Germany (Lonely Planet, 6th Edition) - Andrea Schulte-Peevers [453]
Hotel am Triller ( 580 000; Trillerweg 57; www.hotel-am-triller.de, in German; s/d Mon-Thu €118/146, Fri-Sun €90/110; ) This 110-room boutique hotel, on a quiet street uphill from Schlossplatz, has artsy public areas, creatively ultramodern rooms and an organic restaurant. The website offers discounts. To get there, take Eisenbahnstrasse to Vorstadtstrasse, then on to Trillerweg.
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Eating & Drinking
Many local dishes revolve around the humble potato – look for Hoorische (potato dumplings, literally ‘hairy ones’), Gefillde (Hoorische filled with minced meat and liver sausage) and Dibbelabbes (a potato casserole with dried meat and leeks). In the French tradition, meals are often served with a basket of crunchy French bread.
Saarbrücken’s lively restaurant, cafe and bar scene centres on St Johanner Markt and nearby streets Saarstrasse, Am Stiefel and Kappenstrasse, with cheaper eats along Kaltenbachstrasse. Four long blocks northeast, Nauwieserstrasse is home to a number of cutting-edge student cafes. On the Left Bank, cafes can be found around the Schlossplatz.
Café Kostbar ( 374 360; Nauwieserstrasse 19; mains €5-8; 11am-1am, meals served noon-3pm & 6-11pm) In a neighbourhood with a counter-cultural vibe, this courtyard establishment, popular with impoverished students, serves a small selection of inexpensive but filling salads, mains, vegie options and lunch specials.
Oro ( 938 8663; St Johanner Markt 7-9; daily specials €6, mains €7.50-24.50; 10am-1am) A chic wine bar and upscale restaurant with a leafy courtyard, generous salads and about 30 wines by the glass.
Kulturcafé ( 379 9200; St Johanner Markt 24; mains €6.90-12.90; 8.30am-1am) A cafe by day, this stylish place attracts a youngish crowd after dark with its black-and-red minimalism-meets-gothic decor.
Zum Stiefel ( 936 450; www.stiefelgastronomie.de, in German; Am Stiefel 2; mains €8.50-21) The Gasthaus features good-value classic German and saarländische dishes; adjacent Stiefel-Bräu is Saarbrücken’s oldest brewery-pub.
Wally’s Irish Pub ( 01577 195 4180; Katolisch-Kirch-Strasse 1; 2pm-midnight Sun-Thu, 2pm-2am Fri, noon-2am Sat) A welcoming pub, popular with local Anglophones, that’s owned by an Irish fellow whose name is not Wally.
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Getting There & Away
Saarbrücken Airport ( 06893-832 72; www.flughafen-saarbruecken.de, in German), about 14km east of the city, offers mainly holiday charters and short hops within Germany.
Saarbrücken’s Hauptbahnhof has at least hourly rail connections to Trier (€13.30, one hour), Idar-Oberstein (€13.30, 50 minutes) and Mainz (€27.40, 1¾ hours). The city’s main bus station is outside the Hauptbahnhof.
Saarbrücken is on the A6 from Kaiserslautern and Mannheim and the A1 from the Moselle Valley.
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Getting Around
The Saarland has an extensive integrated bus and rail network ( 500 3377; www.saarbahn.de, www.vgs-online.de, in German) that includes one tram line, optimistically named S1. Tickets within the city (Zone 111) cost €2.10 (€1.90 for up to five stops); a day pass for one/five people costs €4.80/8.20. Bus R10 goes from the Hauptbahnhof out to the airport (€2.30, 25 minutes, hourly Monday to Friday, every two or three hours Saturday and Sunday).
You can book a taxi on 330 33.
Bicycles can be hired from Der Fahrradladen ( 370 98; Nauwieserstrasse 19; per day/weekend/week €15/30/50; 2-7pm Mon, 10am-7pm Tue-Fri, 10am-2pm or 3pm Sat), in the courtyard at Café Kostbar.
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VÖLKLINGER HÜTTE
Both Dickensian and futuristic, dystopian and a symbol of renewal, the hulking former ironworks of Völklinger Hütte ( 06898-910 0100; www.voelklinger-huette.org; Völklingen; adult/7-16yr/student/family €12/3/10/25; 10am-7pm late Mar-Oct, 10am-6pm Nov-late Mar), located in Völklingen, about 10km northwest of Saarbrücken, are one of Europe’s great heavy-industrial relics. Opened in 1873, 17,000