I was lucky enough to finally get to the top of Berlin's TV Tower or 'Fernsehturm' at the start of March this year (2001). When I say top, I mean the viewing platform, which is 203m up the 365m structure.

Having visited Berlin a few times over the past 8 months I had attempted to visit the tower on a few occasions, mainly giving up because of the long queues that can stretch out into Alexanderplatz. Ok, so this wasn't helped by the fact that on one occasion the lifts broke - not exactly confidence inspiring, however the tower was closed for refurbishment for a couple of months afterwards!

Ok, so you probably want to know if it's worth going up for the view - the answer is - definitely! If you have explored the city on foot or on the u-bahn / s-bahn, the view from the tower can help put it all into perspective.

Having, as I said, probably spent about 20 days in the city before I visited the tower I still found it beneficial, even though I know my way around the city anyway.

If you are a first / one time visitor I would recommend you are patient enough to wait for a while, time permitting of course. I think we queued for about 30mins.

On the viewing platform they have a description of what you are seeing out of each of the window sections along with a street plan. It would be a good way of determining what else you would like to visit. On a good day viewing range is reputedly 25 miles.

Weekends be prepared for a long wait, probably better to visit Monday to Friday, also bearing in mind that there may also be people queuing for the 'Tele-cafe' which is situated above the viewing platform.

I didn't bother to visit the cafe mainly because there was a queue and there are lots of reasonable places to eat locally.

Unfortunately I can't remember how much it cost - I think it was about Dm10 per adult - about £3.30, but I'm not sure.

Opening Tim
es:
May - Sept 9am - 1am
Oct - April 10am - midnight

Cafe: 10am - 1am daily

Getting there is easy on the S or U-Bahn. Most lines run through Alexanderplatz Bahnhof (station).