Frankfurt am Main

Sachsenhausen

The whole south bank of the Main, and the answer to 'but isn't Frankfurt just banks?' Germany's densest museum row along the river, a cobbled apple-wine tavern quarter behind it, and a residential district of 60,000-odd people that carries on regardless. Locals call this side dribbdebach — over the water — and mean it as a separate place.

Who it's for: First-time visitors, who should sleep or at least eat here; museum travellers, who will spend a full day on the Schaumainkai without crossing a road; anyone who wants one properly local evening — a Bembel of Apfelwein at a shared table — without leaving the centre. Families, for the riverbank, the Goetheturm and the forest behind it.

Things to know

  • Apfelwein has rules and they're easy. It arrives in a grey-blue stoneware jug (a Bembel) and you pour it into a ribbed glass (a Geripptes) whose facets exist so greasy fingers don't drop it. Order it pur; sauergespritzt — cut with sparkling water — is completely normal. A spruce wreath over a tavern door means the house presses its own.
  • Nearly every museum on the Museumsufer is closed on Mondays. Do not plan a museum day for a Monday. Several city-run museums here are free on the last Saturday of the month.
  • The MuseumsuferTicket costs €21 for two consecutive days across 39 museums (€32 family, €12 concession). It pays for itself at three museums, which is an easy day here.
  • Most classic Apfelwein taverns are cash-preferred or cash-only, and several don't open until 5pm or close on a weekday — Fichtekränzi does no lunch at all, Lorsbacher Thal is shut Tuesdays. Apfelwein Wagner and Dauth-Schneider are the all-day, every-day fallbacks.
  • Alt-Sachsenhausen splits by time of day. Klappergasse and Große Rittergasse by daylight and early evening are cobbled, historic and pleasant; from about 11pm on Friday and Saturday they become a stag-party strip. The best taverns sit on the edges — Wallstraße, Neuer Wall, Schweizer Straße — not in the middle of it.
  • The Saturday flea market alternates between the Schaumainkai embankment and the Osthafen on Lindleystraße across town. Check hfm-frankfurt.de before you walk down there.
  • Getting here: U1, U2, U3 and U8 to Schweizer Platz puts you between the Museumsufer and Schweizer Straße; trams 15 and 16 also serve it. On foot, cross the Eiserner Steg from the old town — five minutes, and the best free view in Frankfurt on the way over.
  • Museumsuferfest, 28–30 August 2026, takes over both riverbanks for three days and roughly a million visitors. Either come for it deliberately or book your Frankfurt trip around it.
  • The Ebbelwei-Express, a painted historic tram, loops through the district as a tourist ride with apple wine on board. It's kitsch, it's aimed squarely at visitors, and it's genuinely fun with kids.
  • The Goetheturm and the Stadtwald are in Sachsenhausen too, but at the far southern end — a deliberate excursion by tram and foot, not a walk from the taverns.