Why go
Bamberg, Lübeck and Quedlinburg invite a town-wide walk; Neuschwanstein and Heidelberg Castle focus attention on individual buildings and their settings. The Upper Middle Rhine adds a landscape of castles. Comparing these with industrial or resort architecture gives a fuller picture than a trip built only around medieval imagery.
The full story
Aachen Cathedral is an early landmark in Germany's World Heritage story. Historic centers such as Bamberg, Goslar, Quedlinburg, Lübeck, Regensburg, Stralsund and Wismar show how much can be learned from streets as well as monuments. Castles offer another route into the past: Neuschwanstein evokes nineteenth-century Romantic imagination, while Heidelberg Castle and the fortifications of the Upper Middle Rhine sit in different historical settings. Heritage also includes the built legacy of industry and the resort architecture of Baltic seaside towns and inland spa towns. Those places broaden the idea of what deserves preservation. Large German cities often have interrupted historic fabric because of the destruction of the Second World War and subsequent rebuilding. Smaller towns may retain more continuous streetscapes, though no town should be assumed untouched. Look at the relationship between surviving buildings and later construction; that contrast can explain as much as a plaque on a famous façade.
Useful to know
- Allow time to walk a historic center, not only its headline monument.
- Compare a castle visit with a preserved town or industrial site to see different kinds of heritage.