Germany Guide
Northern Bavaria: Franconia
The Inselstadt
Cross the narrow, picturesque Alter Kanal by the footbridge behind the Schloss to Inselstadt, the historic heart of the secular city. A pleasant stroll along Habergasse and Zinkenwörth brings you to the modest but pretty eighteenth-century E.T.A. Hoffmann Haus (May– Oct Tues– Fri 10am–5pm, Sat & Sun 10am– noon; €2) where the composer, critic and author of the eponymous Tales lived from 1808 to 1813. The house contains an imaginatively presented exhibition which chronicles his life, work and the opera Undine. Retracing your steps north along Zinkenwörth and Habergasse brings you to broad, busy Grüner Markt, over which presides the massive Baroque Pfarrkirche St Martin (Mon– Wed & Fri– Sun 7.30am–6pm, Thurs 1–6pm; free). The work of brothers Georg and Leonhard Dientzenhofer, completed in 1693, it has a shallow, trompe l'oeil dome inside. Tucked behind it on Fleischstrasse is the Naturkundemuseum (Tues– Sun: April– Sept 10am–5pm; Oct– March 10am–4pm; €2), the city's natural history museum. Its chief glory is the Vogelsaal, in which stuffed birds are still exhibited in the original Neoclassical eighteenth-century display cases. Grüner Markt leads into spacious Maxplatz, dominated by the imposing former seminary, built between 1732 and 1737 by Balthasar Neumann and now functioning as the city's Rathaus. Maxplatz (or Maximilianplatz to give it its official name) is the focus for numerous events, including Bamberg's Christmas market.
There's a studenty vibe to some of the streets between Maxplatz and the river. Follow Heumarkt into Stangstrasse, before heading south down Kapuzinerstrasse to Am Kranen, on the banks of the Regnitz where a couple of historic cranes mark the site of the city's main quay from the fourteenth century until 1912. The riverside north from here is a particularly picturesque jumble of medieval fishermen's houses, with jetties for gardens and steep red-tiled roofs hanging low over the river. Known as Klein-Venedig, or Little Venice, it's seen to best effect from the Bergstadt side of the river.