Swimming – Difficult Berlin, spectacle in Hamburg

Why Deutsche Bahn turned my trip to Hamburg into an adventure became clear to me in the evening when I boarded the ferry to Finkenwerder at the landing stages. In the direction of travel, the sun set behind ships, cranes and the Elbe. Looking back, the moon rose over the Elbphilharmonie in the evening light, and the seagulls above us.

Berlin, an October Tuesday. The train was booked at half past two from the main station. The delay of 150 minutes announced via the app at lunchtime (“repair to the overhead line”) meant that I had to buy the last Flixbus ticket for 2:15 p.m. from Alt-Tegel. Sprint to the subway, then take the bus from Kurt-Schumacher-Platz to the destination. I wait for the delayed Flixbus, check the DB app and find out that my original train has been replaced. I’m thinking about racing from Alt-Tegel to Spandau – and staying. The bus comes, everything is fine. Half an hour later than planned, I stood on the ship in the sunset spectacle and quietly thanked him.

Hundreds of crows met above the Finkenwerder for an evening chat, my friends served me pumpkin cream soup and a place to sleep on the sofa, raved about cooperative living and Go swimming with a view of the Elbeat night the petroleum port squeaked into my dreams.

Wednesday. The morning ferry has sunrise and Icelandic wind ready, I’m alone on deck. Climb jetties, ride the subway, drink coffee at the Niendorfer Markt. In a fancy auditorium, I tell young people about the fall 35 years ago, when I was accused of trying to escape in prison sat. A student asks: “Couldn’t you perhaps have still been happy if the GDR had continued?” I have to think and come to the conclusion that in that case I would probably no longer exist. My friends and I were already on lists of undesirables for whom re-education camps were planned. In any case, I wouldn’t be sitting in front of them today and not in an hour later einem Solebad Drift with spherical sounds under a cozy wooden sky.

The Kaifu-Bad on Kaiser-Friedrich-Ufer is the oldest swimming pool in Hamburg and, like five others in the city, has one Outdoor swimming pool usable all year round with water at 25 degrees. Between coconut pumpkin cream soup and the Himalayan stone sauna, I try the fast swimming lane outside. A handful of exercisers work their way through the metal pool, while just as many take their time under the golden autumn light. Inside, it’s warmer swimming between strips of blue tiles and skylights. The old hall is magically designed, mosaics run through the entire pool, which in the summer has to be gigantic with its open spaces: two halls, several saunas, several laps – and on Tuesdays you can swim topless here.

The ICE leaves on time, I see a flock of jackdaws in Salzwedel, the Elbe again in the last sunlight and the full moon as far as Spandau. We land at Berlin Central Station four minutes early.