Day 3 - Berlin

Berlin Day 3
I am writing this from on a boat. It's 12:30 and our tour leaves in 15 minutes. We have beer and sparkling white wine sitting in front of us, and it is a gloriously sunny, albeit a touch cool day.
We had a late start this morning. No alarm set so it was 10:30 by the time we finished breakfast. We left with the plan to visit the museums of Museuminsel. We walked to our destination only to discover that all but 1 of the museums are closed on Mondays. So we called an audible and decided to take the Spree River cruise instead. We walked in what we thought was the right direction, but we ended up walking in a complete circle around the island to find our cruise that was leaving from where were standing 30 minutes prior. So here we are. A bus load of middle aged passengers just descended on our boat, so this will be an interesting ride.
OK, the boat tour was nice. We wanted to do less walking today, so we took the train to the West side of Berlin in what seemed to be the heart of the business center. We had a roadside currywurst, which was strange and good, then walked to Kaiser Wilhelm's Memorial Church (also known as Kaiser Wilhelm's broken tooth). This is a magnificent church that was all but flattened during WWII, only the tower remains. The mosaics inside were incredible but the visit overall was quite underwhelming. The outside of the tower was surrounded by scaffolding, as they are restoring the building. Only the broken tower peak was visible.
In the fashion of the day, we ended up walking in a large victory lap  (aka circle because we were lost) trying to find our way to the Tiergarten. Finally found it, and the stretch we started on paralleled the zoo, so we saw emus and ostriches, gazelle, wombats and a few other creatures. There were naked sunbathers in the garten. Berlin has a "free body culture" so people just hang out naked. It's pretty admirable.
The walk through the Tiergarten was beautiful; it's like Berlin's Central Park. Lakes and streams, bike paths and walking trails, lots of trees and also open green spaces. We were so tired of walking, though, but we missed our chance to rent a bike from the DB bike rental vending machines. Yes, that's right. They have solar powered bike rental vending machines. Pay a few euros and you get a bike. Ride it around a bit and deposit it at another vending station. Pretty awesome! And Berlin is flat, so biking ain't tough. But the traffic "laws" (or lack-thereof) would probably get us killed. Oh how we wanted a bike the last half of the day. But alas we walked our way to Potsdamerplats and found the Panoramapunkt, which is a building that, on the 24th floor has a viewing deck to get a 360° view of Berlin. There was city as far as you could see. I couldn't help but wonder if Berlin isn't just a lot of cities and suburbs strung together. I couldn't see any break in the building-dotted skyline.
Afterward we stopped for a cappuccino and baked treat, which was just enough energy to help us navigate (walk in circles) through the DB station to get our trains back "home." We stopped in a Bio Market for wine and chocolate and are having that as a pre-dinner snack and muscle relaxer, as we're both feeling pretty beat.
We had dinner at a traditional Berliner pub for dinner. Beers and "Berliner Platte fur zwei." Included currywurst, meatballs, gherkins, prosciutto, brie, and salat (lettuce, tomato and cucumber all spread neatly across the plate). Served with a side of bread and olive oil & balsamic vinegar. More than enough food for us hungry travelers. Had a few strange brews then headed in for the night. Finishing our Riesling and chocolate before bedtime. Tomorrow; Museuminsel take 2.