Münster, Germany

Münster sits on the Aa River in North Rhine-Westphalia, where roughly 320,000 residents share their streets with about 500,000 bicycles — the highest per-capita cycling rate in Germany. Charlemagne's missionary Liudger founded the diocese here in 805, and the 1235 Rathaus later hosted the 1648 Peace of Westphalia signings that ended the Thirty Years' War. The city weathered the 1534 Anabaptist rebellion, which declared Münster the "New Jerusalem" until the bishop's siege ended it in 1535. The 1780 University of Münster has produced nine Nobel laureates among its 44,000 students, while the 1907 LWL Museum of Art and Culture traces Westphalian history across centuries.