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Ghent
Ghent has the canals and guild houses of a postcard town but the energy of a university city, so the Graslei quays fill with locals and students on any warm evening, not just tour groups. Since its 2017 circulation plan pushed through traffic out of the center, the old core is easy to wander without dodging cars.
Give one afternoon to Saint Bavo's Cathedral and the van Eyck brothers' Ghent Altarpiece, then let the rest of the weekend drift between bars, frites stands and the moated Gravensteen castle. It makes a far less crowded alternative to nearby Bruges.
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Ljubljana
Ljubljana's old center is largely closed to cars, and the banks of the Ljubljanica river are lined with café terraces that stay busy well into the evening. Architect Jože Plečnik shaped much of what you walk through, from the two pedestrian spans he added to the Triple Bridge to the Central Market, where a morning of local cheese, honey and produce sets up the day.
A funicular climbs to the castle for the view, and the city was European Green Capital for 2016. It is a capital, but a small one that never feels like hard work.
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Bergen
Bergen packs a lot into a short walk. The wooden Hanseatic wharf of Bryggen, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979, sits a few minutes from the Fish Market at the head of the harbor, and the Fløibanen funicular takes about six minutes to reach Mount Fløyen for views over the city and fjord.
Food and drink are pricey, as everywhere in Norway, and the rain is famous, so pack a proper jacket. In return you get a city where a weekend can include a mountain walk without leaving town.
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San Sebastián
San Sebastián turns dinner into the evening's entertainment. In the Parte Vieja, the old town, the custom is to move from bar to bar ordering a pintxo or two at each, so nothing needs booking and nobody minds a slow pace.
Days split between La Concha, the beach that curves around the bay right by the center, and the old funicular up Monte Igueldo, running since 1912, for the classic view back over the bay. Summer weekends are busy and expensive; spring and early fall are calmer and still warm enough for a walk on the sand.
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Porto
Porto is steep, so every walk comes with a view. The Ribeira riverfront tumbles down to the Douro, and crossing the double-decker Dom Luís I Bridge brings you to the port wine lodges of Vila Nova de Gaia for an afternoon tasting.
Start a morning at the Bolhão Market for fish, cheese and flowers, and leave the evening open: the riverside and the bar streets around Galerias de Paris fill up on their own. The city proper is small even though the wider metro area is not. Expect hills and stairs; comfortable shoes are not optional.
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Strasbourg
Strasbourg's old center sits on an island ringed by the Ill river, and that Grande Île has been on UNESCO's World Heritage list since 1988, so the best of the city is one easy loop. The Gothic cathedral and its astronomical clock fill a morning, the half-timbered lanes of Petite France fill the afternoon, and the winstubs serve Alsatian food and wine in the evening.
December brings one of Europe's best-known Christmas markets and the crowds that go with it; spring or fall is the calmer choice for a slow weekend.
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Freiburg im Breisgau
Freiburg is a university town on the edge of the Black Forest, and its rhythm is set by the Münstermarkt: from Monday to Saturday, up to 130 stalls fill the square around the minster each morning with produce, flowers and grilled sausages to eat on the spot.
Small stone channels called Bächle run along the old-town streets, and local legend says stepping in one means you will marry a Freiburger. At night, students keep the bars and beer gardens lively. It suits anyone who wants a weekend of markets and short walks rather than big sights.
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Salzburg
Salzburg's compact old town sits between the Salzach river and the cliff crowned by Hohensalzburg Fortress, so a weekend falls naturally into fortress, cathedral, Mozart's birthplace on Getreidegasse and long breaks in the coffee houses.
The lanes get busy with day-trippers by midday, but the evenings are relaxed, and the huge Augustiner beer hall in Mülln, with its garden under chestnut trees, is where locals actually go. Avoid the summer festival weeks unless you have tickets, when hotels fill fast.
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Basel
Basel is the pick for a summer weekend in the water. On hot afternoons locals float down the Rhine through the middle of town, clothes stuffed into waterproof swim bags, and four small ferries with no engines, pushed across by the river's current alone, link the two banks.
On a rainy day the Kunstmuseum Basel holds one of the strongest public art collections of any city this size, from medieval altarpieces to modern masters. Switzerland is expensive, but the river, the ferries' views and the riverside steps where everyone gathers at sunset cost little or nothing.
