Bremen (Germany): One Night

~ youkyong

May 2025

Else am See restaurant was a great find

Sometimes you find a gem totally unexpectedly. We were driving to Bremen on our way to Hamburg after spending almost 2 weeks in Riel, Netherlands, and, I was looking for a lunch stop to break up the 6 hour drive. Gary was excited about finally driving the Autobahn, and, the first half of the trip went by quickly. I started a restaurant search on Google Maps and noticed a highly rated place not too far from the freeway. Well, it wasn’t that close, and there were lots of turns that seemed to get us away from any kind of civilization. Suddenly a lakeside recreation area appeared, and there was the restaurant.

The menu was similar to a generic lakeside casual dining eatery in the U.S. But the food was excellent and the price was right unlike most restaurants with scenery to boast about.

In Bremen, the Aparthotel Adagio Bremen was perfect for us once we found it. It was around the corner from the Central Station (#1 on the map above) & there was an all day 5 euro parking structure diagonally across from the hotel. The tricky part was finding the entrance to the hotel. The hotel consists of one section of a huge building complex. You have to be at the correct entrance to see the hotel whose lobby is on the 6th floor & there were many entrances to the complex. The hotel was very comfortable with spacious, clean rooms at 65 euros/night.

It had rained on and off all day, and, the rain became serious as we entered Bremen (population: 560,000). Since we were near the Central Station, there were plenty of places to eat. We ended up at an Asian restaurant which seemed to have a more comfortable sitting area than the other quick meal places. The food was better than we expected.

The next morning was sunny, and we started our exploration at the Central Station whose architecture was interesting.

We walked toward the Old Quarter and crossed a bridge that showed a windmill. Oh, are we still in Netherlands?

A 10-15 minute pleasant walk delivered us to the Market Square (#6 on the map)which is smack in the middle of the Old Quarter.

St. Peter’s Cathedral is in that general area.
So is the Bremen Roland statue. We were in Bremen briefly once before, but the only thing I remember from that trip is this statue.
And the beautiful City Hall is right there, too.
If you walk around the western corner of the City Hall, you will see…
the most famous symbol of Bremen: the statue of the Bremen Town Musicians depicting 4 animals on top of one another as described in a folktale collected by the Grimm Brothers.
the most loved donkey+dog+cat+rooster in the world for sure. They show up everywhere in the city

We walked for another 10-15 minutes and reached the Schnoor (#10 on the map) neighborhood, the oldest district in Bremen.

It’s not a big area, but one can spend hours admiring the details of each building.

Each store is attractive and inviting.
Oh, another cute alley!
The renovated, more modern, buildings blended in well somehow with the colors and shapes they applied.
We were hoping to find brunch in the area, and, we did – at a magical little place.
Yes, the real German breakfast feast!

We walked over to the artsy Bottcher Street (#8 on the map) on the way back. People started pouring into Bremen, we could see.

Bremen probably deserved to be seen at least one full day. We could have visited some museums and spent more time in each location, but we were happy that we stopped there.