Bremen is one of Germany's oldest Hanseatic cities, set on the Weser River about 60 km from the North Sea. The Altstadt survived the Second World War better than many comparable German cities, and the area around the Marktplatz — with the Renaissance Rathaus, the Gothic Dom, and the Roland statue — is arguably the finest medieval market square in northern Germany. Both the Rathaus and Roland are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Beyond the main square, the Schnoorviertel (a tight grid of 15th and 16th-century fishermen's houses) and the Böttcherstrasse (an expressionist alley created by a coffee merchant in the 1920s) are genuinely distinctive neighborhoods rather than theme-park recreations. Beck's beer is brewed here, and the brewery tour is popular with visitors. The Kunsthalle and the Paula Modersohn-Becker Museum in the Böttcherstrasse make a strong pair for an afternoon of art.