The most beautiful cities in Germany

Germany’s most beautiful cities and towns stand among the best places to visit in the European Union. They span almost the full range of European variety. Raven Travel Guides Germany include:

• Cities with Roman origins and remains such as Trier, Cologne, Regensburg and Mainz.
• Medieval cities such as Nuremberg, Erfurt, Bamberg and Worms and the half-timbered Harz region towns of Goslar, Quedlinburg and Wernigerode.
• Renaissance showpiece cities such as Lübeck, Augsburg or Bremen.
• Cities with Baroque survivals, including Dresden, Heidelberg or Passau.
• Plenty of German cities have beautiful palaces on their streets or nearby, like Potsdam, Munich, Stuttgart, Würzburg and Weimar.
• The great cathedrals such as Cologne, Regensburg, Bamberg, Mainz, Erfurt, Worms, with countless other churches, sometimes in Romanesque but more commonly in the Gothic style. The münster of Ulm has the tallest spire of them all.
• Museums of culture and art among world’s best, including Deutsches Museum, Deutsches Nationalmuseum, Alte Pinakothek and the Pergamonmuseum.

All these places can be reached by train and bus (Quedlinburg is on a branch line). All offer a range of hotels, hostels, guest houses and other types of accommodation. All are very walkable and, like most German towns and cities, are really best seen on foot. But trams and buses help get people to and from hotels or attractions and for the bigger centres, Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, Cologne, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf and Nuremberg, there are fast regular options in the form of S-Bahn and U-Bahn trains and light-rail transport.

Quedlinburg

To UNESCO, Quedlinburg epitomises the medieval European town with its architecture and deep historical links to the early German kingdom. The medieval townscape and plan are basically intact, and there are at least 1300 half-timbered houses to stroll past and admire. Many are fully restored in colour with dated personal names, mottoes, dedications and invocations.

The castle above the town has an attached abbey church that is a rare example of Romanesque style. Parts of the sandstone town wall, built from the 12th to 14th centuries, and some of the towers are preserved.

The four churches in the town - St Aegidii, St Nikolai, St Benedikti and St Blasii - are of early date but with some changes, while the Romanesque church St Wipertii just outside the town belonged to an early royal court.