My last day in Berlin called for rain. Since I’d been to the city before, about six years ago, I’d already done a lot of the indoor tourist sights like museums and the Reichstag building. But as I browsed through the results of my Google search — “things to do in berlin indoors” — one particular thing caught my eye. “Berliner Unterwelten,” or Berlin underground bunker tours.
All of the reviews were positive, so I thought I’d give it a shot.
Their website listed all the tours available, but they can’t be booked online. They can only be booked the same day, in person. So in the morning, I made the trek out to Gesundbrunnen Bahnhof to wait in line — almost half a block long — for a ticket. (Pro tip: when you get closer to the entrance, there’s a screen stating which tours are still available for that day and how many tickets are left. When you arrive, you can check out that screen before deciding if you want to stay.)
Tours are offered in several languages throughout the day, mostly in German, English, French, and Spanish, though there are a few other languages as well. When I arrived around noon, there were still plenty of tickets for all different tours and all different languages. I booked my ticket for the 15:30 English “Tour M, Under the Berlin Wall.” This was the most expensive tour by a euro or two, and it also was scheduled to last two hours, which is 30 minutes longer than the other tours. If you have a student ID, the price is slightly reduced!
When I bought the ticket, the ticket agent told me to come back and we’d meet at the U-Bahn station directly next door to their office. So I left for the afternoon — I decided to spend some time learning more about the history of the Berlin Wall before my tour — and came back around 3:20.
I went to the Berlin Wall Memorial at Bernauer Strasse, which isn’t too far from the Underground Tours office.
It seemed that a French tour was departing at the same time as us, so there was a bit of confusion as we determined who needed to be with which tour group. But soon, we had our group of about 30 for the English tour, and we departed down the steps into Berlin’s Underworld.
Our tour guide was a German guy named Jannes, and he — just like most Germans — spoke perfect English. The tour started with some history, as we sat and Jannes showed us a map and talked about what life was like when the Berlin Wall stood. The maps were one of my favorite things about the tour. There were maps of how the city was divided, and even one that showed all the tunnels that were built (or attempted) under the wall.
We learned a lot interesting stories about the escapes which really helped bring history to life. For example, West Berlin students dug one tunnel that started in Pankow Cemetery, behind a specific gravestone. 20+ people were able to escape through this tunnel, until a mother escaping with her young child left a baby carriage behind, alerting authorities to the tunnels’ existence. Others escaped via sewers, and a couple of lucky volunteers from our group got to do a little roleplay – but I won’t spoil the secret.
Another thing I loved about the tour was the international audience. Though it was in English, there was only one other American; the other nationalities I remember were Canadian, Australian, Scottish, Irish, English, German, Spanish, Finnish, Norwegian, Italian, and Indian. It was so cool to think about how this group had come together to learn about such a specific piece of history, sharing the experience in one language.
The majority of the tour was underground. The tunnels we used were close to the subway, and originally these tunnels had been built by the Nazis as fallout shelters. Throughout the tour, Jannes reminded us not to lean on the walls: the neon paint guiding the way was original from the 1940s. If you have claustrophobia or feel sick when breathing kind of “damp” air, you may not want to do this tour. However, there was another tour group associate that went along with us, so she was available to help anyone who needed to get to an exit if needed.
Near the end, we took the U-Bahn over to the memorial at Bernauer Strasse to finish the tour, and this quick ride on the subway was covered by our admission ticket. Just keep in mind that the tour finishes in a different place than where it started. Also, they told us that starting this month, the tour finishes somewhere new, somewhere more authentic than before. I wasn’t able to experience it, so you’ll have to do it and let me know how it is!
Overall, this was the perfect rainy-day activity. Being underground kept me dry, and I loved learning so much in-depth information about a topic I didn’t know much about before. They offer lots of other tours, and I wouldn’t hesitate to do another one next time I’m back in Berlin. I definitely recommend it to any history fans visiting the city.
Have you ever done a strange or unusual tour? How was it? Let me know in the comments!
-Cathy
Originally Published on April 14, 2019.
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