Our annual meeting with Evi and Gerd took place in Berlin during the period 17-19 August 2012.

The highlight was the unforgettable visit at the Pergamon Museum to see Asisi’s panorama: “Pergamon-Panorama of the Ancient Metropolis”, which took the visitor off on a journey through time to the Greek/Roman city of Pergamon in the spring of 129 AD. The combination of 3D, light (day/night) and sound was unique and the words of Ivan S. Turgeniew (1881):

“Als ich das museum verliess, dachte ich: Wie glücklich bin ich, dass ich nicht starb, bevor ich einen solchen eindruck mitnehmen und all diese herrlichkeit sehen durfte,“ made sense to us all.

Schlössernacht in Sanssouci Park
Sanssouci Park is a large park surrounding the Sanssouci Palace in Potsdam placed, at the top of a terracing vineyard .It also includes a baroque flower garden with lawns, flower beds, hedges and trees . The goddesses Flora and Pomona, who decorate the entrance obelisk at the eastern park exit, were placed to highlight the connection of a flower, fruit and vegetable garden.

A 2.5 km long straight main avenue was subsequently built. It began in the east at the 1748 obelisk and over the years, it was extended all the way to the New Palace, which marks its end in the west. In 1764 the picture gallery was constructed, followed by the New Chambers in 1774. They flank the palace and open the alley up to rondels with the fountains, surrounded by marble statues. From there paths lead in a star pattern between tall hedges to further parts of the gardens.

To the south Karl Friedrich Schinkel and Ludwig Persius built Charlottenhof Palace on the site of a former farm house, and Peter Joseph Lenné was commissioned with the garden design. Lenné converted the flat and partly swampy grounds into an open landscape park. Broad meadows created visual avenues between Charlottenhof, the Roman Baths and the New Palace with the Temple of Friendship developed from the time of Frederick the Great. Lenné used the materials excavated to create the pond to construct a gentle hilly area landscape where the paths meet in the shape of stars at the high points.

All this made up the set piece for the annual Potsdamer Schlössernacht with historic entertainments and people dressed up in historic clothes.