as I plan my stay in Nuremberg I am between 3 or 4 nights. Trying to toss around sites, days and times to make the most of our time.
So my question is
Visiting these 3 sights in one day too much?
Historic Art Bunker
Germanic National Museum
Visit Hitler’s Rally Ground and Documentation Center
And if it is too much, how much time do you think I need for each?
Many thanks
It just depends on your approach to museums, etc. I could walk through the average museum in three or four hours primarily concerned with overviews. However, wife believes in reading every plaque and that can take two or three days. We have been to Nurenberg for Christmas markets but never visited those sites so I cannot tell you how extensive they are.
What about the site of the Nurenberg Trials?
three days with two nights should be enough.
Like most places in Europe, I loved Nuremberg and wish that we had spent more time there. The only one of your sights that I visited was the Rally Ground. I suggest that your visit to the Rally Ground would be vastly improved with a guide. Here is a link to Tour Guide Kevin's website. Even if you're not interested in a tour, his website has good suggestions for Nuremberg.
Checking aerial photos, the rally ground has been converted to a dragstrip, a North American football field, and soccer fields. Some of the peripheral stuff remains like some stands and the speaking platform.
https://www.google.com/maps/@49.4305449,11.1233941,867m/data=!3m1!1e3
The tour listed above is using "rally grounds" in a general sense for a section of Nurnberg, but the Zeppelin field is where the actual rallies occurred.
May help in your future trip research: Nuremburg.
Visiting these 3 sights in one day too much?
I wouldn't have been able to visit all 3 of those in one day. It takes a while to get over to (and back from) the Rally Grounds and Documentation Center. It took me 30-ish minutes each way from my hotel, very near the train station. I spent 2 or 2.5 hours inside the Documentation Center, reading the exhibits and watching some of the videos. The Rally Grounds (Edit: more correctly, Zeppelin field) are a healthy walk from the Documentation Center. I walked the grounds a bit, but didn't make it all the way to Zeppelin Field, as I wanted to get back across town for the 2pm English tour of the Trials Courtroom.
The Art Bunker tour (the only way to see it) was from 2:30pm - 4pm the day I took it.
If you got to the Documentation Center first thing in the morning, you might be able to visit it and get back to the top of the town center for the Art Bunker tour in one day. Though it wouldn't give you much/any time for the walk to the Rally Grounds.
The Germanic National Museum is enormous! I spent 1.5 hours and only saw some highlights. Like many such museums, you could easily spend days or weeks in it. So it depends on how keen you are on museums and how much of it you'd like to see.
The most memorable area of the museum, for me, is the "Late Middle Age" section, with various works "exhibited in the historical buildings of the old Carthusian monastery – in the church, cloisters and refectory."
https://www.gnm.de/en/exhibitions/permanent-exhibitions/late-middle-ages/
I stayed 4 nights in Nuremberg and could easily have spent a week. As it was, I visited 4 museums/sites that day: The Transport Museum, 1.5 hours in the Germanic National Museum, 1.5 hours in the afternoon Art Bunker tour, and a quick 45 minutes in the Nuremberg City History Museum to see the history video and the city model. I spent a full day at the Documentation Center/Rally Grounds and Nuremburg Trials Courtroom tour.
It's worth mentioning that I bought the 2-day Nuremberg Museums card, which included the use of city transit. It was well worth it for me, and you can see from my above post that I used it on one of the days - as I often do in cities - as a "sampler" card to drop in on each of the museums that held interest, including the Art Bunker tour and the Documentation Center. I find that, with the city cards, I'll drop in to some museums or sights that I might not have otherwise - since "it's free." It's that "hidden value" of the cards that often tempts me.
While living near Nuremberg I took various friends around and their interests determined where we went and how long we spent. Plus a good "Drei-im-Wechla" lunch, of course, (although I have no idea now which of our favorite restaurants will survive). The local transit is very good S-bahn (surface trams) and U-Bahn (subway trains), which shortens travel between destinations.
4 (3) nights gives you three (two) full days so one site outside the center per day (Documentation Center, Nuremberger Process, etc. ) and one or two sites (Art Bunker, Castle, Toy Museum, Albrecht Durer House, GNM, etc) within the city will work well.
