Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Castles
Eisenach
Wartburg Castle above the town of Eisenach in Thuringia is one of the most historic castles in Germany and a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1999. Martin Luther hid here and translated the New Testament into German, Saint Elizabeth of Hun…
Landmarks
Erfurt
The Krämerbrücke (Merchants' Bridge) in Erfurt is a medieval stone bridge lined on both sides with half-timbered houses, still lived in and filled with small shops. Erfurt bills it as the longest continuously built-up and inhabited bridge…
Historic sites & memorials
Weimar
The Buchenwald Memorial (Gedenkstätte Buchenwald) on the Ettersberg hill above Weimar preserves the site of one of the largest Nazi concentration camps on German soil. Between 1937 and 1945, about 277,800 people from some 50 countries were…
Churches & monasteries
Erfurt
The Protestant Augustinian Monastery (Augustinerkloster) in Erfurt is where Martin Luther lived as a monk from 1505 to 1511. It sits in the old town of Thuringia's capital and combines Luther history, a Gothic church, historic monastery bu…
Other
Kyffhäuserland
The Barbarossa Cave (Barbarossahöhle) near Rottleben in northern Thuringia is one of only two accessible anhydrite caves in the world and the only anhydrite show cave in Western Europe. Instead of stalactites, you will see glassy blue-gree…
Museums
Weimar
The Bauhaus Museum Weimar tells the story of the 20th century's most influential design school in the very city where it was founded in 1919. Housed in a stark concrete cube that opened for the Bauhaus centenary, it holds the oldest Bauhau…
Viewpoints
Unstrut-Hainich
The Hainich Treetop Walk (Baumkronenpfad Hainich) in Hainich National Park is one of the best-known canopy walkways in Germany and a fine stop if you want to see an ancient beech forest from above. A 540-meter path winds through the canopy…
Nature
Eisenach
At its narrowest point, only 68 centimetres separate the rock walls. Walking through the Drachenschlucht (Dragon Gorge) on the southern edge of Eisenach, you follow metal gratings above a rushing stream, with mossy cliffs rising high on bo…
Gardens & parks
Erfurt
The egapark sits where Erfurt once kept its cannons: on the Cyriaksberg hill in the south-west of the city, around the former Cyriaksburg citadel. Today 36 hectares of themed gardens, seasonal flower beds and tropical plants grow here. In…
Churches & monasteries
Erfurt
Erfurt Cathedral (Erfurter Dom, St. Mary's Cathedral) and the neighboring Church of St. Severus rise side by side above Erfurt's vast Domplatz square, forming one of Germany's most striking city skylines. A broad flight of 70 steps leads u…
Museums
Weimar
Goethe's House in Weimar (Goethes Wohnhaus) is Germany's most famous writer's home. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the towering figure of German literature, lived here on the Frauenplan square for most of five decades, worked on "Faust" in it…
Palaces
Rudolstadt
Heidecksburg Palace (Residenzschloss Heidecksburg) in Rudolstadt is a Baroque palace that stands about 200 feet (60 m) above the old town, on a ridge above the Saale river in Thuringia. It was the residence of the counts and princes of Sch…
Museums
Weimar
The Duchess Anna Amalia Library in Weimar is home to one of the most beautiful library halls in the world: the oval, three-story Rococo Hall, lined with books, portraits, and marble busts. Goethe ran the library for more than three decades…
Monuments
Kyffhäuserland
The Kyffhäuser Monument (Kyffhäuserdenkmal) in northern Thuringia is one of Germany's largest national monuments, an 81-meter (266-foot) sandstone tower on a forested ridge above the Golden Meadow plain. It links the medieval legend of Emp…
Castles
Kahla
Perched on a hilltop 395 metres above sea level, Leuchtenburg dominates the Saale valley so strikingly that it is known as the "Queen of the Saale Valley". Its history is anything but regal: over 800 years it has been a seat of power, a pr…
Museums
Eisenach
The Luther House in Eisenach (Lutherhaus Eisenach) is one of the oldest surviving half-timbered houses in Thuringia and one of Europe's most important Reformation sites. According to tradition, young Martin Luther lived here as a schoolboy…
Landmarks
Weimar
A white, almost square cube with a taller middle section, in a residential street on the edge of the Ilm park: at first glance the Haus Am Horn looks unremarkable. Yet it is the only Bauhaus building actually built in Weimar and one of the…
National parks
Unstrut-Hainich
Hainich National Park in Thuringia, between Eisenach, Mühlhausen and Bad Langensalza, protects one of the largest unmanaged deciduous forests in Germany and is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Its star attraction is the treetop walkwa…
Gardens & parks
Weimar
Park an der Ilm in Weimar is the landscape park that Johann Wolfgang von Goethe helped design, and one of the loveliest places to experience Germany's classical age. Stretching for about 120 acres (48 ha) along the Ilm River right next to…
Nature parks
Eisenach
The Rennsteig is Germany's oldest and most-walked ridge trail. Roughly 170 km (105 miles) long, it runs from Hörschel near Eisenach, on the Werra river, along the crest of the Thuringian Forest and the Thuringian Slate Mountains to Blanken…
Castles
Altenburg
Emperor Frederick Barbarossa stayed six times between 1165 and 1185 on a porphyry rock above the town of Altenburg, and in 1455 two Saxon princes were kidnapped from here. Today Altenburg Castle shows princely living quarters, a Baroque ba…
Caves
Saalfeld/Saale
The Saalfeld Fairy Grottoes (Saalfelder Feengrotten) in Saalfeld, Thuringia, are a former alum slate mine that has been open to visitors since 1914 and holds the Guinness World Records title of the world's most colorful show grottoes. Unde…
Palaces
Weimar
Schloss Belvedere is a Baroque summer palace perched on a wooded hill about four kilometers south of central Weimar. Surrounded by an orangery, a Russian garden and a sprawling landscape park, it is part of the Classical Weimar UNESCO Worl…
Palaces
Gotha
Friedenstein Palace (Schloss Friedenstein) in Gotha, Thuringia, is described by its foundation as the largest palace built in 17th-century Germany. Set on a hill above the town and never destroyed, the early Baroque complex holds lavish du…