Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Palaces
Mönchengladbach
Schloss Rheydt (Rheydt Castle) in Mönchengladbach is a Renaissance moated castle on the Lower Rhine and now a city museum. Surrounded by water-filled moats, the complex of gatehouse, outer court and manor house is a rewarding stop in North…
Palaces
Saarbrücken
Saarbrücken Palace (Schloss Saarbrücken) rises above the Saar River in the old part of Saarbrücken, the capital of Saarland on the French border. The white Baroque facade is the city's best-known landmark, but the real surprise lies beneat…
Castles
Sigmaringen
Sigmaringen Castle (Schloss Sigmaringen) sits on a limestone rock high above the Danube and is one of the most striking castles in Baden-Württemberg. Once the seat of the Princes of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, it combines a huge hall of arms…
Palaces
Koblenz
Stolzenfels Castle (Schloss Stolzenfels) near Koblenz is a neo-Gothic palace high above the Rhine and a key example of Prussian Rhine Romanticism. It belongs to the UNESCO World Heritage site Upper Middle Rhine Valley and faces the mouth o…
Palaces
Veitshöchheim
Veitshöchheim Palace (Schloss Veitshöchheim) is the former summer retreat of the prince-bishops of Würzburg, set in one of Europe's finest surviving Rococo gardens. Located about 5 miles (8 km) down the Main River from Würzburg in northern…
Churches & monasteries
Höxter
Corvey Abbey near Höxter on the Weser River is one of Germany's most important monastic sites and a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2014. Its centerpiece is the Carolingian westwork, built in the 9th century and the oldest surviving struc…
Palaces
Schwetzingen
Schwetzingen Palace and its gardens, the former summer residence of the Electors Palatine, rank among the finest historic gardens in Europe. Set between Heidelberg and Mannheim in Baden-Württemberg, the roughly 70-hectare (170-acre) park b…
Palaces
Müglitztal
Weesenstein Castle (Schloss Weesenstein) in the Müglitz valley is an eight-story castle clinging to a rock above the river, famous for having been built partly from top to bottom. Located south of Dohna in Saxony, it is one of the more unu…
Palaces
Weikersheim
Weikersheim Palace (Schloss Weikersheim) is a Renaissance palace in the Tauber Valley of northern Baden-Württemberg and the ancestral seat of the Hohenlohe family. Its highlights are a splendid knights' hall with a painted coffered ceiling…
Palaces
Pommersfelden
Schloss Weissenstein in Pommersfelden is a showpiece of Franconian Baroque and is still owned by the Counts of Schönborn. Built as a country residence for a prince-bishop, it has a spectacular staircase hall, a marble hall and a picture ga…
Palaces
Wernigerode
Wernigerode Castle (Schloss Wernigerode) rises above the half-timbered town of Wernigerode on the northern edge of the Harz Mountains, and it looks like it was lifted from a fairy tale. Its towers and steep roofs date largely from a lavish…
Palaces
Kassel
Wilhelmshöhe Palace in Kassel is the grand Neoclassical centerpiece of the Bergpark Wilhelmshöhe, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2013. Behind its columned facade hangs one of Germany's finest Old Masters collections, with paintings by…
Palaces
Wolfsburg
Wolfsburg Castle (Schloss Wolfsburg) is the historic heart of Wolfsburg, the Lower Saxony city best known as the home of Volkswagen. The castle is more than 600 years older than the city, which actually took its name from it. A medieval mo…
Palaces
Oberschleißheim
Schleißheim Palace in Oberschleißheim, just north of Munich, is a complex of three Baroque palaces set in a vast French-style garden. The New Palace, with a facade more than 300 meters long, is the centerpiece, flanked by the Old Palace an…
Churches & monasteries
Lutherstadt Wittenberg
The Castle Church in Wittenberg (Schlosskirche) is where, according to tradition, Martin Luther posted his 95 Theses on October 31, 1517, sparking the Protestant Reformation. Part of the UNESCO World Heritage site of the Luther Memorials,…
Old towns & squares
Stuttgart
Schlossplatz in Stuttgart (Palace Square) is the city's grand central square and the best place to start exploring the capital of Baden-Württemberg. Framed by the baroque New Palace, the colonnaded Königsbau, the Old Castle and the glass c…
Lakes
Schluchsee
Lake Schluchsee in the southern Black Forest is the largest lake in the Black Forest and the second-largest body of water in the state of Baden-Württemberg after Lake Constance. Set at about 3,050 feet (930 m) between the Feldberg and the…
Old towns & squares
Bremen
The Schnoor in Bremen is the oldest surviving residential quarter of this Hanseatic city, a tangle of cobbled lanes and tiny gabled houses squeezed between the cathedral and the Weser River. It is one of the top things to do in Bremen and…
Museums
Gutach (Schwarzwaldbahn)
The Black Forest Open Air Museum Vogtsbauernhof in Gutach is the best-known open-air museum in the Black Forest and one of the most rewarding things to do in this part of southwest Germany. Historic farmhouses, mills and workshops were mov…
Coast & islands
Heringsdorf
The Heringsdorf Pier on the island of Usedom is one of the longest piers in Germany, stretching 508 meters into the Baltic Sea. It is the landmark of the "Imperial Spas," the elegant 19th-century seaside resorts of Ahlbeck, Heringsdorf and…
Coast & islands
Sellin
Sellin Pier (Seebrücke Sellin) in the seaside resort of Sellin on Rügen is one of the most photographed sights on Germany's Baltic coast. A white, turreted pier house in classic resort architecture sits on stilts above the sea, connected t…
Zoos
Hodenhagen
The Serengeti Park in Hodenhagen is a combined safari park, zoo and amusement park in Lower Saxony, and at 220 hectares (540 acres) it bills itself as Europe's largest safari park. Around 2,000 animals live here alongside more than 100 att…
Other
Ahorntal
The Sophienhöhle (Sophie Cave) near Ahorntal is one of the most beautiful show caves in Franconian Switzerland, a limestone landscape in northern Bavaria between Nuremberg and Bayreuth. It sits on the slope of the Ailsbach valley next to B…
Coast & islands
Sankt Peter-Ording
St. Peter-Ording on the Eiderstedt peninsula in Schleswig-Holstein has one of the most spectacular beaches in Germany: about 12 kilometers long and, at low tide, up to 2 kilometers wide in places. Wooden stilt houses rise from the sand, a…