5 free things: In Berlin, the Cold War’s legacy

BERLIN » In January 1989, then-East German leader Erich Honecker declared that the Berlin Wall could stand for another century. Less than 10 months later the border was open, and soon Berliners were in a hurry to tear down the 96-mile barrier. However, there’s still plenty to see of the Cold War past as Berlin marks the 25th anniversary of the Wall’s fall. Many of the historical sites are free, though you’ll need to take advantage of Berlin’s efficient and inexpensive transport network — or rent a bike — to get around a city that still lacks a single center and whose sights are widely spread.

Where the wall still stands

The Wall’s longest surviving stretch is the East Side Gallery, stretching for 1.3 kilometers (more than a quarter mile) along the Spree river. Artists covered it in colorful murals after the border opened, adorning it with images such as a boxy East German Trabant car that appears to burst through the wall and a fraternal communist kiss between Honecker and Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev. They repainted the murals in 2009.

At the Berlin Wall Memorial on Bernauer Strasse, a stretch of the barrier stands at the end of a nearly one-mile section of the former border strip, which gives a good impression of how deep a scar the Wall cut through the city. An open-air exhibition is spread along the strip, while an indoor museum will reopen after renovation on the Nov. 9 anniversary of the Wall’s fall. The viewing platform above offers a panorama of the site and downtown

Berlin.

Layers of history

A third remaining stretch of the Wall runs along the edge of the Topography of Terror memorial site, which includes the ruins of buildings where the Gestapo secret police, the SS and the Reich Security Main Office ran Adolf Hitler’s police state from 1933 to 1945.

A few small Wall fragments survive at other sites, as do a handful of the 302 watch towers that once dotted the border’s so-called “death strip.”

Where spies were swapped

The Glienicke Bridge, on Berlin’s forested southwestern edge, was the setting for a few of the Cold War’s most spectacular spy swaps. In 1962, U.S. spy-plane pilot Francis Gary Powers was exchanged there for a Soviet spy known as Rudolf Abel. In 1986, prominent Soviet dissident Anatoly Shcharansky walked across the bridge to freedom and later, as Natan Sharansky, to start a new life as an Israeli politician. The border was in the middle of the bridge, still painted different shades of green on the two sides of the divide.

The scenically located bridge spans the channel between two lakes. From the bridge, you can walk or cycle along the Berlin Wall Trail, which largely follows the course of the Wall for 160 kilometers (100 miles) around the former West Berlin. Follow the gray-and-white signs marked “Berliner Mauerweg.”

Western and eastern allies

The Allied Museum, in the western Dahlem district, focuses on the history of the Western allies’ role in Berlin from 1945 until their last troops withdrew in 1994. West Berlin was made up of the post-World War II American, British and French sectors. Its status as a capitalist exclave deep inside the Soviet occupation zone was secured by the 1948-1949 Berlin Airlift. The original Checkpoint Charlie border guardhouse from the time of the Wall’s fall, from the famous crossing in downtown Berlin, stands outside the museum.

Across town in the Karlshorst district, the recently renovated German-Russian Museum concentrates on the history and consequences of Nazi Germany’s war against the Soviet Union, which started in 1941 and ended with the Red Army taking Berlin in 1945. The building includes the room where Germany’s surrender was signed on May 8, 1945.