Hotels in Berlin

Berlin wears its history openly — the Wall's route is marked through the streets, the Reichstag dome and the Holocaust Memorial sit minutes apart, and the East Side Gallery keeps a kilometre of Wall covered in murals. It's also Europe's most stubborn night-owl city: clubs run from Friday night to Monday morning, and door policies are famously arbitrary.

The city is huge and low-rise, so distances deceive; you'll live on the U-Bahn and S-Bahn. It's scruffier than Munich and cheaper than London, and that's rather the point. Stay in Mitte for first-visit sightseeing on foot, Prenzlauer Berg for handsome streets and calmer evenings, or Kreuzberg/Friedrichshain if the nightlife is why you came. August is fine; February is grey and asks commitment.