Must-see attractions in Germany
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Gedenkstätte und Museum Sachsenhausen
Around Berlin
About 35km north of Berlin, Sachsenhausen was built by prisoners and opened in 1936 as a prototype for other camps. By 1945, some 200,000 people had…
Bavaria
Officially called the KZ-Gedenkstätte Dachau, this was the Nazis’ first concentration camp, built by Heinrich Himmler in March 1933 to house political…
Munich
This commanding palace and its lavish gardens sprawl around 5km northwest of the Altstadt. Begun in 1664 as a villa for Electress Adelaide of Savoy, the…
Munich
Home to Bavaria's Wittelsbach rulers from 1508 until WWI, the Residenz is Munich's number-one attraction. The amazing treasures, as well as all the…
Munich
Installed for the city's 850th birthday (2008), the Münchner Stadtmuseum's Typisch München (Typically Munich) exhibition – taking up the whole of a…
City West & Charlottenburg
Charlottenburg Palace is one of Berlin's few sites that still reflect the one-time grandeur of the Hohenzollern clan, which ruled the region from 1415 to…
Cologne
Cologne’s geographical and spiritual heart – and its single-biggest tourist draw – is the magnificent Kölner Dom. With its soaring twin spires, this is…
Cologne & Northern Rhineland
Serenely tucked within beautiful Eifel countryside, Abteikirche Maria Laach is one of the finest examples of a Romanesque church in Germany. Part of a 900…
Aachen
It’s impossible to overestimate the significance of Aachen’s magnificent cathedral. The burial place of Charlemagne, it’s where more than 30 German kings…
Würzburg
The vast Unesco-listed Residenz, built by 18th-century architect Balthasar Neumann as the home of the local prince-bishops, is one of Germany’s most…
Bavarian Alps
A pocket-sized trove of weird treasures, Schloss Linderhof was Ludwig II’s smallest but most sumptuous palace, and the only one he lived to see fully…
Munich
Munich's main repository of Old European Masters is crammed with all the major players who decorated canvases between the 14th and 18th centuries. This…
Munich
The sprawling English Garden is among Europe's biggest city parks – it even rivals London's Hyde Park and New York's Central Park for size – and is a…
Füssen
Appearing through the mountaintops like a mirage, Schloss Neuschwanstein was the model for Disney’s Sleeping Beauty castle. King Ludwig II planned this…
Munich
Germany's largest modern-art museum unites four significant collections under a single roof: 20th-century art, applied design from the 19th century to…
Munich
Picture the classic 19th-century museum, a palatial neoclassical edifice overflowing with exotic treasure and thought-provoking works of art, a repository…
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Chiemsee
An island just 1.5km across the Chiemsee from Prien, Herreninsel is home to Ludwig II’s Versailles-inspired castle. Begun in 1878, it was never intended…
Friedrichshain
Berlin’s oldest public park has provided relief from urbanity since 1840, but has been hilly only since the late 1940s, when wartime debris was piled up…
Fairy-Tale Road
Erected between 1707 and 1717 by Landgrave Karl and declared a Unesco World Heritage site in 2013, the 8.25m-high copper Herkules statue stands atop a…
Fairy-Tale Road
One of the joys of Marburg is simply strolling around its steeply winding medieval core. Its focal point is the Marktplatz; on the southern side is the…
Northern Germany
Gothic and Renaissance turrets, Slavic onion domes, Ottoman features and terracotta Hanseatic step gables are among the mishmash of architectural styles…
Wörlitz Park & Schloss Wörlitz
Central Germany
With peacocks feeding on the lawn before a neo-Gothic house, a tree-lined stream flowing towards a Grecian-style temple and a gap in a hedge framing a…
Central Germany
You’ll find the four surviving Meisterhäuser – Gropiushaus, Haus Feininger, Haus Muche/Schlemmer and Haus Kandinsky/Klee – on leafy Ebertallee, a 15…
Dresden
A collaboration between the architect Matthäus Pöppelmann and the sculptor Balthasar Permoser, the Zwinger was built between 1710 and 1728 on the orders…
Munich
If you’re one of those people for whom science is an unfathomable turn-off, a visit to the Deutsches Museum might just show you that physics and…
Berchtesgaden
Gliding serenely across the wonderfully picturesque, emerald-green Königssee makes for some unforgettable memories and photo opportunities. Cradled by…
Nuremberg
This enormous castle complex above the Altstadt poignantly reflects Nuremberg's medieval might. The main attraction is a tour of the renovated residential…
Nationalpark Kellerwald-Edersee
Fairy-Tale Road
Hesse's first national park encompasses the Kellerwald, one of the largest extant red-beech forests in Central Europe and a rare survivor of the last Ice…
Heidelberg
Towering over the Altstadt, Heidelberg’s ruined Renaissance castle cuts a romantic figure, especially across the Neckar River when illuminated at night…
St Pauli & Reeperbahn
Here's the perfect excuse to stay up all Saturday night. Every Sunday in the wee hours, some 70,000 locals and visitors descend upon the famous Fischmarkt…
Berlin
This museum ranks among the world's finest and most comprehensive collections of European art with about 1500 paintings spanning the arc of artistic…
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Dresden
Dresden's extraordinary Renaissance city palace, home to its Saxon rulers from 1485 to 1918, now shelters multiple precious collections – including the…
The Black Forest
The Schwarzwälder Freilichtmuseum spirals around the Vogtsbauernhof, a self-contained early-17th-century farmstead. Farmhouses shifted from their original…
Rostock
Central Rostock’s pride and joy is the 13th-century Marienkirche, the only main Rostock church to survive WWII unscathed (although restorations are…
Füssen
King Ludwig II grew up at the sun-yellow Schloss Hohenschwangau and later enjoyed summers here until his death in 1886. His father, Maximilian II, built…
Berchtesgaden
At 1834m above sea level, the Eagle's Nest was built as a mountaintop retreat for Hitler, and gifted to him on his 50th birthday. It took around 3000…
Freiburg
With its lacy spires, cheeky gargoyles and intricate entrance portal, Freiburg’s 11th-century minster cuts an impressive figure above the central market…
Frankfurt am Main
Frankfurt’s red-sandstone cathedral is dominated by a 95m-high Gothic tower, which can be climbed via 328 steps. Construction began in the 13th century;…
Munich
Next to the Olympiapark, the glass-and-steel, double-cone tornado spiralling down from a dark cloud the size of an aircraft carrier holds BMW Welt, truly…
