Weird and wunderbar: Top 10 unusual tours in Berlin

Or the US sector in a Mustang: For those whose leanings are more towards Americana than Soviet kitsch, the same company offers the option to travel around the former American quarter of Berlin behind the wheel of a classic Ford Mustang. The commentary is interspersed with recordings of Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the USA and JFK’s spine-­tingling “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech. The spot where he unleashed it – the Schöneberg Town Hall – is one of the stops on the route. Others include the houses where Marlene Dietrich and David Bowie lived and the Tempelhof Airport, the hub of 1948’s Berlin Airlift. Courtesy East Car Tours GmbH & Co. KG

Underground at Tempelhof: When West Berlin was cut off by land in 1948, the Allies flew everything in, with planes landing roughly every two minutes at Tempelhof. Designed during the Nazi regime and finally ceasing aviation operations in 2008, the airport is a staggering piece of architectural monumentalism, with one gigantic building spreading more than a kilometre. The tours of the airport take in the enormous quarter-circular apron that planes would shelter under, before going down to the tunnels that were initially designed for transporting cargo, but became a forced labour camp during the Second World War. It’s the network of bunkers inside the basement levels that are truly eerie, however. One looks like something from a horror film, with the blackened walls reportedly the result of a fire caused by Russian soldiers using explosives to open a room full of highly flammable ­celluloid. Sean Gallup / Getty Images

Delve into Kreuzberg: Kreuzberg is arguably the most fascinating district of Berlin – it’s the birthplace of the city’s punk-rock and squatting scenes and has a high immigrant population. Vive Berlin’s walking tour does a marvellous job of fitting the stories together. It starts off following a park in the path of the Wall, and reveals how the building of the Wall led to the influx of Turks to West Berlin. West German companies had relied on the flood of labour fleeing the East. When that dried up overnight, foreign labourers from Turkey were brought in to ease the chronic workforce shortage. Kreuzberg became the main area where the immigrants lived, as rents were cheap. Artists and musicians followed for similar reasons, and squatters took over the handsome old buildings that were earmarked for demolition during the planned construction of a major motorway. The tour finishes at an old hospital building that, in a neat bit of symmetry, is home to both Berlin’s first major squat and its newest one. Street art lines the sides of the latter. Sean Gallup / Getty Images

Flit between feasts on a bike: Fat Tire’s evening outing is essentially a three-course meal spread over a few hours and interspersed with Berlin knowledge. The route follows Bernauer Strasse, which is the best place in Berlin to get an idea of what the Berlin Wall was actually like. You can see how there was not one wall, but two, with what was known as the Death Strip down the middle. The guide tells tales of how the city was divided overnight and the desperation that led people to risk their lives trying to get out of East Germany. But the tour offers only a light dose of the past – it’s really about going at a relaxed pace and chatting in the three chosen pit stops. These take in impeccable falafel, German-style tapas and a gorgeously decorated cafe that serves up world-class cakes. In theory, the cycling should shift some calories, but Berlin’s basically flat, so it’s not exactly strenuous pedalling. Courtesy: Fat Tire Bike Tours

Tunnel under the city: If Tempelhof’s subterranean chills have given you a taste for underground exploration, then Berliner Unterwelten’s tours dive through the city’s U-Bahn underground-railway network to find the nuclear fallout shelters from the Cold War. The people of Berlin lived in fear that their city would be where tensions would come to an apocalyptic head, and all were drilled in what to do in the event of a nuclear attack. The Pankstrasse station was designed to be a giant bunker – it could be completely sealed up in the event of an emergency – and behind secret doors are the grim, sweaty dormitory rooms where those who dodged the bombs would be expected to sleep. Courtesy Berliner Unterwelten e.V.

