My first ever trip overseas which was not paid for by the military. Never been on holiday as such, never wanted to. But my other half is a bit holoday mad and after 4 years together she persuaded me to go abroad without carrying a weapon.
Left Lichfield in Staffordshire at 07:30 21st Nov, train journey to London, Eurotunnel to Paris, fortunately we only had to stay in the 'City of Love' for a couple of hours, spent the entire time checking pockets and growling at the hordes of Eastern Europeans in fake leather jackets constantly following us around trying to rob us.
Haven't been to France since I had a 1 day trip as a schoolboy nearly 30 years ago, but the same people were there and still had not taken their customer service courses.
We then climbed aboard the Paris to Berlin Sleeper train for our 13 hours to Berlin. When I say Sleeper Train, I refer to the wreck that was discovered in an Eastern Block train yard after the wall came down and then put back in service. The "Schlafwagen" is rather spuriously named, with 6 people per cabin (thank goodness we only had 3), seats came from a T34 and were non adjustable, so we ended up sleeping on the floor. Managing to get to sleep every couple of hours to be woken by a torch wielding German rozzer shouting "Polizei!"
Arrived in Berlin HauptBahnHof and we immediately fell in love with the city. Spectacular sights, the people are courteous and helpful, even with my limited command of German we were able to tear around the city on the fantastic public transport system, food was incredible, beer even more so. I served in Germany but never visited Berlin. We even decided to stay another night rather than endure another trip on the torture train, then flew home to a drizzling England the following day after many Gluhwein mit Rum and Currywurst.
Mrs Danny is now looking for a job over there, I am going to take a higher German language course and am checking about the cross over between my current course and whether I can also find work in the city. Already booking next years holiday, I am converted.
I am amused however by the fact that no one bats an eyelid if you are to order a curry soaked sausage with a stein of beer at 8 o'clock in the morning, but we were looked at as though we were insane when I ordered two espresso's and strudel with vanilla cream for breakfast
