I previously posted about summer crowds at lesser known German palaces and castles, but I'm wondering about overall visitor experiences in various lesser known cities and towns in terms of crowds during the summer, the kind of places that Fred often mentions, such as Celle, Lubeck, Schwerin, Oldenburg or secondary cities that get some international visitors such as Weimar, Erfurt, Marburg, places like that, nice big towns with some things to see, but no huge blockbuster "attraction" that gets too much attention. In figuring out where my wife and I might want to go I think this might be a nice pattern, avoiding the big crowds as much as possible but still enjoying nice sites and experiences.
Personally I found that on our east coast trip last summer I didn't mind crowds sometimes, (the Met, Statue of Liberty, Capitol, etc) but did enjoy getting away from it all and enjoying sites like the Bennington Battle Monument in Vermont, Grover Cleveland's birthplace in Caldwell New Jersey, Norman Rockwell museum in Stockbridge Mass, where we found things much less hectic and crowded.
Still not sure when we'd be going, but likely some time in the summer (summer is best for us due to work situation).
Posted by
Prince George, BC, Canada
444 posts
Germany and other European countries have a large internal travel population during the summer months, so you're going to get some crowds no matter where you go. Having said that, if you visit away from the "blockbuster" areas, I don't think they have the crushing crowds. We normally go in off season, and seldom concentrate on highly popular areas, so have not had any problems in Germany with major crowds.
Posted by
Washington DC
28120 posts
In summer 2015 I went to Schwerin, Erfurt, Quedlinburg, Eisenach and Goerlitz. The core of Quedlinburg's historic district had a lot of tourist foot traffic (not English-speaking), but otherwise none of those places felt particularly touristy. As is typical, if you walked two blocks from the Quedlinburg's tourist center, you were by yourself. Wartburg Castle in Eisenach wasn't overrun, either. There was almost no one at Buchewald (outside Weimar).
I returned to Goerlitz this last summer to attend a pottery fair. The streets with sales booths were crowded. Elsewhere, there were few to zero tourists.
Posted by
Berlin
3016 posts
Germany has a strong growing tourism market and it is important to understand the market to know where "crowds" come from and what their preferences are. Of course Germans and European neighbors have by far the biggest share of overnight amount. Clear number one of international visitors are the Netherlands but even they are far behind Germans itself who love doing vacation in their own country.
I think that nearly nobody on that forum has heard of Heringsdorf and Fehmarn but they are under the top 20 visited places in Germany - obviously most by Germans. By the way: Little town Burg auf Fehmarn has still a copperstone main street but not as pedetrian zone. The German Balitc Sea coast has a lot of fans the whole year through - even in winter.
A lot of smaller towns in Germany - even beautiful ones - are nearly unknown to some tourists. Some not easy to reach but others are. Look at Stade near Hamburg, Wetzlar (Frankfurt) or Montabaur. The last one has an own ICE train station at well frequented Frankfurt - Cologne railway and also a nice hotel in the modernized castle. And you could easily add a few dozen other towns and places.
You can also look at the two biggest German cities Berlin and Hamburg which were not grown from in- to ouside. By political decision they got big because neighboring communities were just integrated, e.g. Greater Berlin Act 1920. Therefore even in the outer districts of these big cities you will still find some pearls, e.g. Alt-Lübars or Alt-Köpenick in Berlin.
There are also more palaces in Berlin and Brandenburg than the ones in Potsdam - ever heard of Rheinsberg Palace? Same is valid for other regions.
Tip 1: The German National Tourist Board website has a real good website which enables people from all over the world also to discover some more hidden places. The filter-function map or the interest-based landing pages allow various ways to discover your next destinations.
Tip 2: Also the tourist websites of German states and cities are worth a search.
Tip 3: Just crawl through the catalogue of German UNESCO world heritage sites and you will discover beautiful places which are not listed in any guide books.
Posted by
Northamptonshire, England
33877 posts
In July I have been in
Coburg - absolutely no crowds
Frankfurt a. M - light crowds
Eltville (thanks, Jo) - not a soul
Nuremberg - light crowds
RodT - moderate crowds to no crowds to can't move
Deidesheim - nobody, except on vineyard fest weekend, couldn't move
Bamberg - a fair few but loads of space to spread them out in so no problem
Trier - modest numbers
Aachen - only a few French
Speyer - very few
Freiburg im Breisgau - a fair few well distributed
Munich - fairly steady but could still get parking at the English Garden beirgarten and Augustinerbräu.
YMMV
Posted by
Alsenborn, Germany
1498 posts
Cities I like that get fewer tourists include:
Marburg (Great Castle and old town)
Koblenz (the Deutsche Eck)
Bitburg (Beer!)
Idar-Oberstein (The old Gem Capitol of Europe)
Heidelberg (the gardens)
Ansbach (Once center of Bavaria)
Nordlingen (At least as nice as Rothenberg)
Ingolstadt (I like the old town and the car museum)
Augsburg (Again, a nice old city easy walk from the train station)
Ulm (Nobody ever seems to go there)
Bayreuth (I like it better than Bamberg, and I like Bamberg)
Bad Hersfeld (Neat old SPA town)
Magdeburg (very underappreciated)
Lubeck (One of the few far north Places I like)
Posted by
San Francisco
14987 posts
The term " lesser known " is relative...lesser known to whom, locals or Anglophones and/or international tourists? That's the difference, if it matters to you. I'm mainly interested in where the locals go.
Posted by
San Francisco
14987 posts
Rheinsberg...yes, I did an afternoon day trip there in 2017 from Berlin. It's known in Prussian history. In the morning prior to going to Rheinsberg, I went to Neuruppin, some ways more interesting for me as it is the birth town of Theodor Fontane, the well-known novelist, which is why I wanted to see the place.
Ulm..." no one ever seems to go there," ...a pity; one of the most famous, biggest cathedrals in Germany, das Ulmer Münster.
Magdeburg..."underrated"...true! You won't see any anglophones there. Also a very interesting place, spent a week-end there in July 2009.
Posted by
Germany
868 posts
Counting the number of reviews on the Internet is a good indication how crowded a site is. Compare Neuschwanstein and Wartburg castle for example:
Neuschwanstein:
16.200 reviews at Tripadvisor (7.300 in English, 800 in German)
29.500 at Google
Wartburg castle:
1.074 reviews at Tripavisor (290 in English, 589 in German)
3.800 at Google
And indeed Wartburg castle is much quiter, and mostly visited by Germans.
Old Masters Dresden:
1.680 reviews at Tripadvisor (600 in German, 490 in Russian, 430 in English)
1.300 at Google
Alte Pinakothek Munich:
2.340 reviews at Tripadvisor (800 in German, 960 in English, 340 in Russian)
2.100 at Google
As you can see, these art galleries aren't nearly as overrun as Neuschwanstein, Germans aren't a small minority, and Dresden as a former part of the Communist block is very popular among Russians.
In general only a few world-famous sites are horribly crowded, many places mentioned in Rick Steves books, especially in Bavaria, can be very crowded, the rest of the country doesn't get that much attention. There are a few places almost unknown to foreigners which are very popular among Germans, like the Baltic coast (which sees more German tourists than Bavaria) or Weimar, but nothing is as crowded as Neuschwanstein or Rothenburg.
No, wait, Warnemünde, with three or four cruise ships in the harbor, is just as bad...