Germany / where ?

[BeaLola]

Off to Germany in Oct half term - 3.5 days free - me, DH & DS11.

Pretty flexible as to where to go - options inc Berlin, Frankfurt, Dusseldorf, Hamburg or anywhere else !

Where would you recommend and why ?

Love Berlin - haven’t been with kids but so much to do that it would be fab

Oohhhh, difficult question.

Hamburg is beautiful. Berlin possibly has the edge on historically significant monuments.

What sort of things do you like to do?

Berlin, lots to see and do.

Munich is lovely.

How about Dresden. Beautiful city and not one everyone goes to.

Berlin or Hamburg - both have lots to keep you busy for several days. Berlin obviously has all the big historical sites and museums, plus lots of art and counterculture and cool areas to explore.

Hamburg has art and food and shopping and the harbour area. My two favourite things on my last visit were rather unexpectedly fun: a boat trip round the docks, including the container port area, and this place, which is amazing (really not just for model railway fans...): www.miniatur-wunderland.com

Jus been to Frankfurt - lovely but prob done in 2 days and not up there with Munich. Could combine easily with Trier which is fab if you are into the Romans. We went to the Mosel valley as well which is wasted on an 11 yr old really being entirely about wine tasting, yum.

Berlin - Unter den Linden is currently a construction site so not this year. Kept sending DH photos of how shit it was and how much I wanted to come home.

Munich, Munich, Munich.

Sounds like a fantastic plan for half term. Berlin is a great capital break, museums, buildings, history. GDR museum and Gendarmenmarkt are worth a visit though Brandenburg Gate and Checkpoint Charlie are a bit meh. Hamburg will be lovely at that time, it's quite posh so parks autumn leaves nice restaurants, boat trips not so good though for the children. But if you have a car then I would definitely go for Dusseldorf- lovely city - Rheinturn tower, boat trips etc. But it's location is the best for day trips to Moviepark, Roermond shopping Outllet, Sclossberg, Haribo factory, Lego Discovery etc etc.

Wow , thank you all & keep them coming !

Should explain we are going by train & driven by the fact that I have never been to Germany except Rhine a zillion years ago when young adult, DH I more familiar having been a lot as a young adult (million years ago) & DS has never been but has just started learning German in Year 7 & said he would like to go to Germany for a weekend (he doesn't know we have booked).

We go on Friday, back Tuesday pm so Im expecting to have Sat/Sun/Mon all free to do things. Berlin I thought as capital & for history, like the idea of train place in Hamburg, Dusseldorf sounds lovely too & DS probably would love Haribo factory - I take it you can tour it ?

Perhaps we need to make all our half terms Germany in Year 7 & explore them all ?

PS - he is also learning Spanish but not enjoying it so far !

Hamburg and Dusseldorf would be a lot shorter train journey than Berlin. London-west Germany took us 7-8 hours.

Berlin was great from a modern history perspective.

I live just outside Düs - it seems to be becoming more popular as a weekend destination, but I don't think there's actually much to do there, you could combine it with Köln and or Bonn, both short hops on the train.

Berlin is fab and good with kids too, we took our three for a weekend and they enjoyed it, loads to do though so you need a bit of a plan.

The Haribo thing is just a factory shop as far as I know, but still worthiness for stocking up, there's one just outside Düs, and one in Bonn too (where haribo comes from)

I love Munich because it's big but not overwhelming so.

DS and DH spent 5 hours in the Deutches Museum. The englische Garten is stunning at that time of year. We had sausages for breakfast in the market.

DS was too young when we went but the tour of the BMW factory is supposed to be great.

I was going to say Berlin until I read that you booked a train for a long weekend. I think it is too far for this. Düsseldorf and the Rhineland are the most convenient to get to and by combining Duesseldorf with places like Cologne and Bonn would fill the time you have. I have family in the area so here is a non-exhaustive list of things to do: boat tour on the Rhine, Cologne cathedral, Beethoven-Haus in Bonn, haribo outlet, shopping...

Thank you all so very much , although you are making it harder to choose !

& yes definitely bar recommendations & food warmly welcomed

what do we like to do : all of us food markets, DS loves haribo & Pizza, DH&DS trains (I don't mind, I prefer art museums & shopping wise stationery & gardens), sitting in pavement cafes and people watching, me - walking& enjoying architecture

Cologne, and visit Dusseldorf for the day to eat at Schweine Janes and visit the Killepitsch shop.

Munich is good too as is Garmisch Partenkirchen. Very picturesque there and lots to do - tobogganing etc. if its snowy.

We’ve been to both Berlin and Munich by train and loved them both. It does take a long time to get there though, although it sounds as though your DS and DH see the journey as part of the fun of the trip! We went on the sleeper to Munich but travelled during the day to Berlin.

I've done both Berlin, Hamburg and Munich with my young son.

We went specifically to Hamburg to Minatur Wunderland (mentioned above). It's an incredible place and highly recommend going if you think you'd enjoy it. We also enjoyed the Chocolate Museum (no big queues for the English tours!), lots of trendy burger places, boat trip, Elbphilharmonie. The city is very green with many parks to visit.

I've been to Berlin twice now, and my husband goes every year. There are tons of museums to visit, both historical and others, Technik/Science Museum is a good one. It's also a super trendy place with lots of independent shops, bars, restaurants you could research in advance.

Munich is another place to consider, a more compact city than Berlin which is easy to get around on foot. Bavaria is more traditional, so you'd be looking a historical buildings and there is lots of beer and sausage. I think Hamburg or Berlin would be better for your DS.

I love Munich, but might be too far on a train.

I have always wanted to visit Lubeck in Northern Germany. It was a Red Cross city in WWII so wasn't bombed and kept its original historic buildings.

Berlin is fantastic, lots of museums and wonderful places to wander around (as pp’s have said ☺️) While out there we took the double decker train from Berlin to Brandenberg and spent a couple of days at the Tropical Islands resort. It’s in an old Zeppelin hanger in miles and miles of woodland. It’s a pretty amazing place!