Discover the magic of spring on Lake Constance between flowering gardens, enchanting waterways and beautiful churches-joint. Explore the cultural and natural attractions of this fascinating region during the most beautiful season of the year.
The beauty of flowering, the pleasure of sailing on ships and boats admiring the landscapes and the first sun, the sound of the bells of the ancient churches that recall the rebirth after the long winter. A short distance from Italy, the Lake Constance International Region – located between Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Principality of Liechtenstein – is a nearby destination for Easter holidays and spring breaks.
It's the perfect time discover the beauty of its gardens and to explore art and history by visiting churches, chapels and abbeys. In 2024, 200 years after the opening of the first regular sailing service on the lake are celebrated. Today regular navigation on the Bodensee is more popular than ever and offers the possibility to reach many coastal resorts safely and pleasantly, even with panoramic or gastronomic tours that allow you to explore the region through the waterways.
Index of Article
Spring on Lake Constance
Parks, Garden and Gardens
Enclosed between discreet or open walls along the walks along the lake, the flowering gardens are the true attraction of the spring on Lake Constance. Although geographical distances are short, travelling to the Bodensee region offers a journey over time, allowing you to understand the evolution of gardening culture.
This area has been inhabited since Neolithic times, as the Unteruhldingen Palace Museum, which exposes the uses and lifestyles of the ancient populations, including their diet and cultivation of herbs and wheat in a prehistoric vegetable garden. Opened only in 2023, but faithful to medieval customs, the garden of the cloister of St. Gall in Gallo combines biodiversity and medieval traditions. Accessible to all, it also houses birds and bees.
Mainau is probably the most famous flower island in the world, created by the noble family of Bernadotte in the 19th century, with over a million plants blooming in late April. Lindau is famous for its parks and gardens, many of which date back to the nineteenth and twentieth century, when the city became a popular holiday destination for wealthy families. In 2021, the city of Überlingen renovated its green spaces and redesigned the parks and promenade on the lake, adding play and leisure areas. In Vaduz there is the Ernährungsfeld, a garden of the size of two football fields, ecologically cultivated to meet the food requirements of the Principality, thus engaging in a more sustainable future.
Explore the Lake Constance Waterways
As two hundred years ago: in 1824 the first steamship was launched for regular service on Lake Constance. Battezzato "Wilhelm", connected Friedrichshafen in Germany to the Swiss shore of the lake. Since then, this type of service has developed considerably, connecting cities, nations and cultures, both local residents and tourists.
Today, the charm of a time manifests itself on the ships Hohentwiel and Oesterreich, beautifully restored: majestic vapours in liberty style and art deco that leave from the port of Bregenz/Hard for cruises that bring the passengers back to the elegance of the first twentieth century and the frenzy of the rugged years. After an aperitif at sunset on the pier, you can descend into the refined restaurant rooms for gourmet dinners with a view. The modern BSB fleets, Vorarlberg Lines and URH also offer panoramic tours and gastronomic experiences to explore the Bodensee from the water.
Depending on the season and hours, you can book lunches with seasonal products such as asparagus, tasting of local wines at sunset or afternoon tea with cakes and sweets typical of the region. Looking forward to the past: the "Insel Mainau", which connects the Island of Flowers to Unteruhldingen and Meersburg, is powered by electric batteries and produces up to 20% of the energy necessary for navigation thanks to solar panels on the bridge.
Between Reichenau in Germany and Mannenbach in Switzerland, on the other hand, the boat "Reichenau" powered exclusively by solar energy, operating only in good weather. For the youngest, the sailing boats "Laedine", reproduced the traditional means of transport of Lake Constance from the Middle Ages onwards, offer pirate and Viking themed excursions starting from Immenstaad. An invitation to say "all aboard" or "to the assembly!".
Fra Cappelle Raccolte e Chiese Gioiello 
With the arrival of spring, the sound of bells evokes a sense of freedom and rebirth. In Uhldingen, Germany, the tower of the Birnau Shrine rises majesticly towards the sky, surrounded by lush vineyards and overlooking the alpine peaks. The church still holds the oldest watch mechanism in Germany. Among its walls, enriched with treasures of baroque painting and sculpture, are organized suggestive concerts in various Sundays of the year.
The cathedral of the convent and castle of Salem, an imposing building in Gothic style, reflects with the splendor of its furnishings in alabaster and gold the power held by the abbots over the centuries. The eighteenth-century four-voice organ of Karl Joseph Riepp, with its 134 registers and 7,680 reeds, had to emulate the voices of the angels and is considered the most complex ever built at the time. The park and the orangery of the Cistercian complex deserve a visit during spring blossoming.
UNESCO heritage, the Abbey of St. Gall in Switzerland, with its library, cathedral and monastic complex, is the heart of the historic city centre. The cathedral, built in the middle of the 18th century on the site where, in 612, the Irish monk Gallo erected his hermitage, represents one of the last examples of monumental sacred architecture of the late Baroque. The visit to the library of St. Gallen and the accessible parts of the abbey complex completes the unmissable experience.
In Austria, next to the bell tower of San Martino overlooking the high city of Bregenz, the chapel of the same name, in its simplicity, tells the story of religious devotion in the Alps from the Middle Ages to the modern era, with late medieval frescoes, eighteenth century additions and stained glass that commemorate the falls of the Upper Town during the two world wars.
