A Rainy Day in Frankfurt: The All-Indoor Route

Frankfurt in the rain is no tragedy. This is a city of museums, covered markets and wood-panelled taverns, stitched together by a U-Bahn that will carry you the length of this itinerary for roughly the price of a sandwich. On a grey weekday it arguably shows better than it does in July, when half the city decamps to the riverbank and the interiors stand pleasantly empty. What follows is a full day — about half past nine in the morning through to closing time — in which the weather barely registers.

Key facts

• Weatherproofing: every stop below is indoors. The one genuinely exposed moment is crossing the Main, and there is a way around that too
• The day it goes wrong: Monday. Most of the museums here are shut. Read the next section before you commit to anything
• The ticket that pays for itself: the MuseumsuferTicket, around EUR 21, covers the great majority of what follows
• Booking: less necessary than you would expect. The Goethe-Haus sells on site only
• Budget: expect roughly EUR 45 to EUR 70 a head with lunch, dinner and transport

Choose your day before you choose your route

This is the part most rainy-day guides skip, and it matters more in Frankfurt than in most cities, because two entirely different things close on two different days.

Monday shuts the museums. The Städel, the Liebieghaus, the Schirn, the film museum, the historical museum and the Struwwelpeter museum are all typically closed, as are the MMK's outposts. If your wet day falls on a Monday, do not attempt the route below in order — you will walk into four locked doors. Build it instead from the handful of places that do open: the Goethe-Haus and the adjoining Deutsches Romantik-Museum, which typically run seven days a week; the Senckenberg natural history museum, which usually opens Mondays too; the Kleinmarkthalle; the Palmengarten glasshouses; and a long tavern evening.

Sunday shuts the shopping. German retail law closes almost everything commercial, so the Kleinmarkthalle is dark and the MyZeil centre typically does not open at all. The museums, though, are open and often at their liveliest. A rainy Sunday is a good museum day and a poor lunch day — plan to eat in a museum café or a restaurant rather than grazing a market.

Thursday is the quiet winner. Several institutions run late: the Städel typically stays open until around nine in the evening, the Goethe-Haus likewise, and the Schirn often later still. A rainy Thursday gives you three or four extra hours of indoor daylight, which is exactly what a wet day is short of. On the first Thursday of each month the Goethe-Haus and Romantik-Museum have been offering evening admission for around EUR 1, which is close to a giveaway.

09:30 — The Städel Museum

Start on the Museumsufer, the south-bank embankment where a dozen museums sit in a row, with the one that anchors them. The Städel holds roughly 2,700 paintings covering some seven centuries of European art, several hundred of which hang at any one time, and the run from the medieval rooms through to the twentieth-century basement is genuinely absorbing rather than dutiful.

Go looking for three things specifically. Vermeer's The Geographer is the quiet star, a small picture that rewards standing still. Botticelli's idealised female portrait is the one most visitors photograph. And Tischbein's enormous 1787 portrait of Goethe sprawled in the Roman Campagna has hung here since the 1880s — worth finding now, because you are going to stand in the man's childhood bedroom after lunch, and the two stops illuminate each other more than you would guess.

Admission runs to about EUR 19 for adults, with reductions around EUR 17 and free entry for children under twelve; weekend and special-exhibition pricing typically sits a little higher. Opening is usually from mid-morning to early evening, Tuesday to Sunday, with the late Thursday noted above. If you happen to arrive on a Tuesday afternoon, the museum has been running a discounted late slot for around EUR 10 covering everything, which is unusually good value. The in-house restaurant has been closed for refurbishment, but the café operates normally and will handle your first coffee. Two hours covers the highlights comfortably; three if you are the sort who reads the wall texts.

The cloakroom is free and takes wet coats and umbrellas — use it. Carrying a dripping jacket around five buildings is the small misery that ruins this kind of day.

11:45 — A second hour on the embankment, if you want one

If you would rather go deep than broad, you do not have to leave the Museumsufer at all. The Liebieghaus stands a short walk along the same embankment in a villa with a garden, and holds sculpture across something like five thousand years — Egyptian, Greek, Roman, medieval, Baroque. It is smaller, calmer and far less visited than its neighbour, and it has a café of its own. Expect around EUR 10 on weekdays and a little more at weekends; it generally keeps the same Tuesday-to-Sunday pattern and closes Mondays.

The German film museum sits along the same stretch and is the better call if you have teenagers: its permanent exhibition on how moving images actually work is hands-on rather than reverent. The permanent display typically costs around EUR 6 to EUR 8, with a combined ticket for everything nearer EUR 15. It too closes Mondays and tends to open later in the morning than the Städel.

Skip this stop if you are running a single day and want the full city. Take it if the forecast is truly filthy and you would rather move twice than five times.

12:30 — Lunch in the Kleinmarkthalle

Cross the river to the covered market hall in the middle of town. This is the best-loved eating room in the city centre by some margin, and on a wet day it is also the warmest.

