The Victory Column is a monument created to commemorate the Prussian victory in the Danish-Prussian War. It's possible to visit this monument and climb the stairs to get to the top of the column where you can find very interesting views of the capital city.

The 3rd of October is a national holiday when Germans celebrate their "Unity Day" (Tag der Deutschen Einheit). This is normally a really good day to walk along the "Straße des 17. Juni", since it's open only to pedestrian traffic. I did that walk last year, visited the column, and shot the picture you can observe above.

In September of 2016 we made a road trip with K and visited Lindau, a major town and an island on the eastern side of Lake Constance. We stayed at a hotel in the island that’s connected with the mainland by a road-traffic bridge.

The current harbour of this island was built in 1856 and the iconic lion sculpture and lighthouse mark the entrance of this port. An interesting fact is that this lighthouse is the only one in Bavaria!

I published some additional pictures of Lindau in my juanpics domain.

Yesterday I started walking from Prenzlauer Berg, all the way to Postdamer Platz. When I was crossing the Museum Island, I noticed the Humboldt-Box and remembered that I had never been there before, so I decided to make a short stop. This temporary construction, created by the Humboldt Foundation, serves as an exhibition space and viewing platform for the Berlin Palace - Humboldt Forum reconstruction project.

It has been a while since the last time I published any picture in this European photoblog. I have been travelling in Asia, so most of the pictures I have been taking are published now in the Breaksian Career Break blog. Nevertheless, I'm currently on a break from the break, spending Xmas with my girlfriend.

If you have been following this photoblog, I think you are not going to be surprised if I mention Berlin is one of my favorite cities in Europe. A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to visit it one more time, and since I stayed with some friends living in the south part of the city I got to see the area around Templehof, including the former airport that is now a huge open green space. In a truly Berlin style, it has an art mini-golf in the middle of the park where we got some water, and this is where I took this picture. During the weekend I was visiting Berlin, there was a referendum to keep the Tempelhof park 100% public, and it passed with around 65% of the votes in favor of the initiative. Therefore, the Berliners will keep enjoying this huge and popular park in the city. Well done!.

Sometimes you get a nice photoshoot in the most unexpected place, so it’s good to have a mobile phone with a decent camera at hand to capture the instant. This is exactly what happened last weekend when we went to the big shopping center in Weil am Rhein, located very close to the river point where countries meet (France, Germany and Switzerland). We were in the parking lot and getting ready to leave the place, but when we looked outside at the sky, we just saw this amazing view composed of some blueish hues and a stripe of sunny light in the background, so I got my phone and shot a couple of pictures trying to capture this view. I wish we had a new year full of nice sky views like the one we experienced last weekend. Happy 2014.

Yesterday we enjoyed a nice day at the thermal baths of this German city located very close to Basel, Mulhouse, and Freiburg. This was the first time we visited this town, and it turned out to be a picturesque place with a couple of fancy hotels, some restaurants, and full of baths due to the spring mineral waters it possesses. When we arrived in the town, we noticed from a distance the ruins of a castle, and when we were going back to the car, we noticed it again, so I grabbed my phone and took a picture. I was able to get a nice silhouette of the castle at this time of the year.

Last Saturday we went to Europapark, a “Europe” theme park located in Rust, Germany. I wanted to celebrate my birthday there because I really enjoy the thrills you get riding a nicely designed rollercoaster. We were lucky with the weather because we had a sunny day that allowed us to enjoy even the water-related attractions. The park was relatively crowded so we had to wait in line for most of the rides, but those seconds when you are rushing through the sky upside down made it worth it. The Blue Fire is probably my favorite ride with all the fast ascents, descents, inversions, turns, and loops. I always finish with a green face, dizzy but extremely happy! This time around I missed riding the Silver Star that you can observe in this picture, but that’s going to be first next time I visit the park. bis bald Europapark!

Normally I publish pictures from European cities or landscapes in this photoblog, but this time I decided to upload a nice butterfly photo I captured earlier today. We decided to visit Konstanz in Germany, and it turned out to be a very nice city with an old, well-preserved city center (luckily the Allied bombs during WWII didn’t touch it). From there, you can take a boat that brings you to a small island called Mainau. K. always wanted to visit this place because she had studied at the school on this island, which had a gorgeous greenhouse full of butterflies. Indeed, once you enter the place, you find plenty of 'Schmetterlinge' flying all over the place, sucking up juice from orange slices and hopping from flower to flower. So my dear K., here is a butterfly picture for you!

One of the plans K. wanted to do for a long time was to visit and walk in the Black Forest in Germany. Basel is located in northern Switzerland, so Freiburg and the small towns in this region of the country are located nearby. Yesterday we booked our economic smart car and headed north to Titisee. Even if the town was a bit too touristy for our taste, it has a nice lake where you can rent a small electric boat and explore around. Additionally, it has some good hiking paths to visit small towns nearby walking through the forest. While we were walking through one of these paths, we had the opportunity to see the lake through this frame made of leaves where I took this shot.

