Mecklenburg Lake District and the Mueritz

The Largest Lake District In Germany, With Over A Thousand Lakes Linked By Navigable Channels, And The Mueritz The Biggest Lake Lying Wholly Inside The Country. The Mueritz National Park On Its Eastern Shore Is One Of The Best Places In Europe To Watch Cranes Gather In Autumn · Waren, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania

More than a thousand lakes lie in the glacial country between Berlin and the Baltic, linked by channels and short canals into a network you can travel for weeks without repeating yourself, and the Mueritz at its centre is the largest lake lying wholly inside Germany. This is flat, quiet, water-dominated land: reed beds, beech woods, small brick towns with harbours, and a boat traffic of houseboats, yachts and canoes that is the whole point of the region. On the Mueritz's eastern shore the national park protects a stretch of bog, lake and old beech forest where sea eagles nest and where thousands of cranes gather in autumn before flying south, which is the single best wildlife spectacle in northern Germany. Waren and Roebel are the practical bases, Plau and Malchow the quieter ones, and the great attraction for visitors is that much of it can be done under your own power: a hired canoe, a bicycle on a flat rail trail, or a houseboat that in some classes can be driven without a full licence.

Around the Mueritz between Waren and Roebel, with the national park entrances at Federow and Boek, central Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Waren, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Germany

The lakes, shore paths and cycle routes are open all the time and free. The national park information houses at Federow and Boek keep daytime hours and close for part of the winter, and the observation hides are open daylight hours year round. Passenger boats on the Mueritz and through the linked lakes run from roughly April to October with a much reduced shoulder-season timetable, and almost nothing runs in winter; the same goes for canoe and houseboat hire, which is a spring-to-autumn business. Autumn crane-watching evenings at the park's hides are guided, limited in number and need booking well ahead. The park closes certain shore sections in the bird breeding season, and those closures are enforced. Trains reach Waren and Malchow from Berlin and Rostock; beyond the towns a car, a bike or a boat is close to essential.

Mecklenburg Lake District and the Mueritz on Spottos · Explore more places on Spottos