Get weird after sundown: Alternative Berlin Tours also runs a special after-dark jaunt around the city, and it’s considerably more edgy than your average walking tour. The places visited are different each time, but show off the city’s weird and wonderful subcultures. That might mean a walk-through an art installation of dancing mechanical monsters or a club for computer hackers – but usually involves a nerve-shredding taste of “urban exploration” through an abandoned tower block. Courtesy Alternative Berlin

Try your hand at street art: Berlin’s street-art scene is one of the best in the world, and the guys with the spray cans play a major part in the city’s hip cachet. Alternative Berlin Tours runs half-day jaunts that run through the history of street art in Berlin, explaining that it’s been able to thrive because of public resistance to CCTV cameras, and showing off some of the best stencils and murals in the Friedrichshain area. The old rail yards near Warschauer Strasse Station are particularly rich. After the walking tour, it’s back to HQ to learn how it’s done. Everyone gets spray cans, templates for stencils and the chance to unleash their inner Banksy on canvas. Courtesy Alternative Berlin

Canoe along the Wall’s path: The boundary between East and West Germany wasn’t just on land. The Landwehrkanal branches off the river Spree, dividing the western district of Kreuzberg and the eastern district of Treptow. These days, the parks along the banks are idyllic. Between 1961 and 1989 it was less so – if you tried entering by canoe then, you’d get shot. The Wall was along the eastern bank, but the water technically belonged to the East, too. It was only once on the western bank that potential escapees were safe. Paddling along, Backstage Tourism’s guide tells the tragic story of two children who swam for the western shore. They were shot by guards in the towers who, in the darkness, had no way of knowing how old the victims were. The canoe tour initially follows the Spree, and there’s nowhere better for seeing Berlin’s frenetic pace of change. Luxury apartments and swanky media-company offices now line the banks where it was once just wasteland. Courtesy Backstagetourism

Home hopping: Berlin’s 21st-century appeal is based largely on the people who live there. Open Doors Berlin gives visitors the chance to meet the locals who have laid the foundations for the city’s attitude. The idea is pretty simple – you’re given three addresses around the city and you go to visit the people who live in them. Chatting over coffee and a cake in Berliners’ homes, it’s an opportunity to hear some extraordinary stories. They include a woman who has spent her life bringing her mother’s communist-era artwork to the wider world and a musician who recorded tracks devoted to East Berlin escapees who tunnelled under the Wall. Courtesy Opendoorsberlin

The hand of history has conspired to make Berlin a genuinely extraordinary city. From the end of the Second World War to 1989, it was divided between the East and West; capitalism and communism. For 28 years, the Berlin Wall provided the world’s most visible symbol of that divide. In November, it’s the 25th anniversary of the Wall coming down – and the post-unification German capital is an edgy hotbed of creative energy. Artists, DJs and tech start-ups have flocked in from around the world to bask in and drive Berlin’s unmistakable cool.

For visitors, that dedication to innovation manifests itself in some rather unusual tours and experiences – and here are 10 of the most fascinatingly enjoyable.

More information:

Home-hopping

• From €36 (Dh171), Open Doors Berlin (www.opendoorsberlin.de; 0049 176 8401 8100).

Flit between feasts on a bike

• €49 (Dh233), Fat Tire (berlin.fattirebiketours.com; 0049 30 2404 7991).

Drive the Wall in a Trabant

• From €79 (Dh376), Trabi Safari (www.trabi-safari.de; 0049 34 9226 6507).

Or the US sector in a Mustang

• From €34 (Dh162) for the longer, two-hour tour, Mustang Safari (www.mustang-safari.de; 0049 34 9226 6507).

Underground at Tempelhof

• €13 (Dh62), Tempelhofer Freiheit (www.tempelhoferfreiheit.de; 0049 302 0003 7441)

Tunnel under the city

• From €10 (Dh48), Berliner Unterwelten (www.berliner-unterwelten.de; 0049 30 4991 0517).

Canoe along the Wall’s path

• €25 (Dh119) for the three- to four-hour Walk on Water tour, Backstage Tourism (www.backstagetourism.com; 0049 30 5321 5742).

Delve into Kreuzberg

• From €64 (Dh304) for the three-and-a-half hour private Bohemian tour of Kreuzberg, Vive Berlin (www.viveberlin.de; 0049 157 8454 6696).

Try your hand at street art

• €15 (Dh71), Alternative Berlin Tours (www.alternativeberlin.com; 0049 16 2819 8264).

Get weird after sundown

• €20 (Dh95), Alternative Berlin Tours (www.alternativeberlin.com; 0049 16 2819 8264).

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