Every time I go to Berlin, I'm quickly reminded why this is my favorite European city. As I get close to Alexanderplatz, I feel excited to be visiting the German capital again. The first time I visited the city was 7 years ago, and it’s amazing how much the city has changed in that short time: The Palace of the Republic is gone, the Hauptbahnhof has been completed, and the area around the parliament is getting nicer and nicer. Each time I visit Berlin, I get the opportunity to see something new I haven’t seen before, and this time was no exception: While we were walking near Postdamer Platz, we saw a small flyer talking about a watchtower, and indeed we found, hidden by a tree, one of the last remaining surveillance symbols of the GDR.

During this long weekend we visited Hamburg for the first time and we got a very good impression about this German maritime city that once was a member of the medieval Hanseatic League. We didn't know, but during those days the city was celebrating the "Port Birthday," and there were a lot of food stalls, bands playing, and nice ships visiting the port. Berlin is still my favorite German city, but this comes second, very close.

Today I have been wondering around Freiburg, enjoying the first sunny day of a spring that almost forgot to come to Europe in 2013. Seriously! This has been the longest European winter since the year I arrived in Europe. I know winter can be long in these latitudes, but if you could see the happiness in the faces of most of the people outside enjoying the sun and grabbing coffee in the terraces, you would understand what I'm talking about. Anyway, when I was walking from the train station, I saw this woman taking a picture of the first blossoms, and you can see her and them in this picture. Welcome spring!!!

Today we visited Karlsruhe, one of the big German cities in the Baden-Württemberg state. Before going there I read that there has been some speculation about this city being used as a model for Washington, D.C. (since both cities have a centre from which the streets radiate). I couldn't stop thinking about this point when we were walking in the city center. When we passed by the Rondellplatz, we observed this obelisk that might, in fact, be a model for the American one. Probably this city is very nice during the summer, but today we realized spring hasn't come yet to Karlsruhe because it was rainy, grey, and cold... brrrr.

I was in Heidelberg 4 years ago, but last weekend I had the opportunity to go back and climb to the castle where I had this amazing view of the city. It was quite an exercise to climb the stairs to go to the top, but once you are there, you feel it has been totally worth it.

When you visit Dresden, it's hard to believe that one of the most important landmarks, the Frauenkirche, was reconstructed only after the German reunification and it has been standing there for less than 10 years (the works were finished in 2005). This famous church was completely destroyed during the bombing of Dresden by Anglo-American allied forces in February 1945. When you look at both the pictures before the war and the pictures of this area during the communist German Democratic Republic, you realize they did an amazing job bringing the Frauenkirche to its former glory. I have been in Dresden only twice, but it was just a short visit while catching a train to Prague. I would love to go back and spend more time in the city.

The first trip of this year 2010 was to Berlin to visit my aunt and uncle. I'm sorry it was such a short trip because I really liked that city! This time, when I was passing near the Brandenburg Gate, I noticed the path of the former Wall and I followed it all the way to Postdamer Platz where I took this picture. As you can see, it was snowing a lot.

In the second week of October 9, I went with K. to Munich and Salzburg for a long weekend holiday. I really enjoyed both cities. I passed by Marienplatz many times during the trip, and every time I enjoyed looking at the "Glockenspiel". We even went there the last day to hear and see the mechanical characters come to life for a couple of minutes :-).

Last Christmas (08) I had the chance to go to Germany and to spend a wonderful Christmas with L. and J. They were wonderful hosts. In this second visit to Berlin I really wanted to visit the Reichstag and I'm glad I did it, but it was not fun to queue outside in the "Berliner Winter". That's a lesson I learned :).

In December 2008, I met my aunt and her husband in Germany. I went to Frankfurt first, and one night, when I was crossing one of the bridges, I took this picture of the lights of the "Wolkenkratzer" in Frankfurt am Main. This was my second visit to the city, and I really enjoyed it :).

The first time I went to Berlin back in 2006 I noticed there was this ugly building "under construction". I was curious and I took a picture that was buried in my hard drive. Today, when I was cleaning up my computer, I found this photo again and I realized they were not building anything, but it was actually the other way around: they were dismantling the "Palace of the Republic". This building was the seat of the parliament of the German Democratic Republic. A couple of years later, I visited Berlin, and the construction was gone. Berlin will always be one of my favorite cities in Europe.

The first time I visited Berlin in the summer of 2006, I fell in love with that really interesting city. I like history, and you can breathe 20th-century history everywhere in this city. When we were walking around with some of my colleagues, we passed next to this statue of Marx and Engels, and that was a good reminder that once this was East Berlin, the capital of the GDR.