10 watery escapes in Berlin

Boats as far as the eye can see: Greater Wannsee is one of the most popular sailing areas among Berliners. It can be reached from the city center in about 45 minutes. Some dozen sailing clubs are located here. In good weather, hundreds of yawls and yachts splash about in the lake, which is actually a bight of the River Havel.

On hot days, up to 30,000 sun-worshippers go to Wannsee's open-air lido. The lakeshore swimming bath, which opened in 1907, is one of the oldest in Europe. The finest Baltic Sea sand was brought from the resort of Travemünde for the kilometer-long beach.

Tegeler See, Lake Tegel, is one of about 70 lakes in Berlin. It contains many islands that can be reached only by water. During the high season, ferries shuttle between the mainland and the islands until the evening. Then the island-dwellers and allotment farmers have the delights of nature all to themselves again.

The Landwehr Canal runs parallel to the Spree through the middle of Berlin. It used to be an important transport route. In the 1920s, promenades with greenery were laid out along its banks to provide recreational space for the residents of the newly founded city districts. Now it's mainly pleasure crafts and excursion boats that ply the canal.

If you look around, you'll find all sorts of bars, pubs, clubs and restaurants along Berlin's waterways. Freischwimmer, for instance, is a restaurant at the eastern end of the Landwehr Canal, opposite the legendary Club der Visionäre. You can sit and relax by the waterside until late at night, with the sounds of minimal music in the background.

The Spree flows almost in a straight line through Berlin until it makes a bend ("Bogen" in German) in the government district and meanders past the Reichstag, the main railway station and the federal chancellery. The meadows and beach clubs on its banks are popular meeting places during the day and after work.

People do more than just sail on Berlin's waters. Rowing has a long tradition here. More than 50 clubs have their boathouses on the Havel and Spree. Köpenick is the district with the most water. In 1880 the first race took place on Grünau's regatta course. That makes it the oldest sport venue still in operation in Berlin.

The official name of the pool is Sommerbad Kreuzberg, but Berliners affectionately call it Prinzenbad, after Prinzenstrasse, the street that runs past it. Since 1965, the open-air pool has been attracting up to 10,000 people a day in summer. Members of all of the Kreuzberg district's demographic groups come here, making it a cultural melting pot.

The first bathing establishment on a moored barge was on the Seine in Paris in the 18th century. There people washed themselves with river water in separate cabins. The Badeschiff, a barge with a swimming pool moored in Osthafen, a former industrial port, continues the tradition, but serves very different purposes: Here you can swim in comfortable temperatures on, not in, the Spree.

The view from Treptow of the Spree, with the Molecule Man sculpture. Since 1999 the sculpture has dominated the Treptow skyline. It symbolizes the three Berlin districts of Friedrichshain, Kreuzberg and Treptow, which converge at this point. It's a popular place to take pictures of the sunset, and afterwards, stop in at to one of the clubs or pubs on the banks of the river.