Regensburg Old Town

Regensburg escaped the rebuilding that reshaped most German river cities, so the medieval trading town is still legible street by street. Wealthy merchant families here copied Italy and raised tower houses to advertise their standing, and a dozen of those towers still break the roofline. The Steinerne Brucke, built in the twelfth century, carried traffic across the Danube for eight hundred years and now carries only walkers, which makes it the best vantage point in the city. Behind it rises the cathedral of St Peter, French Gothic in ambition, home to the Domspatzen boys' choir. Roman Regensburg surfaces too, in the Porta Praetoria gateway left embedded in a later wall.

What you actually see

• The Steinerne Brucke - the twelfth century stone bridge, walkers only, with the whole waterfront in view.
• St Peter's Cathedral - Gothic glass and the Domspatzen choir, whose sung mass is open to anyone.
• The patrician towers - merchant tower houses built to out-rank the neighbours, Italian in spirit.
• Porta Praetoria - a Roman gate arch still standing inside a medieval wall.

When to go

May to September gives long evenings on the Danube embankment and full river boat schedules. December fills the courtyards with markets, including one in the Thurn und Taxis palace grounds. Summer weekends are busy with river cruise passengers who arrive in blocks around midday, so start early and keep the middle hours for indoor sights.

Honest expectations

Cruise groups funnel through the same few lanes between bridge and cathedral, and in July that stretch is shoulder to shoulder. Cobbles are uneven and hard going with a suitcase. The cathedral interior stays dim and its best glass sits high above the nave, which underwhelms visitors expecting colour at eye level. Riverside terraces charge accordingly.

Nearby

Walhalla above the Danube downstream, the abbey at the Danube gorge near Weltenburg, and Landshut.