Berlin Diary: Thursday 17 July 2025
Steps done: 12,879
[see here for notes from our trips in June 2023 and May 2024]
There are 1,001 things to do in Berlin and depending on your sources, each one of them is as attractive as the next. You could possibly cover 101 things over a year, but what if you only have 72 hours? Having read a few such articles I found that it would be challenging to follow their leads as the destinations were all over the place. You simply would not cover the suggested sights, as hopping from A to B to C requires more time than that allocated.
This was our third trip to Berlin and the most organised in terms of logic and location. Since we had previously covered all of the major museums, the strategy was to do one major thing each day and then add in things along the way. Our hotel was also next to a major transport hub. Berlin’s metro, bus, tram and train network made things light for our feet.
Taking the RE 8 train from the airport to our hotel
1:45 PM: Check-in to Hotel, Budapester Straße 40, 10787 Berlin
It’s a strange name for a hotel, but this 25 Hours Hotel is located above the Bikini Shopping Mall, hence its name 25 Hours Hotel Bikini Berlin. I did not know what to expect, but was impressed by how well the room functioned in such a small space, through some very clever carving out of areas within the room.
Downsides: dark corridors, very dark lift, no kettle in the room.
Upsides: views of Berlin Zoo and Tiergarten from the room, air-conditioning, excellent staff, personal Schindelhauer bike in some rooms, complimentary wi-fi. Conveniently linked to all of Berlin via Zoologischer Garten S-Bahn and U-Bahn stations. Bus 100 and 200 takes you across town via Tiergarten. Less than 10 minutes’ walk to KaDeWe department store. Einstein Kaffee in the mall opens daily from 8am – midnight so you can always get a drink and a pastry to keep you going.
View of the aviary in Berlin Zoo from the room (top) and a peek into the monkey enclosure from the Bikini shopping mall (below)
2:45 PM: KaDeWe, Tauentzienstraße 21-24, 10789 Berlin
We just made it through the doors of KaDeWe when the the rain came pouring down. What great timing, as we had been wanting to eat the apple strudel at Einstein Kaffee (6th Floor Food) since spotting it two years ago.
This was the only day we would have in KaDeWe so we went to every department, staying in some (food, stationary) longer than others. I am almost certain you would find anything you were looking for here. A small example below is tea leaves and a kettle. Just for teatime you would also find: baking books, teacups and saucers, teaspoons, tablecloth and napkins, ready-made cakes, milk and sugar, cards to invite friends to tea, thank you cards if you were invited to tea, clothes/ shoes/ handbag/ earrings/ make-up to wear for tea, and tea towels etc for washing and drying up afterwards.
6:00 PM: Love Story Of Berlin, Kastanienallee 88, 10435 Berlin
There are a few English-language bookstores in Berlin, should you be staying here long-term. Dussmann das KulturKaufhaus (Friedrichstraße 90, 10117 Berlin) would be a good place to start, but Love Story Of Berlin was conveniently located round the corner from where we were having dinner at otto. If you are visiting Berlin for a few days, this is a good place for local maps and souvenirs.
6:30 PM: Dinner at Otto, Oderberger straße 56, 10435 Berlin
We have eaten at otto each time we visited Berlin, always at the earlier sitting so we can have ice cream afterwards. Due to the rain we had to sit inside this time. The food is very good (all of it), the service is great and being indoors we had the benefit of listening to the music which was very pleasurable: English pop songs from the 1980s including Dire Straits, Brian Ferry, Spandau Ballet made us feel 35 years younger. As for their signature beetroot, I had to make it at home after tasting it two years ago.
For dinner we started with sourdough bread and koji butter, followed by the garden salad, cold chicken, zucchini, seared beef and finally the beetroot.
otto’s menu in July 2025
8:15 PM: Jones Ice Cream, Eberswalder Straße 32, 10437 Berlin
Black Forest (left) and Carrot Cake (right) ice cream
9:00 PM: REWE Supermarket at The Playce (lower ground floor) , Alte Potsdamer Straße 7, 10785 Berlin
I am not really a night owl so would not know where to look for entertainment past 9:00 PM, and I hardly drink alcohol so a bar would be a useless destination for something to do post-dinner. When we were young (really, young, like Primary School age) our parents would bring us to the supermarket after dinner. Mostly we would already be in our pyjamas. But we had a lot of fun in the air-conditioned space as we only had fans in the house then. We were allowed ice cream and whatever snacks were going. So I am totally fond of supermarkets and cannot think of a better activity to end the day.
In the next post we visit the Berlin Biennale and have dinner at another favourite restaurant, REMI.