German Christmas Market

[KenAdams]

Can anyone recommend a German Christmas Market please? It would only be a weekend trip so somewhere near an airport would be good.

Cologne?

Cologne, Munich, Nuremberg

I love Cologne and want to go back this year (went in April!). I want to do Wintertraum (winter festival) at phantasialand theme park which is easy to get to from the city centre but you won't want to do that I guess if you only have a weekend and also want to do markets. I'm planning on staying in a hotel in bruhl and going into the city for a markets trip and possibly one-night to Oma Bei Kleinman schnitzel restaurant. Or sushi. Lots of Japanese restaurants in Cologne.

It's dead easy to get into the city from the airport and cheap on the train. Flights were good value in April. Walk up the cathedral steps. Stay in the Belgian quarter to be near good restaurants but its a doddle to get into the very centre.

It's not the prettiest city, bombed in the war like lots of Germany, but the old churches all stayed standing! I love the cathedral and the walk over the bridge and by the rhein.

I stayed at Art'otel which was a good location and right on the rhein. But that's in the old town area by the chocolate museum.

Nuremberg is very famous for its Christmas market, which means it is completely overrun with tourists.
Every town in Germany has a Christmas market, bigger cities like Berlin can have several Christmas markets.
Mainz is really close to Frankfurt and very picturesque at Christmas. Munich is always lovely. Dresden is pretty and the home of Stollen. Berlin is great fun but can be VERY cold.

Thank you!

I went to Dusseldorf, which was v pretty and we also went to Cologne which is v close by train. Have been to Berlin, there's lots of markets there to enjoy.

How commercial do you want it to be? Smaller markets are more personal/not same stuff across stalls but also obviously much smaller scale. I think a nice balance between scale and individual is Heidelberg Christmas Market - it is the Oxford/Cambridge of Germany and a very pretty city and the markets were spread out across lots of the towns squares.

Munich is cold with a reasonable chance of snow. All the markets are in a short walk of each other plus there is a lot to do in terms of museums/galleries/palaces if you are fed up of markets or just want to be indoors.

Yes there is the same stuff as every other market which might be tat or lovely depending on your point of view. Definitely not tat is the section of the market in Marienplatz devoted to handcarved nativity figures and scenes.

Not been but I've seen Wroclaw in Poland mentioned. Beautiful city, very reasonable prices.

Ulm, flying to memmingen from London Stanstead.

Berlin has lots of lovely Christmas markets and it's a great city
.

Hannover was lovely.

Dortmund is lovely and has the biggest Christmas tree

Does it have to be Germany? The Christmas markets in Basle are pretty much perfect imo. It is an expensive place to visit though.

Sorry, coming back tothis, I'd basically like a market with local handicrafts rather than Chinese tat, but doesn't have to be Germany I suppose.