Nantes, France
It’s an unusual dilemma: ride a giant squid or take a submarine to the ocean floor. In the end, I’m drawn to a fierce-looking merhorse and cautiously take the reins. Above me, my daughter glides by on a flying fish with flapping metallic fins, while her dad battles stormy seas at the helm of a huge conch shell. Riding the Carrousel des Mondes Marins—a three-story steampunk carousel inspired by Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea—is one of the highlights of visiting Nantes. It’s a surreal fairground ride, a work of art, and a tribute to the city’s most famous native son. And it’s a lot of fun.
On the banks of the Loire, 30 miles from the Atlantic, Nantes is a city whose fortunes were built on the sea. Growing up near the docks in the 1830s, young Verne dreamed of being a ship’s captain, but that wasn’t meant to be. Instead, he went on imaginary journeys, pouring his wanderlust into novels like Around the World in 80 Days and Journey to the Centre of the Earth. The last of Nantes’ shipyards closed in the 1980s, but Verne’s unique vision inspired a bold art and regeneration project called Les Machines de l’Île, which has brought life back to the abandoned quays and warehouses of the Île de Nantes, the river island that once housed the city’s docks.
This is now home to the Grand Éléphant, a 12-meter-high mechanical elephant that carries passengers around the island, spraying bystanders with water from its trunk. I’d seen photos, but nothing prepares you for the thrill of turning a corner and seeing the real thing lumbering toward you. You can learn about the magic behind the machinery at the nearby Galerie des Machines, where the creators bring a mechanical menagerie of strange creatures to life.
The Verne connection also inspired the name of the city’s summer arts festival, Le Voyage à Nantes, which turns streets, parks, and public spaces into an open-air art gallery from July to September. Our visit coincides with the festival’s opening weekend, and the squares and avenues of the elegant Graslin district are buzzing with DJ sets, food stalls, and people checking out the new artworks. In Place Graslin, a beautiful square built—like much of Nantes—from chalky-white tuffeau stone from the Loire valley, some kind of cataclysmic eruption has been conjured up in front of the opera house. Huge ammonites appear to have been forced up from beneath the earth, engulfing cars in a mountain of rubble, their doors wide open, radios playing, as if abandoned in a hurry.
Just yards away, children play in the dancing fountains of the square, while white-aproned waiters from the art nouveau brasserie La Cigale weave through the pavement tables, delivering seafood platters to diners unfazed by the apocalyptic scene before them. Titled Fossil Opera, the artwork comments on consumerism and the fleeting nature of human effort, and it’s one of about a dozen site-specific installations that have appeared in the city, as if by magic.
Even outside the summer months, there’s plenty to discover in France’s sixth-largest city. Each year, a handful of festival installations are chosen to become permanent fixtures, resulting in an impressive collection of contemporary public art—from Les Anneaux, a series of 18 giant steel rings on the Quai des Antilles that frame views of the Loire and light up at night, to Tadashi Kawamata’s Belvédère de l’Hermitage, a viewing platform inspired byA swallow’s nest juts out over a sheer cliff.
View image in fullscreen
La Cigale, an art nouveau brasserie on Place Graslin. Photograph: Hemis/Alamy
All these cultural highlights, old and new, are connected by the Ligne Verte, a 12-mile (20km) green line painted on the pavement. We follow the trail through the Passage Pommeraye, a beautiful 19th-century shopping arcade with a glass roof; past the grand Château des ducs de Bretagne, a 15th-century castle surrounded by a moat; stop at the excellent Musée d’arts de Nantes, which has an impressive collection of international art spanning seven centuries; and finish at the peaceful Jardin des Plantes, a charming (and free) botanical garden with a few modern art installations and a good café. From here, it’s a short walk to the Lieu Unique, a cultural space and concert venue set in the factory that once made the city’s beloved buttery LU biscuits.
And there’s more to come. The Jardin Extraordinaire is a newly created garden and climbing wall in a disused granite quarry in the Bas-Chantenay district. The exotic plants, waterfall, and paddling pools were inspired by descriptions in Verne’s novel, The Mysterious Island. The nearby Chantenay docks now host studios, music spaces, and the Little Atlantique Brewery, which is housed in a 19th-century former oil mill. Opposite the quarry, a derelict industrial building is being turned into a new riverside cultural hub, the Cité des Imaginaires, which will eventually house an expanded Jules Verne museum. It’s an ambitious project: creative, unconventional, and forward-looking. I’m sure Jules Verne would approve.
Joanne O’Connor
The trip was supported by Le Voyage à Nantes. Oceania Hôtel de France, just off Place Graslin, has air-conditioned doubles from €101 room-only. Winter’s Journey, a seasonal festival of concerts, temporary light installations, artworks, and gastronomic events, runs from 21 November to 3 January.
