7 Best Shopping in The Pfalz and Rhine Terrace, Germany

The Gutenberg-Shop, in the building of the local newspaper, Allgemeine Zeitung Mainz, offers splendid souvenirs and gifts, including pages from the Bible, books, posters, pens, and stationery. The friendly staff will also arrange to ship your purchases outside the country. There's a similar selection at the shop in the Gutenberg Museum.

After seeing the fantastical Elwetritschen fountain in action, you might want to take a smaller version of it home. Workshop, gallery, and pottery store Keramik-Atelier Ingrid Zinkgraf has amusing ceramic renditions of the mythical birds, as well as modern and traditional pottery and sculptures.

Antiques and perhaps a few hidden treasures await the patient shopper at Krempelmarkt. The flea market is on the banks of the Rhine (Rheinufer) between the Hilton hotel and Kaiserstrasse. At the Theodor Heuss Bridge is the children's flea market, where the youngest sellers offer clothes, toys, and books.

This rather nondescript city-center shopping mall offers a standard selection of German chain stores, cafés, and kiosks, but if you're a keen chef then go upstairs to kitchen store Fissler to pick up excellent-quality cooking utensils or a traditional German clay cooking pot (Römertopf). The Römerpassage also houses the remains of a Roman temple (AD 1) discovered in 1999 during the construction of the mall. The temple, which is dedicated to the goddess Isis and Magna Mater, is in the basement and can be visited during mall opening times (donation requested).

Eat, drink, and shop: this store and restaurant specializes in regional culinary items, including gift baskets, from Rheinhessen, Odenwald, and Pfalz. They also offer wine seminars, such as guided wine and cheese or chocolate tastings.

This small shop next to the Dürkheimer Riesenfass offers a selection of more than 200 wines from Bad Dürkheim and around, available by the bottle or box. It also sells other grape-related products and accessories.

Artist Georg Wiedemann is responsible for both the contents and the design of the beautiful glass bottles at Germany's premier wine-vinegar manufacturer. The wide range of creatively named vinegars are of organic quality, but are not labeled as such because Georg doesn't want to make public his secret recipes. Vinegar tastings and cellar tours take place on Saturday morning (90 minutes, €30); the shop is in Venningen, 2 km (1 mile) east of Edenkoben.