Do not sit down and order. The way the hall works is that you graze: a hot sausage from one of the butchers' counters on the ground floor, eaten standing with mustard and a hard roll; olives and salami from one of the Italian stalls; cheese, bread and fruit from the rows behind. Frau Schreiber's sausage counter, near the ground-floor entrance, has been there since the hall reopened and reliably draws the longest queue in the building, which tells you most of what you need to know. When you are done, climb to the upstairs gallery, where a wine bar overlooks the whole churning floor — a glass of Rheingau Riesling up there, watching the hall work in the middle of a downpour, is one of the better half-hours Frankfurt offers.

The hall typically opens early and closes around six on weekdays, earlier on Saturdays, and shuts entirely on Sundays and public holidays. Budget around EUR 12 to EUR 20 for a thorough graze with a drink. Come hungry; this is the meal of the day that costs least and satisfies most.

14:00 — The Goethe-Haus and the Romantik-Museum

A few minutes' walk from the market stands the reconstructed house where Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was born in 1749 and wrote his first works. The original was destroyed by bombing in 1944 and rebuilt to the last cornice; purists grumble about that, and they are missing the point, because what the rebuild preserves is the plan of a wealthy eighteenth-century Frankfurt household — the kitchen, the astronomical clock on the stairs, the puppet theatre, the writing desk.

Since 2021 it has been joined by the Deutsches Romantik-Museum next door, which sets Goethe's world in the wider Romantic movement across manuscripts, paintings and first editions. A combined ticket covering both has been running at around EUR 12 for adults, roughly EUR 7 for students and about EUR 18 for a family, with under-eighteens admitted free. Crucially for this itinerary, the pair typically open every day of the week including Monday, with a late Thursday. Tickets are sold at the door rather than online, so there is nothing to book.

Allow about an hour for the house alone, or a little over two if you take the Romantik-Museum seriously. If you found the Tischbein portrait at the Städel this morning, the connection will land here.

15:45 — Your second museum, chosen by mood

By mid-afternoon on a wet day you want one more substantial interior. Pick by temperament.

For contemporary art, the Schirn Kunsthalle near the Römer mounts large temporary exhibitions rather than holding a collection, so check what is actually on before you walk over. Admission varies with the show but has typically sat around EUR 12, with reductions near EUR 10. It closes Mondays, opens late midweek, and stops selling tickets roughly half an hour before closing.

A word of warning about the MMK. The Museum für Moderne Kunst's wedge-shaped main building — the one every guidebook photographs — has been closed for an extended fire-safety refurbishment that has run considerably past its original schedule. The museum's two satellites, a tower space in the banking district and the former customs house beside the main building, have continued to operate on a Tuesday-to-Sunday pattern for around EUR 10 to EUR 12. Check the museum's own site the morning you go rather than trusting any guide, this one included.

With children, take the Senckenberg natural history museum out in the Westend. The dinosaur hall is the draw and it is a real one; adult admission has been running around EUR 10, and it is one of the few large museums here that typically opens on Mondays. Alternatively the small Struwwelpeter museum in the reconstructed old town, devoted to Heinrich Hoffmann's gleefully gruesome Victorian children's book, costs around EUR 8, offers a free English audio guide and takes under an hour.

For the city itself, the historical museum on the Römerberg explains how a medieval trading town became a banking capital, and has a scale model of the pre-war city that is worth the entry on its own.

17:30 — An hour in the dry

MyZeil, the shopping centre on the Zeil with the glass funnel torn through its facade, is a legitimately photogenic place to shelter and the escalator ride up through the funnel is free. There is a food court on the upper level if you need a coffee and a sit-down. It typically opens mid-morning to early evening, later on Thursdays through Saturdays, and closes on Sundays.

If the rain has eased into something merely grey, a better use of the hour is the Palmengarten's glasshouses in the Westend. The Tropicarium is a run of connected houses moving from desert to cloud forest, and standing in eighty per cent humidity while November batters the glass overhead is a specific pleasure. Adult admission has been around EUR 9, under-eighteens free; it opens daily, including Mondays, with shorter hours in winter. Note that the glasshouses close before the garden does.

19:00 — Apple wine, and where to drink it

Finish across the river in Sachsenhausen over Ebbelwoi, the tart, barely sweet apple wine that Frankfurt drinks and much of the rest of Germany does not understand. It arrives in a Bembel — the grey stoneware jug with blue detailing — and is poured into a Geripptes, the faceted tumbler whose cut sides are said to have been designed so a greasy hand keeps its grip. Order it pure, or ask for it sauergespritzt with sparkling water if the acidity is too much at first.

