Hohenzollern Castle

Ancestral Seat Of The Hohenzollern Dynasty, Rebuilt In Neo Gothic Form Between 1850 And 1867 On A 855 M Hill; The Prussian Crown And Frederick The Great'S Personal Effects Are In Its Treasury · Bisingen, Baden-Wurttemberg

Hohenzollern Castle is the picture on the calendar: a crowd of neo-Gothic towers on a conical 855 m hill above Hechingen, sometimes floating on a sea of autumn fog. Be clear about what it is before you drive an hour from Stuttgart. This is the third castle on the site and almost all of it was built between 1850 and 1867 for King Frederick William IV of Prussia, as a romantic monument to his dynasty rather than a place anyone lived - the medieval castles here were destroyed, and only the fifteenth-century St Michael's Chapel survives from earlier work. No king ever held court here. What you get is a superb approach, a spiral of gates and ramps up into the courtyard, ramparts with a long view over the Swabian Jura, a short circuit of nineteenth-century state rooms, and a treasury holding a Prussian crown and Frederick the Great's personal effects. The courtyard and the walls are the best of it, the interior the least. And the famous fog view is seen from a hill opposite, not from the castle itself.

On a conical hill above Hechingen and Bisingen, on the edge of the Swabian Jura south of Stuttgart, Bisingen, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany

Open daily nearly all year, with shorter hours in winter and a different pattern during the Christmas market weeks, when entry is by timed ticket and the shuttle may be the only way up - confirm. Expect roughly 10 am to 5 or 6 pm, last admission about an hour before closing, with the interior circuit stopping earlier than the courtyard. The castle closes for a short maintenance period and for private events, and in snow or ice the access road and the shuttle can stop without notice, which strands you at the car park. The shuttle bus from the lower car park runs through opening hours for a small fee; the walk up takes 20-35 minutes. Book timed entry online for weekends, holidays and all of December.

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