North Germany

Elena, I loved the island of Ruegen (Germany's largest) on the Baltic. The city of Stralsund is near there and worth at least a stopover. It's very picturesque, with some buildings 2-300 years old or older. Ruegen has several towns, a train ride on the small train from one to the other is fun and so is a boat ride along the coast on one of the passenger steamers. It also has beaches. There were no crowds when we were there, lots of beautiful scenery. You can go over to Hiddensee Island from Ruegen. There are no cars allowed on Hiddensee as far as I remember. We went towards the end of May. It was still off-season and the price for a really nice hotel was very low, well under a 100 Euro, breakfast buffet included. The restaurants were already open. We happened to have sunny and warm weather and actually saw some bathers on the beach. Ruegen is best visited by car. Off-season, when we were there, we had no parking problems at all.

Hi, Good that you're traveling in the Schleswig-Holstein area and cities along the Baltic. I've seen some of it. Flensburg came through the war intact, undamaged. If you want to see a smaller place, I recommend Eutin/Holstein as far as art, esp. music and also history are concerned. Schleswig is famous for its Schloss. Rostock is absolutely worth a visit as is the city west of it, Schwerin, formerly of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. From Hamburg both Schwerin and Rostock are on the same train line.

OK, Schleswig. Art and history edition. The remains of the fortifications of Hedeby/Haithabu (9th century Viking settlement) and the Haithabu museum in situ. Gottorf Palace and the S-H state museums therein. Mostly three parts: - History and archeology of S-H in the main building (and the building itself). - In the Nydam hall artifacts recovered from S-H's moors/bogs ("sacrifices"). Vikings again.
- A collection of German 20th century expressionists in the former stables. Schleswig's cathedral. The tower/spire is quite modern (1880ish I think), but the building itself is from the 12th century. Nice gothic church with an altar showing the passion of Christ carved in hundreds of oak figures from the 15th century. If the weather is good you could walk in the Holm, a part of the town that used to be a separate fishing village. Cute little cottages/houses, especially around the old cemetery/chapel.

Rostock itself is ugly BUT Warnemünde is great and beautiful (probably one of the most beautiful baltic seaside resorts in Germany). Easily accessible by S-Bahn from Rostock. Bad Kühlungsborn is a nother very old, traditional seaside resort village. When you went to Lübeck I assume you visited Travemünde as well? Probably the most traditional on the Baltic Sea side is the peninsula of Darßt/Zingst. Consider staying in Zingst and day-tripping the area. You should really love nature to vist that place though. Another must-see on the North Sea side is the Watten Sea. This is absolutely unique in the world! One nice sea side resort there would be St. Peter-Ording (but there are many others). And then there is THE German island itself, the queen of all German islands and in summer THE place to be for all celebrities and (self-proclaimed) upper class people: SYLT.