Park Sanssouci

My first time in Potsdam and the Sanssouci Palace. WOW - so lovely! 6 hours and a few hundred digital pics blew by so fast I could barely believe it.  There are so many beautiful plants, buildings, statues - gorgeous all around!

I visited the grave of the Old Fritz in this lovely Park of Sanssouci. Once the Prussian King issued his last will to be buried in the park next to the graves of his dogs. But his successor refused after his death to do so. It appeared to be inacceptable to bury a Prussian King adjacent to his dogs. His last will was disregarded and the Old Fritz was buried in the Garnisonskirche Potsdam. During World War II Adolf Hitler started to worry about the Old Fritz. He arranged his transfer to the castle Hohenzollern in Hechingen in southern Germany. There he was resting during the cold war in the castle’s chapel. At those times it was not acceptable of course to extradite the Old Fritz to the German Democratic Republic. After the reunion, however, cancellor Kohl resumed the pending issue and arranged that the Old Fritz was now finally buried next to his dogs in the Park of Sanssouci according to his last will. People are there laying potatoes on his grave, because the Old Fritz earned also merits on the potatoe.

The park surrounding Sanssouci is quite breathtaking, the vast gardens and woodlands are a great place to escape to from the busy Berlin city life. Give yourself a few hours to enjoy them fully while you walk around the buildings contained within.

Unlike the Schloss which you have to pay to go into, entrance to the park is free. Bikes are prohibited in the park, although I did see quite a few people flouting this in the areas away from the shloss.