Check out their museum guide:
https://museums.nuernberg.de/nuremberg-municipal-museums/
The Documentation Center is worth a morning or afternoon, but is a 15 minute S-bahn ride SE of the Hauptbahnhof. The "Rally Grounds" as noted above aren't much and are mostly used these days for rock concerts (or have been). The Germanisches National Museum is wonderful (the oldest globe, great pre-historic, Medieval, Renaissance exhibits, excellent art, etc) and is near the train station (but inside the city wall). GNM is worth a half day at least, or probably half a day on each of two days for some variety time in between. The Art Bunker is up near the castle on the north side of town and a half hour walk from the GNM. Nice walk through the main market square (home of the Christmas Market) with its famous fountain, and various churches Lorenz Kirche, Frauenkirche, St Sebaldis Kirche (which is now a war memorial). The castle is nice castle (totally rebuilt of course after the US Army Air Force did it's thing in 1945) and may deserve a walk through but not much to really see. In June they have beer festival in its moat.
You don't mention the Nuremberger Process - which is the actual courtroom where the Nuremberg Trials were conducted. It is out the U-bahn several stops west of the main station. Because the Germans wanted/needed it as a normal courtroom it was converted back into everyday use and can only be visited on weekends when the court is not in session - but it has an excellent museum about the trials in the upper floors of the building, which used to be open most days.
Just a note: Both the Documentation Center and the Nuremberger Processes courthouse leave most visitors rather shaken.... it is not easy to contemplate the horrors .... so something lighter to follow is usually advisable.
Nick makes a great point about following the WWII sites with something lighter, which is exactly what I did...after spending about 3 hours at the Documentation museum and rally grounds I took the tram back to the Hbf and walked into the old town to explore the handcraft shops near the entrance, then on to a wonderful lunch at Restaurant Literaturhaus on Luitpoldstrasse, toured the Albrecht Durer house and ended the day with the thoroughly delightful Toy (Spielzeug) Museum--several floors of fabulous old toys, my family and I have collected toys for decades (particularly Steiff) so it was really a treat and definitely not just for kids.
I spent three nights in Nuremberg which I was using primarily as a base to visit (on day trips) Bamberg and Regensberg. I didn't plan on any of the sites you list so I just wanted to "see" the town. Turns out we really liked the city a lot and wished we had more time. So given the things you want to do, just make sure to plan some time for visiting the city center itself.
Here's my trip report in which I describe what we saw and did in Nuremberg. - https://andiamo.zenfolio.com/blog/2018/11/bavaria-to-bratislava-and-back---part-2-bavaria
We spent four nights in Nurnberg five years ago during the Christmas Markets and thoroughly enjoyed it! One day we focused on the Zeppelin Field and the Documentation Center. Lots to see and do there. We stayed at the Drei Raben hotel and found it to be delightful ( not inexpensive during the market but very close to markets and easy access to the city center). I recommend any trip or an overnight in Regensburg. We visited Regensburg last Dec. on another Christmas market trip and found it to be a very picturesque and historic town along the Danube. Easy train ride to Frankfurt.
My wife and I spent three nights in Old Town Nuremberg before taking a Viking Danube River Cruise in 2019. The WW2 sites were part of the Viking itinerary so we spent all our time in the Old Town. We toured the castle and the Albrecht Durer House, visited quite a few shops and dined al fresco entertained by the myriad of music performers throughout the town. A highlight was the farmers market where we were educated on gingerbread cookies by mom and daughter bakers. A MUST is a sandwich of three tiny Nurnberg sausages - mit Senf (mustard). Nurnbergers are fiercely proud of what they claim is the best of the wursts in all Germany. I can't argue their point.
Making me hungry here.
I lived in Nuremberg for 3 years in the early 1980's when I worked as a civilian employee of the US Army. The places to visit have already been well covered by others and you'll need to prioritize.
Be sure to prioritize eating, too. There are great places to eat grilled Nuremberger bratwurst, my absolute favorite brats.
Hopefully restaurants like the Bratwurst Röslein will be open when you go: https://www.bratwurst-roeslein.de/en/. An advantage of ordering Nuremberger bratwurst is that you can order as few or as many as you want.
I'm a big fan of schäufele mit knödel, but when I was there, I typically got it at a small place in Erlangen where I usually worked. In trying to find a place I remembered in Nuremberg, I stumbled on this DIE FÜNF BESTEN SCHÄUFELE IN NÜRNBERG, 5 best places to eat it link: https://echt-nuernberg.de/echt-jetzt-beitrag/der-grosse-schaeufele-test/. Don't miss this Fränkische specialty, but be aware that the portions are large. Note at the end of the page linked, you can go to other listings of things to see and do in the city.
Another thing I loved is the white asparagus available only in the late spring or early summer. Restaurants will feature it and it can be prepared in many ways. It's another taste treat not to miss if you're in Germany at the right time of year. This link shows a few of them.
