Germany (Lonely Planet, 6th Edition) - Andrea Schulte-Peevers [401]
The city centre is a traffic headache, especially at weekends. Your best bet is probably the free Park & Ride lot 3km northwest of the Altstadt, near the Flugplatz (airfield) on Max-Stromeyer-Strasse, where your only outlay will be for a bus ticket.
Local buses (www.sw.konstanz.de, in German) cost €2 for a single ticket (€3.50 at night); day passes are €3.90/6.60 for an individual/family. Bus 1 links the Meersburg car-ferry dock with the Altstadt. If you stay in Konstanz for at least two nights, your hotelier will give you a Gästekarte entitling you to free local bus travel.
For a taxi, ring 222 22.
Bicycles can be hired from Kultur-Rädle ( 273 10; Bahnhofplatz 29; per day €12; 9am-12.30pm & 2.30-6pm Mon-Fri, 10am-4pm Sat year-round, also 10am-12.30pm Sun & holidays Easter-Sep), 50m south of the tourist office.
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AROUND KONSTANZ
Mainau Island
Jutting out over the lake and bursting with flowers, the lusciously green islet of Mainau ( 3030; www.mainau.de, in German; adult/under 12yr/concession/family €14.90/free/8/30; sunrise-sunset) is a 45-hectare Mediterranean garden dreamed up by the Bernadotte family, relatives of the royal house of Sweden.
Around two million visitors flock here every year to admire sparkly lake and mountain views from the baroque castle, wander sequoia-shaded avenues and hothouses bristling with palms and orchids. Crowd-pullers include the Butterfly House, where hundreds of vivid butterflies flit amid the dewy foliage, an Italian Cascade integrating patterned flowers with waterfalls, and a petting zoo. Tulips and rhododendrons are in bloom in spring, hibiscus and roses in summer. Try to avoid weekends when the gardens get crowded.
You can drive, walk or cycle to Mainau, 8km north of Konstanz. Take bus 4 from Konstanz’ train station or hop aboard a passenger ferry.
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Reichenau Island
07534 / pop 3200
In AD 724 a missionary named Pirmin founded a Benedictine monastery on Reichenau (www.reichenau.de), a 4.5km-by-1.5km island (Lake Constance’s largest) about 11km west of Konstanz. During its heyday, from 820 to 1050, the so-called Reichenauer School produced stunning illuminated manuscripts and vivid frescoes. Today, three surviving churches provide silent testimony to Reichenau’s Golden Age. Thanks to them, the island was declared a Unesco World Heritage Site in 2000.
Bring walking boots and binoculars, as this fertile isle of orchards and wineries is home to Wollmatinger Ried, a marshy nature reserve whose reed wetlands attract butterflies, migratory birds including kingfishers, grey herons and cuckoos, and even the odd beaver.
A 2km-long tree-lined causeway connects the mainland with the island, which is served by bus 7372 from Konstanz. The Konstanz–Schaffhausen and Konstanz–Radolfzell ferries stop off at Reichenau.
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Marienschlucht
Well worth the 15km trek north of Konstanz, Marienschlucht (admission free; daylight hours) is a deep ravine wedged between the villages of Bodman and Wallhausen. A wooden staircase zigzags up through the chasm, past a babbling stream and 30m-high cliffs thick with lichen and ferns. The top rewards with snapshot views of Lake Constance through the beech trees. Bear left to follow the trail along the ridge and back down to Wallhausen. There are picnic areas and a kiosk en route, as well as pebbly bays for refreshing dips in the lake.
Coming from Konstanz, Wallhausen is the best place to access the gorge, either by bicycle or bus 4 or 13 from the Haupt-bahnhof (€2, 30 minutes). From Wallhausen it’s a 3km walk to Marienschlucht.
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MEERSBURG
07532 / pop 5500
Tumbling down vine-streaked slopes to Lake Constance and crowned by a perkily turreted medieval castle, Meersburg lives up to all those clichéd knights-in-armour, damsel-in-distress fantasies. And if its tangle of cobbled lanes and half-timbered houses filled with jovial banter don’t sweep you off your feet, the local Pinot noir served in its cosy Weinstuben (wine taverns) will, we