GR® 53 : stage 1

Magnificent view of Wissembourg and its vineyards. In the middle of the latter stands the Château St. Paul, the last of the 4 castles built to protect the city.

A beautiful view of the Lauter valley. In the village Weiler stands the Langenberg, a former castle from the 13th century.

Decided by Marshal de Villars in 1706, they were intended to lock the north of Alsace during the war of succession to the Spanish throne (1701-1714). Thus, 50 redoubts and 28 dikes constituted a continuous parapet allowing the valley to be flooded. An important redoubt was named Maréchal de Bourg, the man who improved and increased the lines in the Scherhol area.

Shelter and refuge of the Club Vosgien at the Col du Pigeonnier

On the site of an old redoubt of the lines of the Lauter was built a telegraph station from 1795 to 1860, which was replaced by a pyramid of logs to carry out geodesic measurements in 1875 before being used as belvedere to admire the landscape . Replaced by a stone tower in 1895, it served as a watchtower during World War II before being destroyed by the Germans dynamite. It was never rebuilt. More info here.

Built on a sandstone promontory 20 m high, 125 m long and 8 to 15 m wide at an altitude of 370 m, the castle has existed since the 12th century to control the roads to Lorraine and Haguenau. After the sieges of 1276 and 1315, it was restored in the 15th century, redesigned and modernized in the 16th century, but destroyed in 1680. The rock, cut vertically, was dug out to build chambers. On the upper platform there are remains of the 15th century palace and a chapel.