Want to visit Rostock in winter? Here to study in Germany for one semester? Don’t know what to do at a place near the Baltic Sea during the cold months? Here you’ll find some great suggestions of how to enjoy this city and its environment – even if you can’t go swimming in the Baltic Sea (unless you want to look like this).
My first suggestion is that you can go to Rostock’s ice rink. You can find it at Schillingallee No. 51, and it’s open every wednesday, saturday and sunday from 10th September to 9th april. On Wednesday, it is only open in the evening (7 to 11 p.m.), but on saturday (11 a.m. to 11 p.m.) and sunday (10 a.m. to 6 p.m.) you can go there for nearly the whole day. If you really like ice-skating, you can also stay there the whole day because you always have to pay for a day ticket (adults: 8 euros, children: 5 euros) and can stay as long as you want. Since your bags won’t be checked, you can bring your own food and drink, but, of course, you can also buy some tasty things or soft drinks there. Don’t have your own ice-skates? No problem! For 3 euros per person you can rent them in the ice rink. The same is true for the Midnight Ice-Skating which takes place on every first saturday of the months from october – april. Here you can read more of my thoughts on the Midnight Ice-Skating.
If you like to be active, you can go to the “Sportzentum Schwanenteich” at Kuphal street No. 77a and do sports like tennis, squash, badminton, yoga or a body workout. The equipment and fields are not too expensive. I can only recommend it to you if you stay in Rostock for a longer time because they are often booked up and so you have to reserve fields at least a week in advance.
Another great idea is to go swimming. Rostock has two indoor pools – the “Neptunschwimmhalle” is at Kopernikus street No. 17 (near the ice rink), and another one is in Rostock-Gehlsdorf at Steuerbord street No. 7. In the “Neptunschwimmhalle” you have to pay 5 euros per 1,5 h, and in Gehlsdorf you pay 6 euros for two hours. The indoor pool at Gehlsdorf has better facilities, but in winter it is more complicated to get there because the ferry is closed. Therefore you have to go by tram and bus. From the “Steintor” stop you can take trams 1, 2, 3 or 4 and get off at the “Dierkower Kreuz” stop. Then you have to take Bus No. 15 towards “Warnowblick” and get off at stop “Pressentinstraße”, follow the street “Zur Yachtwerft” and turn left into the “Steuerbordstraße”. Follow it to the end of the street where you’ll find the indoor pool. If you’d like to combine swimming and wellness, you should go to the “Aquadrom” in Graal-Müritz. For a detailed description of how to get there and what to do in Graal-Müritz in general, look here (link’ll be added soon). If you have children who enjoy slides, waves and whirls in the water, I can recommend the indoor pool in Ribnitz-Damgarten which is called “Bodden-Therme”, and open from Tuesday to Sunday. The best way to get there is by car, and if you want to use public transport, you can use this homepage to plan your trip beforehand. Another possibility is Wismar’s indoor pool “Wonnemar” where you can have a lot of fun because there a many slides, and lots of offers for children. It’s really great there and you can also reach it by train, but it takes about one hour to get from Rostock’s main station to Wismar’s main station (that’s why it’s the last indoor pool I mention).
The greatest thing to do in Rostock in winter is to go for a walk through the Christmas fair in the centre of Rostock. You can easily get there by all trams – just get off at the stops “Neuer Markt”, “Lange Straße” or “Kröpeliner Tor”, and enjoy the wonderful atmosphere and the delicious, Christmas-like smells. There are many stands – most of them offer food, souvenirs or typical things from the North of Germany. One special part of the Christmas fair is devoted to a medieval atmosphere. The best thing is that a huge part of Rostock’s Christmas fair is situated in the “Kröpeliner street”, which offers a wealth of shops. This enables visitors of the Christmas fair to go shopping at the same time. Most shops have special business hours or offer “Christmas shopping” during this time.
I hope that I made some useful suggestions of what to do in Rostock in winter for you. For more information, you can contact me or read other contributions on this website. If we have as much snow as in 2010 again, you can also engage in a “Schneeballschlacht” (snow ball fight) or coast near the former city wall. Have a lot of fun :)!
