Hamburg, Germany: River Port, Speicherstadt Canals, and the Best Music Scene in Germany

Miniatur Wunderland is the world's largest model railway exhibition — 16,000 square meters of track, 1,380 trains, and dioramas covering Hamburg, the Alps, the United States, Scandinavia, and other regions, with 390,000 individual figures. The attention to detail includes tiny Autobahn traffic jams, planes landing at Hamburg Airport with synchronized runway lighting, and a Hamburg harbor with 280 ships. It is genuinely one of the best visitor experiences in Germany for any age. Booking well ahead is required; daily capacity limits are enforced.

Speicherstadt, the red-brick warehouse district built on piles in the canals between 1883 and 1927, is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the city's most evocative neighborhood. The canals between the warehouse blocks catch the northern light at a quality that makes the whole district photogenic in any season. The Spice Museum and Hamburg Museum of Miniatures (separate from Miniatur Wunderland) occupy the warehouse buildings. The Chilehaus, a 1924 office building in the shape of a ship's prow, is ten minutes from Speicherstadt.

The Elbphilharmonie, opened in 2017 on top of a former warehouse building at the harbor entrance, is one of the most dramatic concert halls in Europe. The wave-shaped glass superstructure sits on the original brick warehouse base; the public plaza at the ninth floor level is freely accessible by escalator and provides 360-degree views over the Elbe, the harbor, and the city. No concert ticket needed for the plaza.

Reeperbahn, the entertainment district in the St. Pauli neighborhood, is what Hamburg is known for internationally. The music clubs and bars on the surrounding streets are where the Beatles played 800 hours of live shows between 1960 and 1962 before returning to Liverpool to record their first albums. Indra Club and the Kaiserkeller still operate.

The Alster lakes, two artificial lakes in the center of the city, are circumnavigated on foot in about ninety minutes. The Binnenalster (inner lake) has a fountain; the Außenalster (outer lake) has sailing dinghies and kayaks for rent. The boulevard hotels on the Außenalster are the most expensive real estate in Hamburg.