Germany (Lonely Planet, 6th Edition) - Andrea Schulte-Peevers [135]
Orientation
Information
Sights
Walking Tour
Tours
Festivals & Events
Sleeping
Eating
Drinking
Entertainment
Getting There & Away
Getting Around
AROUND LEIPZIG
Colditz Escape Museum
CHEMNITZ
Orientation
Information
Sights
Sleeping
Eating & Drinking
Getting There & Around
AROUND CHEMNITZ
Augustusburg
ZWICKAU
Orientation
Information
Sights
Sleeping
Eating & Drinking
Getting There & Around
EASTERN SAXONY
BAUTZEN
Orientation
Information
Sights
Sleeping
Eating & Drinking
Getting There & Away
GÖRLITZ
Orientation
Information
Sights
Tours
Sleeping
Eating
Getting There & Away
BAD MUSKAU
ZITTAU
Orientation & Information
Sights & Activities
Sleeping & Eating
Getting There & Away
AROUND ZITTAU
Zittauer Gebirge
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If you’re going to visit just one state in the east, make it Saxony. With rejuvenated Dresden providing the culture, prosperous Leipzig laying on the glitz, and the Sorbs injecting a little Slavic colour, Saxony is firmly back on the traveller’s map. Away from the cities, the low hills of the Erzgebirge and rock formations of the Saxon Switzerland are a tranquil bliss. And through this eternal landscape zigzags the Elbe River, just beginning its long journey to the North Sea.
Saxony’s landscapes have tugged for centuries at the heartstrings of visionaries. Canaletto and Caspar David Friedrich captured Dresden’s baroque brilliance and the mystical beauty of Saxon Switzerland on canvas; JS Bach penned some of his most famous works in Leipzig; and the ‘musical poet’ Robert Schumann grew up in Zwickau. Dresden’s famous Semperoper and the Gewandhaus in Leipzig are two of the world’s greatest high-brow venues.
Dresden and Leipzig naturally grab top billing when it comes to the region’s history. The former became synonymous in the 20th century with the devastation of WWII, but has since resurrected its baroque heritage, most notably the Frauenkirche. The latter sparked the ‘peaceful revolution’ of 1989, bringing down the Berlin Wall.
Its sooty socialist-era industries mostly cast aside, Saxony now enjoys the most vibrant economy of the former GDR, and rebuilding work continues apace. But Saxony also gives abundant opportunity to indulge in an odd nostalgia for the erstwhile East Germany, with curious museums packed with planned-economy bric-a-brac, the Zwickau car plant that once rolled out the infamous Trabant, and Soviet-tinged Chemnitz still parading its Karl Marx monument.
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HIGHLIGHTS
Baroque Bash Revel in the kicking nightlife scene of Dresden’s Neustadt, the best in the east outside of Berlin
Honecker’s Heritage Travel back in time to the GDR at museums in Leipzig, Pirna and Radebeul
Giddy Heights Clamber up the Bastei for gobsmacking panoramas of the Saxon Switzerland and the Elbe
Go Sorbing Party with Bautzen’s Sorbs, German’s little-known Slav minority
Blinding Beauty Don sunglasses to view the dazzling treasures at Dresden’s Historiches Grünes Gewölbe Click here
That’s Neisse Marvel at the architecture of Görlitz Click here, one of Germany’s most attractive cities
POPULATION: 4.35 MILLION
AREA: 18,413 SQ KM
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Information
If you need to book a room, or just want more information about Saxony, log on to www.sachsen-tour.de.
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Getting Around
An enticement to use public transport is the good-value Saxony-Ticket (€28), giving you and up to four accompanying passengers (or one or both parents or grandparents, plus all their children or grandchildren up to 14 years) unlimited train travel during the period of its validity (9am to 3am the next day). Tickets are good for 2nd-class travel throughout Saxony, as well as in Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt. As well as any regional Deutsche Bahn trains (IRE, RE, RB and S-Bahn), you can also use some private trains, including the LausitzBahn.
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CENTRAL SAXONY
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DRESDEN
0351 / pop 512,000
There are few city silhouettes more striking than Dresden’s. The classic view from the Elbe