Night five was the first, last and only night in Berlin where i successfully explored anything. Originally, Jobo, Freakingpolle and me had planned to do this already a night earlier, but that hadn't worked out. Now, Ijsbeer joined us and we were driving into the City of Berlin. The background music for the trip was, as far as i know, the latest album from Rammstein (which i don't really like all that much).

Skyline of Berlin at night

Our parking lot was somewhere at the end of a long road halfway into a forest. The first thing Ijsbeer noted after we all got out of the car was that it was very cold. From my point of view however, it was neither cold, nor was she happy to see us. But it was very dark, so i couldn't really see all that much. I got out my flashlight, which led to the second observation of the evening: I have a very small flashlight. Okay... maybe it was indeed very cold. Nonetheless, as soon as i turned my flashlight on, everybody seemed impressed by it's power. Jobo had the biggest flashlight, although it was not as bright as mine. Freakingpolle could attach his flashlight to his forehead which i guess is handy for the cunning linguist when he sticks his nose into things, like books or whatever.

Long and hard structure with a glowing red head penetrating the night sky

We walked through the darkness up a little hill, all with our flashlights in our hands. Except Ijsbeer, who didn't have a flashlight. Which was perfectly OK, because like most people i don't really like girls with flashlights. A nice pair of round spotlights is more my thing. But i digress. Step by step we followed our path. I started feeling warmer and warmer and i could hear the breathing of us all getting heavier. Probably we were not used to doing this at such a pace. Especially not while wearing heavy camera backpacks. Still, we managed to reach the climax simultaneously.

Funkturm (foreground) and Fernsehturm (background)

A way through the fence was quickly found and the buildings were also easy to enter. Our destination however was the rooftop. We ascended the first stairway and then had to look for the next one. That turned out to be not all that easy because we were already high enough for any light to be visible from far away. We spotted a door that looked promising and Freakingpolle tried it since he had already been here before, although during daylight. Behind the door was nothing except a 20m drop. Wrong Entrance. Happens to the best i guess.

Big Balls

As soon as we reached the roof, we were immediately standing between a magnificent view over Berlin and some skeletons of huge balls. One upon a time, during the cold war, these were radomes which protected the gear that the NSA used to spy on East Berlin (and yes, i know that they are probably not made of steel, thank you). It was like heaven, but more down to earth. Since our cameras were already turned on very much, we only had to spread the legs of our tripods and start shooting. However, the weather started to become a problem again. After it really sucked on day 1 and 2 of the trip, mother nature was now blowing very hard. That was probably part of the reason why the rest of the group finished early.

Glowing Lights. 5 minutes exposure.

I was wearing all kinds of protection, so i stayed up longer and took some more shots. In fact i could have continued for the entire night. But well, you always have to stop when it's the most fun. We were all a bit exhausted and the batteries of our flashlights were getting empty because of all the dark holes we had to illuminate.
Largely satisfied, we drove back to the hotel, while listening to Rammstein again. Next time, i'll bring along my "The very worst of Scooter" compilation.

I did not take more than the 5 photos in this post, but these can also be found in the Gallery:
NSA Teufelsberg