Next month in Germany, more than a million visitors will marvel at world-class play during the World Cup soccer championship. They can also admire great art, stroll through mediaeval town squares and savour some of the world’s best beer.

The World Cup offers great tourism as well as sport, with the 12 host cities including perennial travel favourites Berlin, Cologne, Munich, Nuremberg and Hamburg. With as little as two or three spare hours before a game, visitors can take in Albrecht Duerer’s Self-Portrait in Munich’s Alte Pinakothek art museum, or try a crisp-roasted schweinshaxe, or ham hock, with sauerkraut and a cold pilsner from a centuries-old local brewery.

Visitors during the 9 June-9 July tournament will not even need tickets to plug into the soccer excitement. Games will be shown live on big screens in public places such as Berlin’s Potsdamer Platz and Munich’s Olympic Park, and thousands of people are expected to take part in fan festivals around the country.

Berlin alone is expecting 300,000 overnight guests, but tourism authorities say there will be room. “Anyone who comes will always find a hotel bed,” promised Berlin’s tourism marketing operation head Hanns Peter Nerger.

Of course, one can even forget the soccer. As with Athens and the 2004 Olympics, the week after the event ends might be a good time to visit, since some hotels are raising hotel prices on game days.

Here are leading attractions for quick visits in the top cities:

BERLIN: The museums clustered on the Museum Island in the Mitte district are superb, led by the Pergamon Museum with its 2nd century BC altar from the Greek city of Pergamon, and the blue-tiled Ishtar Gate built during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II around 575BC in ancient Babylon, now in Iraq. In the nearby Altes museum you can see the exquisite, 3,300-year-old bust of Egypt’s Queen Nefertiti.

For more recent history, the museum at Checkpoint Charlie recalls Berlin’s four decades as a divided city. A replica of the guard shack from Checkpoint Charlie, the East-West crossing point, stands on Friedrichstrasse; The real shack, hauled away after the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, can be found in the Allied Museum in the Zehlendorf district, which focuses on the Berlin Airlift and the US occupation after World War II, and is free of charge.

In the city centre, one can climb the glass dome of the historic Reichstag, home of the Bundestag lower house of parliament – also free, but go early or late to beat the queues.

Between museums, stop for Berlin’s trademark fast food: currywurst, or succulent chunks of pork sausage with curry-spiced ketchup, available everywhere at snack stands but especially well done at Bier’s Curry and Spiesse, on Friedrichstrasse underneath the train station overpass of the same name.

You can ask for yours without sausage casing if you like: “Ohne darm, bitte” – literally, “without intestine, please.”

Berlin will host the World Cup final on 9 July.

MUNICH: The World Cup begins here on 9 June with Germany’s match against Costa Rica.

For non-soccer sightseeing, duck into the Alte Pinakothek museum, stuffed with works by Duerer, Van Dyck, Rubens and Rembrandt. Or stroll through the English Garden (warning: nude sunbathers); visit the Deutsches Museum technology exhibits, or watch the Glockenspiel statues – animated figures on the Rathaus, or city hall, ring the hour at 11am, noon and 5pm.

The Hofbraeuhaus, dating from 1589, is the epitome of a Munich beer hall, with long benches and big mugs of suds. Locals like hefeweizen, or wheat beer, naturally cloudy with yeast, just slightly sweet and perfect on a hot day.

Touring the Dachau concentration camp, about 20 minutes from the central station by S-Bahn, or local train, is a very worthwhile break from mere tourism.

NUREMBERG: Stroll around the old town, restored after World War II to near its mediaeval splendour, and head up to the Kaiserburg fortress on top of the hill, residence of German rulers from 1050 to 1571.

The city has sobering reminders of its Nazi past: the Nazi parade grounds remain, with a documentation centre. At the Nuremberg Palace of Justice, in the northern part of town, you can tour Room 600, where the Nuremberg war crimes tribunal tried Nazi leaders.

COLOGNE: The awe-inspiring Cologne cathedral, its twin gothic spires soaring 155 metres high, stands next to the train station. Leave at least an hour to roam the inside, home to a gilded sarcophagus holding what tradition says are the remains of the Magi – the wise men who paid tribute to the new-born Jesus. The Roman-German Museum, a few yards away from the cathedral, has spectacular floor mosaics and other archaeological finds from the city’s days as a Roman outpost.

The taverns clustering the cathedral area offer Cologne’s trademark Koelsch, the frothy, faintly bitter beer served in what look like large shot glasses.

Portugal plays its former colony, Angola, in Cologne on 11 June.

HAMBURG: Walk for two hours around the Aussen Alster lake, for pedestrian-only views of the city and its parks. A boat tour of the harbor (about €10) connects you with the great northern port’s maritime role and history.

You can go to the famed Reeperbahn red-light street in the St Pauli district if you must, but it’s jammed with tourists and has lost much of whatever charm it once had.

Labskaus – a stew of potatoes, corned beef and beets with a fried egg on top – is said to have been served on board ship because the ingredients would keep.

The Czech Republic and Italy, two of the strongest soccer teams, face off in Hamburg on 22 June.

FRANKFURT: The Roemerberg, the mediaeval town square, rebuilt after its destruction in World War II, makes a lovely break from the city’s skyscrapers, and is ringed by restaurants with local fare such as Frankfurt’s green sauce, a creamy herb sauce served with potatoes or hard-boiled eggs. But if you order a frankfurter, you’ll get two long, thin sausages with mustard and a hard roll instead of an American-style hot dog.

The traditional brew here is apfelwein, a tangy apple wine that goes straight to your head.

Walk it off by hiking across one of the two pedestrian bridges spanning the Main River, to a row of museums on the south riverbank, just a few blocks from the main train station.

KAISERSLAUTERN: Not a major tourist stop, K-town, as it is called by the thousands of American soldiers stationed nearby, will host the US team’s game against Italy on 17 June. The city centre and Renaissance castle make a pleasant stroll, but the best move might be to drive to Trier, home to the Porta Nigra, or Black Gate, built by the Romans – some of the best Roman ruins north of the Alps.