if it is flat and not raining. So, Berlin, Sunday 4 May was ideal for an outing.

Team Family hired bikes from our hotel (Casa Camper Berlin – top location, feel, service and view from breakfast) and chose to take in several sites between us (in Mitte) and Charlottenburg (the location of the Helmut Newton Museum), and it couldn’t have been easier, safer, more satisfying and interesting.

• Easier – you can hire bikes pretty much anywhere and get going

Look these are just like the ones in London (though not blue) (Image sourced smutpedaller.blogspot.com)

• Safer – I know this will shock…drivers are actually thoughtful and patient…and cycle paths are everywhere

• More satisfying – I could take in everything, feeling like I was exercising, had control over how long I wished to stop in places and after listening to my 13 year grumble about never getting to go on his computer, hear him squeal with delight as we weaved our way through the Tiergarten.

See how happy and satisfied this lot looks (Image sourced visitberlin.de)

• Interesting – you can cycle down the Unter den Linden, through the Brandenburg Gate, park up for a while to visit the Holocaust Memorial and walk a little over to Hilter’s Bunker; get back on – do some circle work at Potsdamer Platz ; see some bunnies eating the grass – in the Tiergarten not on the street; two wheel along the canal; and see a cathedral that looks like a broken tooth as you gracefully alight in Charlottenburg – all before lunch. Then…back route it through the Tiergarten, past a never have I experienced it before, beautiful Bell Tower, playing Bells (yes really); over to the Reichstag; through Alexanderplatz just for fun; stop at the Galleria to purchase Falke hosiery for mummy; and back in time for afternoon Cocktails…Nice.

The Tiergarten – you can see why the 13 year old was cheery (Imaged sourced berlin.de)

And I thought Oxford was a city for cyclists.

And a little map which covers the area we explored (image sourced overt.org)