Arriving in Berlin

It's day four of the fifteen day cruise my sister and I are taking from Vienna to Amsterdam. I've been in Europe for about five days. I arrived at Frankfurt airport last Friday afternoon where I wasted no time getting ripped off. I'll just say this: "duty-free != cheaper". Other than that, Frankfurt airport was very nice. Each gate has a bathroom and a complimentary tea/coffee and newspaper station. It’s too bad they can’t do that type of thing in the US. Pretty soon they’ll be charging us for peanuts. From there I flew about an hour and a half to Berlin. I ended up taking the bus from Berlin's Tegel airport into town. It was an adventure -- very crowded and I had no idea where I was going or when I was getting off. It reminded me of the bus ride to meet Peter in Rome from the central station with all my luggage. I was able to get my bearings thanks to some Americans waving around a map. (Their southern accents gave them away.) The only advice the bus driver offered was "Watch the numbers". Turns out they number one side of the street completely differently from the other side (i.e. one side was in the hundreds while the other was in double digits.) While I didn't overshoot my destination, I think I could have stayed on for one more stop. I only had to walk a few blocks to the hotel and it was a beautiful sunny afternoon.