Basel, Switzerland
View image in fullscreen
Swimmers in the Rhine beside Basel Cathedral. Photograph: Hemis/Alamy
Unless you’re a professional who goes to the Art Basel fair every year, chances are Switzerland’s third-largest city will have passed you by – or rather, you will have passed it by. Basel is one stop before Zurich on the fast train from Paris, but speeding through would be a mistake. For art and design lovers, it’s the perfect city to explore over a long weekend.
Basel calls itself “the city of art and culture on the Rhine,” and it lives up to that claim. Stroll around the charming old town and admire the cathedral before enjoying a cold beer at one of the many cafés. If temperatures rise, you might want to join the locals for a dip in the Rhine.
Once you’ve done all that, you need to explore the area’s art offerings. In the city, the Kunstmuseum holds more than 300,000 works spanning eight centuries, with big names like Monet, Van Gogh, and Warhol, while Museum Tinguely showcases the work of the quirky Swiss sculptor Jean Tinguely and his dada-esque machines.
But the two real highlights are on the outskirts of the city. Fondation Beyeler in the suburb of Riehen has an impressive collection of modern and contemporary art, and always has a blockbuster exhibition (currently Pierre Huyghe) to see. A short bus or train ride across the German border in Weil am Rhein is the Vitra Design Museum, home to one of the world’s largest permanent exhibitions of modern furniture design.
View image in fullscreen
Miniatures of designer chairs at the Vitra Design Museum near Basel. Photograph: Sipa US/Alamy
Before you admire the furniture collection, take a walk around the campus, where you can marvel at the main museum building designed by Frank Gehry; the Vitra Schaudepot – which houses the furniture collectionDesigned by Herzog & de Meuron, along with Zaha Hadid’s former fire station and Tadao Ando’s conference centre, the area also features a beautiful garden by Dutch designer Piet Oudolf. More recently, the Doshi Retreat was added—a quiet spot for reflection designed by Indian architect Balkrishna Doshi. It was his first completed project outside India and the last he worked on before he passed away in 2023.
That takes up half the day, so it’s time to head inside. Exploring the Schaudepot is a bit like walking through a giant doll’s house, with rooms full of instantly recognisable furniture icons from the 19th century to today, including pieces by Verner Panton, Le Corbusier, Alvar Aalto, and Charles and Ray Eames. The museum also hosts temporary exhibitions. And if all that has worn you out, stop by the VitraHaus Café for a tasty lunch.
Max Benato
The Volkshaus, a boutique hotel in the old town, has doubles from 152 Swiss francs (about £138), room only.
Lübeck, Germany
View image in fullscreen
The ‘wonky’ Holsten Gate in Lübeck. Photograph: SW Travel Imagery/Alamy
Unless you’ve read Buddenbrooks, Thomas Mann’s epic family saga, you might not have heard of Lübeck. But in the Middle Ages, this port city in Germany, 70km north-east of Hamburg, was one of the richest and most powerful places on Earth. Today, despite the RAF’s efforts to destroy it in 1942, it remains a beautifully intact medieval gem.
The old town is a Unesco world heritage site. It sits on an island in the centre of the city, surrounded by the rivers Trave and Wakenitz, and the water is a great place to start exploring. My boyfriend and I hired an electric boat (€49 for up to six people) and spent an hour circling the island, taking in its distinctive seven church spires.
Back on dry land, we joined a guided walking tour, starting at the imposing—if wonky—Holsten Gate. We visited the five red brick churches the spires belong to (two have twin towers), and climbed one of them, St Petri’s viewing tower, for a panoramic view. We also stopped at the 800-year-old town hall on the marketplace.
But just as fascinating was what lies behind the gothic splendour. At one time, there were 180 hidden alleyways and courtyards threaded through the old town, and about 80 remain. These maze-like lanes were built behind wealthy merchants’ mansions to house the poor. Today, the restored cottages are highly sought after, and the flower-filled, cobbled alleys are charming to explore.
Behind the gothic splendour is a labyrinth of flower-filled, cobbled alleys to explore.
To better understand Lübeck’s past, we visited the European Hansemuseum in the old castle monastery. It tells the story of the Hanseatic League, the powerful trade network that stretched from England to Russia and gave Lübeck (“the Queen of the League”) its wealth in the Middle Ages and its status as a free city state right up to 1937.
In a nearby palace, the Museum Behnhaus Drägerhaus displays 19th- and early 20th-century German and European art, including work by Edvard Munch, who visited Lübeck and painted its salt warehouses. Just round the corner is the Günter Grass-Haus, where the writer regularly stayed (he died in Lübeck in 2015).
