Kreuzberg - Luisenstadt canal and surroundings

My walk today, together with reiselustig, took us across Kreuzberg from the Spree along the Luisenstädtischer Canal to the Landwehrkanal at the level of the Urbanhafen, continuing over the Admiral Bridge, further over Grimmstraße, Fontanepromenade to Südstern and then along Bergmannstraße to Mehringdamm.

(unfortunately, certain routes cannot be tracked well on foot in Maps - but now the map shows roughly our path...)

For me a familiar route, as it corresponds roughly to my commute, which I try to cover on foot 2 times a week via various routes. However, in the middle of Berlin one can hardly imagine a more beautiful commute, which is almost completely through green areas and/or beautiful buildings...

The Luisenstädtischer Canal was built in the second half of the 19th century as a connection between the Spree and the Landwehrkanal / Urbanhafen. In between was the Engelbecken with a small inland port. The Engelbecken is still filled with water today, the rest of the canal was decommissioned in the 1920s and 1930s and later partly filled with war debris. The entire canal is now a green area, partly interrupted by streets and subway viaducts.

From Köpenicker Straße we walked to the Engelbecken. Here you have a great view of the Michaelkirche, which was unfortunately partially destroyed in the war and is being preserved with the war damage.

By means of old postcards, one can better imagine the history of the canal What I find very peculiar is the vegetation along the canal. During the operational times as well as today. After the greening started, there were no trees. Since the inner city border ran exactly here (east of Engelbecken was Kreuzberg (W) and east of the basin Mitte (O). Therefore, I suspect that the trees were only reforested after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

next you pass a great blue bridge in the canal without function, which is certainly more of a "modern stuff" than old stock.

Then we passed a very interesting building - the Elisabeth-Hof - and explored the courtyard

The Admiral Bridge, or as reiselustig spontaneously renamed it yesterday, the "Kronkorken Bridge", is usually completely crowded on summer evenings. Actually, there's usually 1 or 2 people sitting on every stone, chatting and enjoying their evening. The bridge was empty yesterday - except for the bottle caps stepped into the tar between the cobblestones (which I didn't include...). Last year, one morning, I discovered a whole stack of bicycles fished out of the Landwehrkanal. Yesterday, there was only this one still life at the foot of the Admiral Bridge.