The south of Leipzig, a former opencast mining area, has been flooded over the last ten years and turned into a series of relaxing lakes. Cospudner is the first of these.
Hire a bike in the city, and cycle the 20 mins through the wonderful parks and forest to the lake, where you can take a dip in the water, and have lunch at the harbour, or even cycle the 10 km around the lake

Tourist office, ask for a city map

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A cafe, bar and restaurant tucked just 50 metres away from the maddening crowd and central city tourist mayhem. It’s a hangout for students, artists and writers... with a sprinkling of business people lunching together.

Read newspapers in any language, or work on your laptop. They have free WLAN, so it's deal for hanging out while working online, just surfing, or even reading the Guardian! The menu is good and reasonably priced. Breakfasts are excellent, however the coffee is the typical German barely-tolerable lukewarm stuff… try to think of it as something else and put up with it. Having said that, it’s still one of the city’s top (secret) locations.

It's between the end of Barfussgässchen (where all the tourists and village Germans go) and the main ring road. Walk towards the Stasi Museum (worth visiting!) and you´ll find Telegraph on the right.

Dittrichring 18-20;
tel: 0341.149 49 90;
www.cafe-telegraph.de

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A semi-underground bar/cafe/venue/club with plenty going on from lunchtime until the early hours. It’s built from an old fortress on the south-east corner of the city centre. During Euro '96 the Leipzig Brits always watched the big screen TV there. Southgate broke our hearts...

Universitätsstrasse 9;
Get the tram to Augustusplatz or Leuschnerplatz, or walk 10 mins south and then east from Marktplatz. Lots of steps - so access may be a problem;
tel: 341 702590;
www.moritzbastei.de

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A bar that's quite trendy-looking, with a good selection of well-priced cocktails and light meals. We went in there on a Saturday and there was a jazz band playing who were quite good.

Markt 9

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