In another article we have already presented the most beautiful Brandenburg sights. Here we want to deal with the most important practical aspects of travel and give you some important Brandenburg travel tips.
The most important Brandenburg travel tips
Climate and travel time
Brandenburg is located in a temperate climate zone and is influenced by the foothills of the Atlantic winds and the Eastern European continental climate. Mild summers are followed by relatively cool winters, which roughly correspond to the German average, but are often somewhat cold, especially in southern Brandenburg and in Lusatia. There are few differences within Brandenburg due to the few elevations.
Winters and spring are usually relatively dry, most of the precipitation here comes from the sky in summer and autumn.
The optimal time for your visit to Brandenburg depends, of course, on your personal interests. Are you planning a visit to Potsdam with its parks and palaces? Of course, this is possible all year round. In summer, however, it can get very crowded here, so ideally you should spend your time there in the off-season. If you prefer to visit the countless forests, rivers and lakes of the state, summer is ideal. Whether in Havelland or on the Spree – here are the ideal temperatures for nature lovers.
The most beautiful sights of Brandenburg
- Potsdam – one of the most beautiful cities in Germany, enchants with Sanssouci Palace, the Babelsberg Film Studios and the Dutch Quarter
- Spreewald – a unique cultural landscape in which many houses are accessible only by boat
- Beelitz Heilstätten – a former pulmonary sanatorium and later a major Soviet hospital, today with a treetop trail and guided tours
- Rheinsberg – picturesque small town with a castle that provided a home for Tucholsky and Frederick the Great
- Brandenburg – beautiful old town that gave the state its name
- Fläming – nature region with a 230km trail system for skaters and cyclists.
- Niederfinow Ship’s Hoist – technical masterpiece and attractive photo motif not only for engineers
- Grumsin beech forest – Unesco World Natural Heritage with natural hiking trails
- Chorin Monastery – monastery with unique Nordic brick architecture.
- Lower Oder Valley National Park – natural landscape with countless rare birds and great views
In a separate article we have presented you the most beautiful Brandenburg sights.
Special routes
By car
German Avenue Road – leads in Brandenburg from Rheinsberg via Neuruppin, Brandenburg and along many beautiful avenues through the Fläming further to Wittenberg in Saxony-Anhalt
By bicycle
Elberadweg – one of the most beautiful cycling routes in Germany also leads through Brandenburg along the area around the Elbe and Elster rivers
Oder-Neisse Cycle Route – one of the most popular cycle routes in the East leads from the Czech Republic through Lusatia along the Neisse River to the Szczecin Lagoon and on to Usedom. Most of the route is in Brandenburg
Public transport
Of course, you can also use the long-distance trains of the Deutsche Bahn in Thuringia. However, due to the relatively low population density by German standards, only the following stations are served by long-distance trains:
- Angermünde
- Schönefeld
- Bernau (bei Berlin)
- Brandenburg an der Havel
- Cottbus
- Eberswalde Central Station
- Elsterwerda
- Airport Berlin Brandenburg
- Forst (Lausitz)
- Frankfurt (Oder)
- Lübben (Spreewald)
- Lübbenau (Spreewald)
- Potsdam Central Station
- Prenzlau
- Wittenberge
The VBB (Verkehrsverbund Berlin-Brandenburg) is responsible for the smaller long-distance and local transport in Brandenburg. You can view detailed network plans of the association here.
Especially around the German capital Berlin and the state capital Potsdam, the network is well developed and the frequency is high. This also applies to the cities of Frankfurt/Oder, Cottbus and Brandenburg an der Havel. Otherwise, however, you may have to expect longer waiting times on regional and commuter trains, which also applies to buses.
Regional tickets
Deutsche Bahn’s Brandenburg-Berlin-Ticket is an inexpensive way to explore Berlin and Brandenburg and is therefore ideal if you want to discover both the capital and the region, for example to take trips to Potsdam, the Havel River and the Spreewald. The ticket costs a flat €33 and is valid for one to five people. So if you’re traveling alone or as a couple, it may be cheaper to buy a one-way ticket. The Brandenburg-Berlin-Ticket is only valid for local trains on the selected day. From Monday to Friday you can unfortunately only start from 9 o’clock, on weekends already from midnight. The validity ends at 3 a.m. on the following day.
In addition, there is also the Brandeburg-Berlin-Ticket-Nacht (Night Ticket). The difference to the normal Länderticket is that you can only travel from 6 pm to 6 am (on weekends until 7 am), but the price is only 25 €. For example, if you start in Berlin and want to travel in a group to a city in Brandenburg on Fridays after work, the ticket is worth it.
If you are not sure which ticket is the cheapest for you, you can simply use the Deutsche Bahn timetable information, which always shows you the optimal ticket.
On the road with the car
Since the bus and train schedules are not always optimal, the car is of course a good alternative to get around Brandenburg. This is especially true if you want to travel to more remote places in the south or north of Brandenburg.
Of course, Brandenburg also benefits greatly from Berlin’s excellent connection to the German highway network. The highways usually do not lead into the city area of Berlin, but in a ring around the capital, which is why you can easily switch from one highway to the other.
The following highways (Autobahn) run through Brandenburg:
- The A2 leads from the Ruhr area via Bielefeld, Hanover and Saxony-Anhalt past Brandenburg an der Havel and then as the A10 or A12 through eastern Brandenburg via Frankfurt/Oder to Poland. The most important German east-west axis is therefore ideal if you visited western Germany, Lower Saxony or certain parts of Saxony-Anhalt before coming here.
- The A9 connects Munich with Berlin and runs through southwestern Brandenburg. If you are coming from Bavaria, Thuringia, western Saxony or eastern Saxony-Anhalt, this is the best option.
- You can get from Dresden to Brandenburg via the A13. The route leads through the Spreewald and then to Berlin.
- The A15 is one of the shortest German freeways and leads from the Polish border via Cottbus to the Spreewald. There is a connection to the A13.
- If you are coming from northern Schleswig-Holstein or from the Baltic coast of Mecklenburg, you can either take the A24 described below or drive parallel to the coast to Greifswald, where the autobahn makes a detour to the south and leads past Neubrandenburg and Pasewalk near Prenzlau to Brandenburg. Here you change to the A11 and reach the Berlin ring road.
- Visited Hamburg before? Good, the A24, which starts in the Hanseatic city, runs through western Mecklenburg-Vorpommern to Brandenburg, is a good place to start.
In addition, there are numerous federal highways.
Typical dishes in Brandenburg
- Plinsen – a kind of small pancake that comes from the Sorbian cuisine
- Curd potatoes with linseed oil – especially popular in the south of Brandenburg
- Wrukeneintopf – dish from the Uckermark with turnips
- Spreewald gherkins – pickled cucumbers
What do you think? Do you have any other Brandenburg travel tips? Write your Brandenburg travel tips in the comments!