Discover Görlitz: Old Town, culture and routes along the Neisse

Görlitz invites you to choose between impressive architectural history, museums and activities along the Neisse. Its historic Old Town has around 4,000 listed buildings and is considered one of the best-preserved ensembles in Central Europe. When planning your trip, you can choose your focus: churches and urban history, exhibitions and film locations, or a cycling route along the river.

Old Town sights and architectural history

At Untermarkt, the historic heart of Görlitz, you’ll find townhouses dating from the Renaissance and Baroque periods. St. Peter’s Church also shapes the cityscape: its twin towers are a distinctive feature of the skyline, and it is Saxony’s largest hall church. Inside is the Sun Organ, with 17 sun-shaped ranks of pipes. Among other things, it can imitate the calls of cuckoos and nightingales. The organ was built by Eugenio Casparini towards the end of the 17th century.

The Holy Sepulchre offers another perspective on religious architectural history. The complex consists of a double chapel, a House of Anointing and a Sepulchral Chapel, and is modeled on the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. It was built between 1481 and 1504. The historic city tour begins and ends at the Görlitz Information Centre on Obermarkt. If you include it in your plans, you can use Obermarkt as a landmark for exploring the city; check local access conditions before your trip.

Görlitz owes its still-visible splendor to its location on the historic Via Regia. The trade route once connected trading regions between Thuringia and Saxony in the west and Silesia, Bohemia and Poland in the east. The city’s towers tell another part of its history: the Reichenbach Tower explores city defense and the lives of its tower keepers, and also has a viewing point. The Nikolai Tower is Görlitz’s oldest surviving city tower and houses a small exhibition on the city’s history.

Museums, film and culture

The museums cover different periods and themes. The Kaisertrutz explores 14,000 years of cultural history, alongside special exhibitions and a modern gallery. The Silesian Museum in the Schönhof is devoted to nine centuries of Silesian history and culture across 2,000 square meters. Its focus is specifically on Silesia, while the Kaisertrutz covers a much longer period of cultural history.

The Schönhof itself is also part of this history: after a city fire, it was rebuilt in the Renaissance style from 1526 onward. It is the main building of the Silesian Museum and is one of the oldest Renaissance buildings north of the Alps. Film fans have another way to discover the city: more than 100 film productions have been shot in Görlitz since the 1950s. The “Walk of Görliwood®” takes you from one filming location to another around the city using a free SmartGuide app. Check in advance whether the app is available. ViaThea, the street arts festival, is one of the regular highlights of Görlitz’s cultural calendar; check dates and the program before your trip.

Routes between the city, river and lake

A cycling route follows the Neisse from the Old Town Bridge to Hagenwerder, then continues to Berzdorf Lake. Berzdorf Lake is a recreational lake with water sports, beaches, and walking and cycling paths. To start the cycling route, take tram line 1 or 2 to Jägerkaserne; from there, it’s about a ten-minute walk to the Old Town Bridge. Check the latest timetable information before setting off. The Old Town Bridge itself is a pedestrian bridge over the Neisse. Since 2004, it has once again connected Görlitz with its Polish twin city, Zgorzelec, and allows pedestrians to cross the border.

For a different kind of day, consider Görlitz City Park. Established in the 19th century, it offers meadows, mature trees and walking paths in the heart of the city. This lets you treat historic sightseeing, museum visits and walks in green spaces as different elements of your trip, rather than focusing on the same thing every day.

Family museum and regional cuisine

At the Senckenberg Museum of Natural History Görlitz, the family museum takes you on a thematic journey from Lusatia to a tropical coral reef. The vivarium displays around 70 animal species in twelve elaborately designed habitat tanks across 100 square meters. A live animal feeding demonstration takes place in the live animal area on the first Thursday of each month at 4 p.m.; admission is included in the museum ticket. Since this is a recurring program, it’s worth checking the current calendar before planning your visit.

The local cuisine also draws on a variety of regional influences: traditional dishes from Görlitz take inspiration from Silesian, Saxon and Polish cuisines. Silesian Heaven is a distinctive dish of Silesian cuisine. It adds a culinary dimension to your trip without requiring you to visit a particular restaurant.

Plan your stay around your interests

When looking for accommodation, it helps to first decide what you’d like to focus on. If you’re mainly interested in the Old Town, its architectural history and museums, consider including the historic tour starting at Obermarkt in your plans. For a trip with cycling stages along the Neisse, the route over the Old Town Bridge and the tram connection to Jägerkaserne are useful landmarks. If you’d like to combine several interests, you can include culture, a visit to the Senckenberg Museum and walks in green spaces in your plans. It’s best to check the dates for ViaThea, the museum program and the latest transport information before your trip.

Discover more destinations

Discover more destinations: Ebersbach-Neugersdorf, Oderwitz, Seifhennersdorf, Hähnichen, Oppach, Kreba-Neudorf, Zittau, Boxberg/Oberlausitz.

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