A Few Days in Berlin...

For a great personal guide try "The Berlin Experts". He can tailor your tour to match your personal interests.
http://theberlinexpert.com/

If you don't want a private tour, try Insider Tours who offer daily tours at a good price with professional guides. http://www.insidertour.com/

Thank you Ms. Jo

I will check out these resources.

Any thoughts on hotels in the Tempelhof-Schöneberg borough?

Mark

Not really familiar with this area to tell you the truth, but am sure someone else will contribute information.
Since public transportation is excellent and I am usually there in the summer and want AC, I stay in the budget chain, Motel One. They have multiple locations, but I find the one near the Hauptbahnhof suitable for my sightseeing needs.

I went to Berlin for 6 nights last year. Sorry I can't help with hotels, as I stayed in an apartment 20 minutes walk from Tempelhof.

I didn't feel the need for a guide, as most of the "essentials" are easily covered at your own pace. However, I did start the trip with a "free" walking tour for 2.5 hours (tip suggestion is €15 pp), which was excellent.

I booked a tour of the old airport direct. The other museums are easily covered yourself at your own pace - most have organised talks that can be joined.

Forgive my lack of logic, but why would someone go on a "free" 2.5 hour tour where the "suggested" tip is 15€, when a professionally guided, 4-hour tour is only 14€, or 12€ if you are a senior or student and even cheaper if you buy it ahead of time. How is that a good idea?

You won't find much about hotels in that area in tourist guides because it's relatively remote from the centre, although there are easy public transport links. Looking on line there's meant to be a Mercure nearby, which is a decent chain choice. Alternatively there's Riehmer's Hofgarten, which is a famous old Berlin hotel about a kilometre away.

A very good resource: https://www.visitberlin.de/en

Hi,

The place that RS recommends is in Charlottenburg, "Pension Peters" at the corner of Kantstraße and Savignyplatz. No , I don't stay there, never have, since there are numerous small hotels and Pensionen in the Savignyplatz area and adjacent to it.

I'll be back in Berlin in May. On what to recommend in Schöneberg, I can't help there. One of the traditional Berlin songs connects Schöneberg with the month of May. The first line goes, "Das war in Schöneberg im Monat Mai."

The "more famous sites" in Berlin are cultural, political, historical (not only WW2 sites but also those pertaining to Prussian history), Which ones are you mainly after?

For expert English speaking guides, I can recommend Bernd Lucht and his team. I have worked with them for several years. Ask for guides Vivienne, Christabel or Bernd himself, you won't be disappointed.
Email: info@tourismus-service-lucht.de

As you were stationed in Berlin, you might enjoy this museum:
http://www.alliiertenmuseum.de/en/home.html
Enjoy Berlin!

Thank you EVERYONE!
These are amazing resources. I cannot wait to return some 30 years hence!

Hi,

Some time between 1971 and 1973 the role of Tempelhof changed, ie no more civilian air flights.

As a college backpacker my first trip to Europe/Germany was in the summer of 1971. As such (west) Berlin was most definitely on the itinerary, and since I didn't want to be hassled by the Vopos when taking a train through East Germany to reach Berlin, I flew instead using the Hannover-Berlin corridor. (That was also the cheapest corridor) That flight in 1971 landed at Tempelhof.

Two years later in the summer of 1973, I was fortunate to take the 2nd trip to Europe/Germany. Again, I flew Hannover to Berlin but this time it was no longer Tempelhof but Tegel as the landing site. For the rest of the cold war years, including 1989, I never landed at Tempelhof again, always Tegel.

Make sure your hotel has convenient mass transit. Berlin is a very large city with widely separated major attractions. While I understand your interest in Tempelhof, I would suggest staying closer to something you know will sustain your interest, like (just to name examples - Museum Island, Zoo and shopping area, Bundestag/Brandenberg, opera houses.) With only three nights, you don't want to spend 1/2 hour on the train to get to your first visit, or to a scenic (municipal, not HO-HO) bus ride. I would add that it can be fiercely HOT in August. We gave up a prepaid cheap hotel night in Mitte because we saw that the window faced a trolley train curve ("screeeeeech") and managed to get into a nearly full, air-conditioned luxury hotel to escape the heat.