Sehenswürdigkeiten

Berlin's many parks and forests are tailor-made for walking and jogging, and the countryside around central Berlin has many lovely cycling routes. Ice skating is available at a number of indoor rinks from mid-October to early March. There are also dozens of swimming pools to choose from.

The Bauhaus Archive/Museum of Design is devoted to the members of the Bauhaus School, who laid the basis for much of contemporary design and architecture. Founded in Weimar by Berlin architect Walter Gropius, it aimed to unite art with everyday functionality, from doorknobs and radiators to the layout of entire districts and apartment blocks.

Walter Gropius himself, the founder of the Bauhaus school (1919-33), designed the avant-garde building housing the Bauhaus Archive/Museum of Design, whose gleaming white shed roofs look a bit like the smokestacks of an ocean liner. Exhibits behind this striking silhouette document the enormous influence the Bauhaus exerted on all aspects of modern architecture and design. The collection includes everything from study notes to workshop pieces to photographs, models, blueprints and documents by such Bauhaus members as Klee, Kandinsky, Schlemmer and Feininger. Prized collection highlights include the original model of Gropius' 1925 Bauhaus building in Dessau and a reconstruction of Lázló Moholy-Nagy's kinetic sculpture Light-Space-Modulator, a clever kinetic sculpture that combines colour, light and movement.

It's easy to spend an entire day at the giant Deutsches Technikmuseum and the sizable Museumpark. The museum's 14 departments examine technology throughout the ages - from printing and transport to computers - with interactive stations. Demonstrations of historical machines and models take place throughout the museum.

A highlight is the reconstruction of the world's first computer, the Z1 (1938) by Konrad Zuse. Elsewhere there's an entire hall of vintage locomotives and rooms crammed with historic printing presses, early film projectors, old TVs and telephones. A new wing opened in December 2003 holds the museum's stellar collections on aviation and navigation. Be sure to save some time and energy for the adjacent Spectrum (enter from MÖckernstrasse 26; admission included). At this fabulous science centre, you can participate in around 250 experiments that playfully explain the laws of physics and other scientific principles. If you ever wondered why the sky's blue or how a battery works, this is the place to get the low-down.

Berlin's JÜdisches Museum, the largest Jewish Museum in Europe, celebrates the achievements of German Jews and their contribution to culture, art, science and other fields. An architectural work of art, the building and its contents are a major destination in Berlin.

Arranged in a chronological fashion, the exhibit also includes one section about the Holocaust, although this is by no means the museum's entire focus. In fact, what makes Berlin's Jewish museum different is that it looks at Jewish history beyond the very narrow context of the 12 years of Nazi rule. Jews are not exclusively presented as victims but as vital citizens who have played enormously important roles in Germany through the centuries. One part of the exhibit also deals with the resurgence of Berlin's Jewish population since reunification. The museum building itself is a stunning work of art designed by Daniel Libeskind and an excellent example of crisp modernism. Zinc-clad walls rise skyward in a sharply angled zig-zag ground plan that's an abstract interpretation of a star. The general outline is echoed in the windows: triangular, trapezoidal and irregular gashes in the building's gleaming skin. The interior is designed as a metaphor for the history of the Jewish people; 'void' spaces represent the loss of humanity, culture and people, and a field of concrete columns symbolises Jewish emigration and exile.

If you only see one Kulturforum museum, make sure it is the GemÄldegalerie. Opened in June 1998 and housed in a gloriously designed building, it focuses on European painting from the 13th to 18th centuries, with more than 1300 paintings on view.

The collection is famous for its exceptional quality and breadth. It's especially strong when it comes to Dutch and Flemish masters, such as Van Dyk, Hals and Rubens. It also boasts one of the world's largest Rembrandt collections, with 16 paintings on display, including the famous The Man with the Golden Helmet. Other highlights include works by Cranach, DÜrer, Holbein and other Germans. The Italians are represented by Botticelli, Raffael, Titian and many others, while the French collection includes paintings by Watteau and de la Tour. Gainsborough and Reynolds are among the British artists represented here, while the Spaniards field such heavy hitters as Goya and Velázquez. The galleries radiate out from the lofty Great Hall, which has the dimensions and solemnity of a cathedral. To keep the overwhelm factor to a minimum, grab a map in the huge foyer and prepare to spend at least two hours just to gain an overview. Admission includes free audio guides (German or English) with commentary on selected paintings.

Just north of the Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag has been the seat of the Bundestag (German parliament), since 1999 following a complete renovation by Lord Norman Foster. The British architect turned the 1894 building by Paul Wallot into a state-of-the-art parliamentary facility, preserving only the historical shell and adding the glistening glass dome.

The view from the top is one of the highlights of visit to Berlin, as much for the 360-degree panorama of the city as for the close-ups of the dome. From the outdoor viewing platform you can climb the spiralling ramp inside the dome itself. At the top, displays document the building's history. The Reichstag has been the setting of numerous milestones in German history: the proclamation of the German republic, the Reichstag fire in 1933 allowing Hitler to blame the communists and seize power, the Soviet attack a dozen years later which destroyed the building, and the enactment of the reunification of Germany on 2 October 1990.

If you've been to any of the other Guggenheim museums, especially those in New York and Bilbao, this small, minimalist gallery space - a joint venture between Deutsche Bank and the Guggenheim Foundation - might be a tad disappointing but still, curators mount several exhibits a year featuring international contemporary artists.

Pergamon Museum

If you only have time for one museum in Berlin, make it the Pergamon for a feast of classical Greek, Babylonian, Roman, Islamic and Middle Eastern art and architecture. The giant complex, which was only completed in 1930, harbours under one roof: the Collection of Classical Antiquities, the Museum of Near Eastern Antiquities and the Museum of Islamic Art.

All three collections are worth seeing at leisure, but if pressed, make a beeline to the following highlights. The museum's undisputed crowd magnet is the Pergamon Altar (165 BC) from Asia Minor (in today's Turkey). It's a gargantuan raised marble shrine surrounded by a vivid frieze of the gods doing battle with the giants. Walk up its steps for close-ups of the Telephos Frieze, which depicts the life story of the legendary founder of Pergamon. The next room presents the immense Market Gate of Miletus (AD 2), a masterpiece of Roman architecture. It's also impossible not to be awed by the reconstructions of the Babylonian Ishtar Gate, the Processional Way leading up to it and the facade of the king's throne hall. All are sheathed in glazed bricks glistening in a luminous cobalt blue and ochre.

The restored landmark Brandenburger Tor (Brandenburg Gate), a symbol of division during the Cold War, now epitomises German reunification. It was against this backdrop in 1987 that then-US president Ronald Reagan uttered the now famous words: 'Mr Gorbachev - tear down this wall.' Two years later, the Wall was history.

The gate's northern wing contains the Raum der Stille (Room of Silence), where the weary and frenzied can sit and contemplate peace.