Dreilinden Hug on Flickr.
Today I hug the Raststätte Dreilinden. Back when Germany was still divided, if you wanted to drive between West Berlin and West Germany, chances are you passed through what the Americans called “Checkpoint Bravo,” and what everybody else called Drewitz-Dreilinden. It was the border crossing which marked the shortest land transit distance between Western Allied occupation zones through the Soviet occupation zone. After 160km (100 miles) of harrowing travel - where stopping for any reason was severely frowned upon by East German police -and long lines to get through East German border control, the Raststätte Dreilinden in Zehlendorf was the first opportunity in West Berlin to refuel your car or to use the toilet. The border crossing is long gone, but the remains of the rest stop still stand along the A115 Autobahn to remind drivers of how hard it used to be to simply gas up the car and take a leak after a long road trip through hell.