About the Palatinate Wine Trail

The Pfälzer Weinsteig has an official total length of 185 kilometres, which can be walked in eleven daily stages. Opened in 2010, the long-distance hiking trail is the longest of the three certified hiking trails in the Palatinate Forest, ahead of the Palatinate Forest Trail and the Palatinate High Trail. The trail is marked with a red and white wave and runs in a north-south direction from Bockenheim near Grünstadt to Schweigen-Rechtenbach on the German-French border. It alternates repeatedly between the Palatinate wine-growing region on the German Wine Route and the heights of the Palatinate Forest. In total, there are about 6,000 metres of altitude difference to be climbed along the entire route. Highlights of the tour include the Kalmit, the Weinbiet, Bad Dürkheim, Annweiler with its Trifels group of castles, the Peace Monument and many small winegrowing villages along the way.

We were on the Palatinate Forest Trail in mid-March 2021 and decided to reduce the number of stages to seven, resulting in a daily stage length of about 25 kilometres. Due to the Covid-19 situation in 2021, all accommodation was closed and the nights were still too cool for bivouacking. So we were on the road with two vehicles and always parked one vehicle at the end point in the morning and drove to the starting point with the second vehicle. We spent the night in the vehicle, some of which had very nice places to stay overnight. Have we aroused your interest? Then come with us on our journey along the Palatinate Forest Trail!

Day 3 - From Deidesheim to Hambach Castle

We started today's stage at the Sensetal hiking car park near Deidesheim. Since we had a longer stage this day and we already knew Deidesheim, we deviated from the original route and took the vineyards as a connecting path past Deidesheim.

The route runs over gentle hills, first through vineyards, before re-entering the Palatinate pine forest and the "Haardt".

The Haardt

Incidentally, the Haardt is a 30-kilometre-long and approximately two to five-kilometre-wide low mountain range that is geologically distinct from the rest of the Palatinate Forest, but not spatially. It is one of four sub-units of the Palatinate Forest (Haardt, Lower and Middle Palatinate Forest, Wasgau). In the west, the mountain range is separated from the inner Palatinate Forest by the Lambrecht Fault. This fault line, named after the town of Lambrecht, runs parallel to the rift edge of the Rhine plain at a distance of about 2 to 5 km and has led to the displacement of various rock layers by 80 to 100 metres. This is why the formations of the Lower or Middle Buntsandstein, for example, are found at a correspondingly lower altitude in the Haardt than further to the west (source: Wikipedia).

The trail leads steadily up and down with great views of the Rhine Graben past Königsbach and Gimmeldingen and from here turns into the depths of the Haardt. From here it runs idyllically with an easy ascent directly along the Mußbach to the Benjetal forester's lodge.

Over the Weinbiet to Neustadt an der Weinstraße

Now it was time to climb the first major goal of the day, the 554-metre-high Weinbiet. Over a distance of 3.5 kilometres and 300 metres in altitude, we reach the summit with the Weinbiethaus, the Weinbiet tower and the weather station. Incidentally, the highest night-time low temperature ever measured in Germany was recorded at this weather station in the summer of the century, 2003, at 27.6 degrees.

On the way up to the Weinbiet we passed the "Stone Shark", a rock that is supposed to look like a shark, but looks suspiciously like a bearded whale. Maybe it's not just us.

Via small paths, we now went gently downhill again through the pine forest with many blueberry and heath landscapes, past the shoe tree, which is decorated with many hiking shoes, to the lookout rock with a sea of rocks and a beautiful view of the Wolfsburg castle ruins.

Over the Nollenkopf to Deidesheim

On the way to Neustadt an der Weinstraße we passed the Deidesheim Temple and the Mediterranean Garden. We quickly passed through the old town of Neustadt with its small alleyways and old half-timbered houses, and on the other side of the town we immediately tackled the next steep ascent to the Nollenkopf with its "Stone of Wise Satisfaction". We were all satisfied because the long climb was over. The Nollenkopf is a beautiful place surrounded by forest for a longer rest with beautiful views of the surroundings.

On the remaining kilometres to today's end point at Hambach Castle, there were two more beautiful viewpoints on our way: the Bergstein and the Sühnekreuz. This marked the end of a beautiful third day with many metres of altitude.

Watch the video of the third day on the Pfälzer Weinsteig here

The tour on Komoot