Drinking, Dancing and Nuptials…

We have hardly had time to stop in the last month or two and so it was when we went as guests at Erica and Tomasz’s wedding in Poland recently.

Along with good friends of ours, Chris and Carole, we decided to tack on a side trip to Berlin which is nearby before driving just across the border to Szczecin.

At Berlin we stayed at the Marriott which was built after the reunification on ground that was part of the death strip on the East Berlin side of the wall.

After arriving in Berlin we decided the best way to see the highlights in the short time we had was to jump on an open top bus that ran in a loop around city. And being as it was a hote day this proved to be a wise idea.

We started near our hotel at Potsdamer Platz, a place renowned for the musicians who stayed here such as David Bowie and Iggy Pop. There are several sections of the wall displayed out side the new underground station.

The tour took us passed all of the major landmarks and we jumped of to get a closer look at Checkpoint Charlie where there are more sections of the wall on display along with information and actors dressing up as US Soldiers for the tourists to get there pictures with outside the checkpoint box. We also got off at the Brandenburg Gate which Sue and I revisited early the next morning before the crowds appeared when we went walking in the park and visited the very moving Jewish Memorial.

Berlin is still undergoing a lot of change with roads dug up and cranes littering the skyline and it has a very vibrant cultural community with high brow classical events alongside underground raves, gay clubs, burlesque clubs, music, dance and theatre of all sorts to choose from. Feeling too old to go to a night club and not feeling intellectual enough for theatre I found us a place that I thought might suit us better. We went out dancing the night away at Clarchens Ballhaus with Cha Cha Walzer & Co. this was a fabulous rough and ready old dancehall that hosted old school dancing of different types – tonight was the cha-cha and waltzing. The place was really buzzing and surprisingly full of youngsters in groups or as couples watching or joining in with the enthusiastic dancers on the floor. There was a DJ who was playing a variety of music from classics to more contemporary music alternating the beat so that the dancing alternative from waltzes to more free form jive dancing. I had done a little bit of jive dance decades ago so I dragged Sue out for a few spins of the floor. It was a great night and inspired us to think about finding somewhere to do more of this when we get back to the UK.

As we drove off towards Poland we made a couple of detours and found a lovely lakeside village of Altenhof and another one at Penkun.

We crossed the border without any fuss just a sign at the road and different speed limits (they seem to drive faster in Poland – at least the taxi drivers do). Szczecin was a very pleasant surprise to us as we knew next to nothing about the country and city.

We stayed at the lovely Hotel Atrium that was a short walk away from the plac Jasne Blonia, a lovely park with informal and formal gardens spread over many acres including a lake and an impressive open are auditorium.

The visiting wedding party arranged to meet at Café 22 which was at the top of a tower with a view across the city. The café seemed to be set up mainly for deserts and they certainly did some fabulous cakes which we ate and washed down with wine as the sun set.

The wedding was held in the Dukes of Pomeranian Castle, an imposing group of buildings in the old quarter of the town surrounded by a great collection of churches and other structures of grand architecture.

The bridal party arrived in a horse drawn carriage and we were guided into the vaulted hall where the civil ceremony took place. It was a lovely venue and we could participate full as they provided an interpreter for the none-Polish speakers of us.

The party afterwards was held at an allotment, which sounded strange until we got there and found the these allotments were more like a collection of holiday homes in fabulous gardens (some even had satellite dishes on the top). In the middle of these allotments was a lovely hall that faced out onto a green and it was here that the party began.

At the table were soft drinks, bottles of wine and bottles of vodka. There were a few speeches and some toasts made with the vodka and then the food came out, masses of lovely colourful and delicious food. We thought we had come to the end of a sweet dish, but it was merely a pause as more savoury dishes followed on all through the night.

Dancing started formally with the bride and groom performing a piece they had learned and then it went on into full on party mode with more dancing and more vodka. Knowing we were leaving the next day to return home we were kind of glad not have to repeat this on the second evening of celebration. There was perhaps a little too much vodka for some of us and we left by midnight not staying t witness the conclusion at 4am.

On our drive back to the airport in Germany we had a short break at an old walled town called Templin where we had an ice cream in a small man made beach next to the town hall.