Checkpoint Charlie

Checkpoint Charlie is the name everyone knows, and it is worth seeing as long as you know what you are looking at. From 1961 to 1990 this point on Friedrichstrasse was the crossing between the American sector of West Berlin and East Berlin used by the Allied forces, foreign diplomats and foreign tourists; the name comes from the NATO phonetic alphabet, as it was the third Allied checkpoint after Alpha at Helmstedt and Bravo at Dreilinden. It became the stage for some of the most dramatic moments of the Cold War. In October 1961, only weeks after the Wall went up, a dispute over Allied access escalated until American and Soviet tanks faced each other here with live ammunition, a standoff that brought the superpowers closer to open conflict than almost any other moment in Berlin. It was also the scene of escape attempts, both successful and fatal. Today, the original buildings have gone, and the site is a modest, busy junction. What you will find is a recreated checkpoint hut with sandbags and a flag, modelled on the original and very popular for photographs; a large light-box installation by the artist Frank Thiel showing portraits of an American and a Soviet soldier; a commemorative plaque; and a free open-air exhibition at the corner of Schuetzenstrasse and Zimmerstrasse telling the stories of escapes across the border. Around it, the corner is thick with souvenir stalls and paid attractions, including the long-running private Wall Museum at Haus am Checkpoint Charlie and Yadegar Asisi's panorama of the Wall. A free augmented-reality app, Cold War Berlin, lets you see a 3D model of the crossing as it was, with historical photos, films and radio reports, which brings the empty junction back to life.

How to plan your visit: the site is outdoors and free, so you can visit at any time, but it is at its quietest early in the morning or in the evening, when the photo queues at the guard hut have gone. Kochstrasse and Stadtmitte U-Bahn stations are each a few minutes away. Allow twenty minutes for the junction and the open-air exhibition, longer if you visit one of the paid attractions nearby. Be aware that the people in uniform at the hut are not real soldiers, and taking photos with them usually costs money.

Getting the most from it: download the Cold War Berlin app before you go and use it on the spot to see the crossing as it looked; read the open-air exhibition on the escapes, which is the most informative thing on the corner; and look for the double row of cobblestones set into the road that marks the line of the Wall nearby. Then decide whether you want more. The Wall Museum is cluttered and old-fashioned but full of extraordinary escape devices and stories; the Asisi panorama gives a vivid sense of everyday life beside the Wall. If you want to understand the border more deeply, the Berlin Wall Memorial on Bernauer Strasse is the essential visit, and the Palace of Tears exhibition at Friedrichstrasse station tells the story of border crossings within the city very well.

Who it suits and what to pair it with: first-time visitors who want to see one of the great names of the Cold War, history buffs who pair it with deeper sites, and families who will enjoy the photo stop and the escape stories. It sits on a natural history route: walk a few minutes west to the Topography of Terror, south to the Jewish Museum Berlin in Kreuzberg, or north along Friedrichstrasse to Unter den Linden and the Brandenburg Gate, and save a separate visit for the Berlin Wall Memorial and the East Side Gallery.