We visited in June during the HanseKulturFestival, when the quarter around St Jakob’s church was full of live music stages, food stalls, and outdoor bars. The next festival isn’t until 2028, but there are annual museum, theatre, and literature nights, as well as pop-up live music in the summer.
Lübeck has three natural open-air swimming areas, one on the island. And the seaside isn’t far away—we took a day trip to Travemünde, a historic resort town with miles of sandy beach, getting there by scenic river ferry (90 minutes) and returning by a 20-minute train.
View image in fullscreen
The old town of Lübeck is encircled by the rivers Trave and Wakenitz. Photograph: Acnakelsy/Getty Images/iStockphoto
In town, the medieval Schiffergesellschaft (Seafare(Restaurant Guild) is now a traditional Hanseatic eatery with long shared tables. Alongside North Sea fish and Holstein meat dishes, they offer vegetarian versions of labskaus, a kind of hash.
Unfortunately, we couldn’t visit Buddenbrookhaus, the museum dedicated to the novel, because it’s undergoing renovation. It’s expected to reopen in 2030 – which gives you plenty of time to read Mann’s 864-page doorstopper. Like Lübeck itself, it’s worth the effort.
Rachel Dixon
The trip was provided by germany.travel and luebeck-tourismus.de. Accommodation was provided by Liho Lübeck, with doubles from £73 room-only.
Parma, Italy
View image in fullscreen
Parma Cathedral and the octagonal baptistery. Photograph: Peter Adams/Getty Images
Parma sits just far enough off Italy’s main travel routes to avoid the huge tourist crowds that flood places like Venice and Florence. Most visitors reach this tranquil Italian gem by flying into Milan or Bologna, then taking an hour-long train ride. It’s definitely worth that extra effort, as I discover a city that ticks every box for a weekend getaway: fabulous museums and frescoed churches without long queues or needing to book a time slot in advance; friendly, affordable trattorias and osterias showcasing a feast of local food and wines; and, if you time it right, the chance to catch an opera by locally born Giuseppe Verdi in the intimate Teatro Regio.
The historic center of Parma is small and easy to explore on foot, taking me past an array of architectural masterpieces. I start at the grand Piazza Duomo, dominated by the imposing 900-year-old Romanesque cathedral. Everyone’s eyes are drawn up to the ornate cupola, decorated with a captivating illusionist fresco by local Renaissance artist Antonio da Correggio. Next to the cathedral stands the early Gothic Battistero, an octagonal baptistery whose bare, minimalist exterior contrasts with an incredible burst of colors from the 13th- and 14th-century paintings covering the interior. Then, tucked away behind the Duomo, I come across the entrance to the medieval Monastero di San Giovanni Evangelista, whose cloisters and garden are a peaceful oasis. Entry to the monastery and cathedral is free.
Appreciate works by Leonardo da Vinci, Tintoretto, and Canaletto without being surrounded by crowds.
Parma’s big must-see is the monumental Palazzo della Pilotta, a baroque complex of palatial museums, a library, and a remarkable 400-year-old theater, all included in a single €18 entry ticket. Just by the Parma river that splits the city in two, the palazzo was built by the Farnese family, whose patronage created most of the city’s Renaissance monuments. The Teatro Farnese, made almost entirely of wood, is rarely used as a venue today, but a visit remains an incredible experience. I save most of my sightseeing time, though, for the Pilotta’s landmark Galleria Nazionale di Parma, a treasure trove of old master paintings. It may not quite rival the Uffizi’s collection, but I enjoy the chance to just show up without booking in advance and quietly appreciate works by Leonardo da Vinci, Fra Angelico, Canaletto, and Tintoretto without being surrounded by crowds.
View image in fullscreen
Antonio Correggio’s Assunzione della Virgine in the cupola of Parma’s Duomo. Photograph: Gordon Sinclair/Alamy
Sightseeing is only part of Parma’s appeal, however, as this is one of Italy’s food capitals. I walk into the rustic, lively OsteMagno bar, where everyone is digging into tagliere – wooden boards piled with razor-thin slices of cured ham, the famous prosciutto crudo di Parma, artisan salami, and crumbly aged parmigiano reggiano cheese, accompanied by a glass of the locals’ favorite drink, fizzy red Lambrusco wine, which is much more drinkable than I expected.
This isn’t a city for chic, gourmet restaurants, but rather for one of the many traditional trattorias like Da Antonia, whose eponymous owner has run the kitchen for over 50 years, or the 120-year-old Trattoria.Corrieri serves up generous plates of homemade pasta for under €15.
John Brunton
Palazzo Dalla Rosa Prati has doubles from €80, room only.