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Maastricht
Maastricht feels more Burgundian than Dutch: long lunches, café terraces spilling onto the Vrijthof square and a food culture closer to neighboring Belgium's than to Amsterdam's.
Boekhandel Dominicanen, a bookshop fitted inside a former 13th-century Dominican church, is worth an hour even if you never buy a book, and it has a café among the stacks. Cross the Maas to the Wyck district for independent shops and quieter bars, and you have a weekend with almost nothing to plan.
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Trieste
Trieste is Italy's coffee city, a former Habsburg port whose grand old cafés still work as living rooms for readers, students and card players. Its Piazza Unità d'Italia opens straight onto the Adriatic, and the city bills it as the largest square facing the sea in Europe; at dusk it is the obvious place to start an evening.
Add a walk along the Barcola seafront out to Miramare Castle, and the weekend fills itself. It sees far fewer visitors than Venice, which is much of the appeal.
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Verona
Verona has far more to it than Juliet's balcony. Piazza delle Erbe, the old market square, is the place for an evening spritz, and the Roman Arena still stages open-air opera on summer nights, which turns a weekend into an occasion if you book seats.
The center sits inside a loop of the Adige river, so the walk from Castelvecchio to the Roman theater on the far bank is short and scenic. Valpolicella wine comes from the hills just outside the city and is on every list, usually at fair prices.
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Parma
Parma is the pick for a weekend built around lunch. The city behind Parmigiano Reggiano and Parma ham was named a UNESCO Creative City of Gastronomy in 2015, the first in Italy, and its delis and trattorias justify the title without any fuss.
Between meals, the cathedral's dome, frescoed by Correggio with a swirling Assumption of the Virgin, and the octagonal baptistery beside it fill an unhurried afternoon. It is quieter and far less touristy than Bologna, and the evening passeggiata through the center is the only plan you need.
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Girona
Girona is a short train ride from Barcelona but feels a world away once the day-trippers leave. The colorful houses hanging over the Onyar river, the climb up the cathedral's great flight of steps and a stroll along the old city walls make an easy first day, and the narrow lanes of the old Jewish quarter are made for getting a little lost.
The city has a serious food reputation, so book one good dinner and keep the other evening loose, with tapas around the arcaded Plaça de la Independència.
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Cádiz
Cádiz is almost surrounded by the Atlantic, so a lap of its old town is also a seaside walk. Phoenician traders from Tyre founded it as a trading post, and it is often called the oldest continuously inhabited city in Western Europe, though historians still debate how far back the founding really goes.
Fried fish in a paper cone near the Mercado Central, sunset at the little La Caleta beach and the tapas bars of the La Viña neighborhood cover the rest of the weekend. The famous carnival takes over the city in late winter, usually in February, so plan around it or book well ahead.
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Coimbra
Coimbra is Portugal's old university city, and the university crowning the hill is the reason to come. Its historic buildings have been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2013, and the gilded baroque Joanina Library is home to a colony of small bats that come out at night to hunt the insects that would otherwise damage the books.
Below the hill, the steep lanes of the old town lead down to the Mondego river, and evenings can include Coimbra's own style of fado, closely tied to its student tradition. Hotels and meals cost noticeably less than in Lisbon or Porto.
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Graz
Graz is Austria's second city, yet its center walks like a small town and sees a fraction of Vienna's or Salzburg's crowds. The historic center has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1999, and the Schlossberg hill with its clock tower rises right above the red rooftops for an easy climb and a view.
Across the Mur river, the blue, bulbous Kunsthaus, opened in 2003 and nicknamed the Friendly Alien, makes a cheerful contrast with the Renaissance courtyards. Students keep the bars busy, and the cooking leans on the surrounding Styria region, with dark pumpkin seed oil turning up on almost everything.
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Bath, Somerset
Bath is small enough to cross in half an hour, and its honey-colored Georgian terraces, the Royal Crescent above all, make even an aimless walk feel like sightseeing. You can't swim in the Roman Baths themselves, but the modern Thermae Bath Spa draws on the same natural thermal springs, and its open-air rooftop pool looks out over the city skyline and the surrounding hills.
Pubs and restaurants are plentiful and close together. Saturday nights can get loud with groups, so a Sunday-to-Monday stay is the calmer version.
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