Sassnitz Cruises

The island of Rügen juts out into the Baltic Sea, and its largest town, Sassnitz, is a magnet for visitors and holidaymakers who enjoy the constantly changing sight of luxury yachts, trawlers, passenger ferries and pleasure boats.

The harbour wall stretches almost 1.5km out to sea, and the old part of the town sits at the northeast end of the harbour. Just past the harbour, close to a disused ferry terminal, is a U-boat museum featuring, perhaps strangely, the British submarine HMS Otus, which was rescued from a scrapyard in Portsmouth and towed here.

The island has an astonishing number of museums – over 40 in all – covering everything from local history to underwater archaeology. There are also many monuments, churches, palaces and stately homes, including graves and tumuli from the island’s historic past, and the Ralswiek Palace and Granitz hunting lodge from the 19th century.