Santander, Spain
View image in fullscreen
El Sardinero beach, Santander. Photograph: Miguel Moya/Alamy
Santander is often dismissed as little more than a ferry terminal – a place to stop overnight if you’re taking your dog to Europe or trying to cut your carbon footprint. But this port city is now going through something of a cultural revival. It already has a stunning bay facing the Cantabrian mountains, wide sandy beaches, grand plazas with columns, and fantastic food. Now, with new art spaces and museums opening in the coming months, the Cantabrian capital is set to become a real weekend destination.
Leading the way on 8 September is Faro Santander – a new cultural centre in a grand historic building that houses a 1,000-piece art collection owned by Banco Santander. It includes works by Velázquez, Goya, Titian, Rubens, and Picasso, with different parts of the collection shown at different times.
There’s an unhurried, laid-back vibe in the streets, grand plazas, and narrow alleys near the gothic cathedral.
With its ornate white facade facing the bay, the Pereda building was once the bank’s headquarters. It has now been transformed into a striking, 21st-century museum space by Pritzker Prize-winning British architect David Chipperfield.
Santander’s moment in the spotlight will continue into 2027, when Madrid’s Reina Sofia Museum opens its first outpost in a similarly grand neo-Renaissance building just a few metres from Faro Santander. The museum will house the Archivo Lafuente, with paintings, sculptures, and manuscripts, including major collections on dadaism and the Spanish civil war, as well as art from Spain, North America, and Latin America.
Faro Santander and Archivo Lafuente will form two points of a kind of “art triangle,” along with architect Renzo Piano’s 2017 Centro Botín contemporary art centre just across the road. With a small but impressive permanent collection, including works by Matisse, Juan Gris, Joaquín Sorolla, and Mark Rothko, the Centro Botín sits on the waterfront like a giant, stilt-mounted 60s alarm clock sawn in half.
View image in fullscreen
Renzo Piano’s Centro Botin. Photograph: Nick Hatton/Alamy
Spaniards have long appreciated Santander’s charms. The seafront is lined with elegant fin-de-siècle villas, built when wealthy Madrileños discovered that the city’s Atlantic breezes were the perfect escape from the Spanish capital’s brutal summer heat. More than 100 years later, while Britain was in the middle of its own heatwave, I followed their lead. Temperatures were in the pleasant high 20s as I strolled past toddlers building sandcastles and teenagers playing in the surf on El Sardinero beach, just 15 minutes by bus from the city centre.
The centre itself is wonderfully walkable, and there’s an unhurried, laid-back vibe in the streets, grand plazas, and narrow alleys near the gothic cathedral, lined with bars serving pinchos – the Cantabrian version of tapas.
After enjoying tender, grilled squid with bold garlic and olive oil at Mesón Rampalay on a leafy square, I spent a fascinating couple of hours at Mupac – the Museum of Prehistory and Archaeology of Cantabria, just a few minutes’ walk from Faro Santander.
The museum, which holds one of Spain’s most important prehistoric collections, features excellent interactive displays. In 2027, it will move to a brand new, multimillion-euro building. By next year, it seems, Santander will be not just the capital of Cantabria, but a capital of culture too.
Eddi Fiegel
The trip was provided by Faro Santander. Abba Santander, near the Centro Botín, has stylish doubles from €66, room only.
Frequently Asked Questions
Here is a list of FAQs based on the article title and topic
1 What does undertheradar actually mean in this context
It means were talking about cities that arent the first places people think of for a weekend trip These are smaller less crowded capitals or regional hubs where you get a big cultural experience without the massive tourist crowds
2 Why should I choose one of these cities over a major European capital
The main benefits are shorter queues and more breathing room You can walk into major museums without booking weeks in advance prices for hotels and food are usually lower and you get a more authentic local feel because you arent surrounded by thousands of other tourists
3 Can you give me an example of a city that fits this description
Places like Valencia Porto Krakow or Antwerp are perfect examples They have fantastic art history and architecture but they dont have the same overwhelming foot traffic as London or Barcelona
4 Is it true that no queues means I can just walk right in to any museum
Not any museum but generally yes You might wait 510 minutes to buy a ticket but you wont face the 2hour snaking lines you see at the Louvre or the Uffizi For the most famous single attraction in these cities you should still book a slot online in advance
5 Are these cities good for people who dont usually like museums
Absolutely Because they are less crowded you can spend less time feeling rushed and more time actually enjoying the exhibits Plus these cities usually have amazing food scenes and lovely old town centers to wander through so you can mix a quick museum visit with other relaxing activities
6 When is the best time of year to visit to guarantee fewer crowds
The shoulder seasons are your best bet You get pleasant weather but avoid the summer holiday rush Also visiting during the week is much quieter than on weekends
7 Are these destinations harder to get to than major capitals
Not necessarily Many of these cities have their own international airports served by budget airlines Even if they are smaller they are