Where you drink it is a real decision. Alt-Sachsenhausen, the cobbled quarter roughly between Affentorplatz and Frankensteiner Platz, is the postcard version and holds several long-standing houses. It also turns into a loud street-drinking district at weekends and after Eintracht Frankfurt win, which is either the evening you wanted or precisely the one you did not. Many Frankfurters instead steer guests to the Brückenviertel just west of it, or up Schweizer Straße, where the taverns are less costumed and the surrounding streets hold bookshops and small bars.

Among the reliable names: Apfelwein Wagner on Schweizer Straße has been pouring since the early 1930s and typically opens daily from late morning through to midnight, which makes it the safest bet on an awkward day. Zum Gemalten Haus, which the city's tourist board describes as among Sachsenhausen's best-known apple-wine houses, has been running for the better part of a century and does ribs with cabbage. Fichtekränzi, in the Brückenviertel, dates to 1849 and is known for ribs with sauerkraut. Atschel is of similar vintage. All are wood-panelled, communal-tabled and built for exactly this weather; nobody will hurry you out. Expect around EUR 20 to EUR 30 a head for a main and a few glasses.

Eat Handkäse mit Musik if you are brave — a translucent sour-milk cheese under raw onion — or Schnitzel, or the boiled beef that traditionally accompanies Grüne Soße. On which, see below, because the timing is not obvious.

When in the year this day works

Frankfurt receives something in the region of 600 to 700 millimetres of rain a year, spread unusually evenly — roughly ten to twelve wet days in most months, with December typically the dampest and April the driest. There is no rainy season to avoid and no dry season to count on, which is precisely why a plan like this earns its keep.

The seasonal catch is on the plate, not in the sky. Grüne Soße, Frankfurt's cold herb sauce of parsley, chives, cress, chervil, salad burnet, borage and sorrel, is a seasonal dish. The season traditionally opens on Maundy Thursday and runs until the first frost, because all seven herbs have to be in the ground at once. Order it in November and you will either be refused or served something made from imported or frozen herbs. If green sauce is the reason you came, come between spring and early autumn.

November through February is otherwise the strongest case for this itinerary: the museums are quiet, the taverns are full of locals rather than visitors, and darkness at four in the afternoon stops feeling like a loss when you were planning to be indoors anyway. The Christmas market weeks are the exception — the Römerberg is mobbed and the central stops slow down accordingly.

What the day costs, and how to get between the stops

On full-price tickets, the Städel at around EUR 19, the Goethe-Haus pair at around EUR 12 and a third museum at around EUR 10 to EUR 12 comes to roughly EUR 41 to EUR 43. The MuseumsuferTicket, at around EUR 21 for an adult, around EUR 12 concession and around EUR 32 for a family, covers a large group of Frankfurt museums across two consecutive days — so it repays itself before lunch on day one. If the day after your visit is one on which the museums are closed, its validity has generally been extended by a day to compensate, which makes it unexpectedly good for a Sunday-Monday pairing. The Frankfurt Card, at roughly EUR 13 for one day and EUR 21 for two, bundles transport with discounts of up to half off admissions instead; it suits a shorter, more transport-heavy day.

For transport alone, a single ride inside the city zone runs around EUR 3.65, so the city day ticket at around EUR 7.10 pays for itself on the third journey and removes any temptation to walk through a downpour to save a fare. Buy it before the first trip.

The geography is simpler than it looks. Schweizer Platz is the nearest U-Bahn to the Städel; Hauptwache and Konstablerwache bracket the Kleinmarkthalle and put you within a few minutes of the Goethe-Haus; the Dom/Römer stop serves the Schirn and the historical museum; and Bockenheimer Warte covers both the Senckenberg and the Palmengarten. Nothing on this route is more than a few stops from anything else.

One piece of specific wet-weather advice: the walk from the Museumsufer to the city centre crosses the Main on an open footbridge with no shelter of any kind, and it is the only fully exposed stretch of the day. In real rain, take the U-Bahn under the river instead. It is two stops and about four minutes.

What to skip

The Main Tower observation deck. It is the standard Frankfurt recommendation and it is pointless in weather — you pay to stand in cloud on an open-air platform, and it closes in high wind and storms anyway. Save it for a clear evening.

A river cruise. Same logic. The boats run, the windows fog, and you see a grey embankment.

Trying to fit in four museums. Three is the honest maximum with a proper lunch and an unhurried evening, and the day is better for it. Museum fatigue in wet shoes is a specific kind of unhappiness, and Frankfurt's compensation — a warm tavern with a jug on the table and no expectation that you will leave — is genuinely the better half of this itinerary.

Tip: If your wet day is a Monday, run the route in reverse and lean on the exceptions — the Kleinmarkthalle in the morning, the Goethe-Haus and Romantik-Museum in the early afternoon, the Senckenberg or the Palmengarten glasshouses after that, and a long evening in Sachsenhausen. Confirm opening days on the museums' own sites the morning you set out; Frankfurt's institutions adjust their hours around public holidays more than most, and Hesse keeps a few that the rest of Germany does not.