Free Walking Tour Stein am Rhein: Bridge to Castle

Your Stein am Rhein Walking Tour, Five Stops in Order

1. 1

   Rhine Bridge

   

   Start on the bridge and look along the water: right here, at and beneath this crossing, the Untersee, the lower arm of Lake Constance, comes to an end and the High Rhine begins. Today the bridge carries a two-lane town road with a footpath on each side, so you can stand at the railing and take in the river without dodging traffic.

   People have crossed the Rhine near Stein for almost two thousand years. Wooden piles studied by tree-ring dating prove that the Romans built a bridge here in the years 81 and 82, slightly downstream near Eschenz, using the eastern tip of the island of Werd as a stepping point. The southern half was a pile bridge 217 m long and 6.4 m wide, with ten oak piles of 30 to 45 cm thickness rammed into the riverbed under each yoke. The northern half ran another 220 m, and because no piles were found along a 74 m stretch, archaeologists believe that part floated on boats.

   Toward the end of the 3rd century a new, probably stone bridge rose upstream, close to today's crossing, protected by the Roman fort of Tasgetium. Its bridgehead foundations were later found beneath St. George's Abbey on the right bank, which is exactly where you are heading next.

   The medieval bridge came from the abbey too. Around 1200 the abbot most likely ordered a crossing at the narrowest point of the river, and documents mention the wooden bridge in 1267: an open timber walkway on about ten pile yokes, wide enough for one cart at a time. It was thoroughly repaired from 1520, and during the Thirty Years' War drawbridges were fitted and the town side was fortified more strongly.

   From the bridge it is only 90 m and one minute to the abbey, the institution that made this little fishing spot a town.

   Local name

   Rheinbrücke Stein am Rhein

   Location

   Rhine Bridge on Google Maps ↗

2. 2

   St. George's Abbey

   

   Around 1007 Emperor Henry II moved this Benedictine abbey from the Hohentwiel near Singen to Stein, then little more than a fishing village on the Rhine. His reason was strategic: major roads and river routes met here. He handed the abbots wide rights over the settlement and its trade, and they used them well. Stein grew quickly into a prosperous town and in the 15th century was even, briefly, granted the status of a free imperial town.

   The abbey prospered alongside it and rebuilt its whole complex in the 15th century. What you see is still counted among the region's important examples of late Gothic architecture. The last abbot, David von Winkelsheim, took office in 1499, finished the building works and commissioned a suite of Renaissance frescoes that rank among the earliest known in Northern Europe. Those painted rooms are the main reason to go inside.

   His story ends badly. With the Reformation the abbey was secularised and Zürich took over its assets. Von Winkelsheim negotiated that he and the remaining monks could live out their lives in the buildings, but Zürich suspected him of plotting with the Habsburgs and locked him in his own new rooms. He escaped to Radolfzell and died there shortly afterwards, in 1526. The buildings survived intact until the 19th century, when their owners used them for industrial purposes and caused considerable damage.

   The abbey is the one stop on this route with an entry fee. If you care about art history or want to see some of the oldest Renaissance wall painting north of the Alps, it is worth the hour. If you are here mainly for the townscape, the outside and the courtyard view will do, and you can save the time for the climb later. Rathausplatz is 130 m and two minutes away.

   Local name

   Kloster Sankt Georgen in Stein am Rhein

   Hours

   Tue–Sun 12:00–17:00, Mon closed (Apr 3 – Nov 1)

   Price

   CHF 7 full, CHF 4 reduced (AHV/IV/students), under 16 free

   Website

   klostersanktgeorgen.ch ↗

   Location

   St. George's Abbey on Google Maps ↗

3. 3

   Rathausplatz

   

   This is where the town the abbots built shows off, and it costs nothing. Rathausplatz is the central market square of the old town, open public space with no gate and no ticket. Painted Renaissance facades stand next to plain half-timbered houses, and that contrast is the thing to look for: two building traditions sharing one square, colourful painted fronts right beside bare timber frames.

   Take a slow lap and compare them house by house. The wealth you heard about at the abbey, a trading town that briefly answered to no lord but the emperor, is written on these fronts. Keep the picture in mind; you will look down on these roofs from the castle hill at the end of the walk.

   The square also works as the hinge of the route. The abbey is one lane back, Museum Lindwurm one lane on, and the way up to the castle starts at the edge of the old town. If you joined the walk here, the story picks you up now. Museum Lindwurm is 120 m and two minutes away.

   Hours

   Always open

   Price

   Free

   Location

   Rathausplatz on Google Maps ↗

4. 4

   Museum Lindwurm

   

   Before houses had numbers, they had names, and this one is called Lindwurm, an old word for dragon. The building is much older than its neat classicist front from 1819 and 1820 suggests: tree-ring dating of the ceiling beams in the lower floor traces its origins back to 1279. In 1712 a rear building was added as a stable and farm building, a reminder that town life and farming were never far apart here.

   Inside, the museum shows middle-class living and agricultural work around 1850 across 1,500 square metres. Entry is free, and it is well worth the time if you want to see how a household in town actually functioned, from the living rooms to the work spaces at the back.

   The house kept its 19th-century character almost by accident. The Gnehm family owned it from 1853, and Robert Gnehm, born in Stein in 1852, bought it around 1900 but barely used it, at most as a holiday home in his old hometown. He left his fortune, including Sandoz shares and the house, to his daughter Marie, a trained doctor. Her cousins Jakob and Emma Windler inherited from her and set up the foundation that still runs the museum and other cultural venues in town.

   In 1947 and 1948 the architect Wolfgang Müller remodelled the house, preserving the old fabric and adding pieces to give a full picture of the period. That is why the pillar and the round-arched and Renaissance doors in the entrance hall did not originally stand here. The museum, designed by the folklorist Peter Bretscher, opened in 1993.

   Now comes the one real walk of the tour: 920 m and 24 minutes up to Hohenklingen Castle.

   Hours

   Mar–Oct: Tue–Sun 10:00–17:00, Mon closed; Nov–Feb: Sat–Sun 10:00–17:00, Mon–Fri closed

   Price

   Free

   Website

   museum-lindwurm.ch ↗

   Location

   Museum Lindwurm on Google Maps ↗

5. 5

   Hohenklingen Castle

   

   Hohenklingen sits at 594 m, nearly 200 metres above the little town, on a narrow ridge of conglomerate rock that forms the southwestern spur of the Schiener Berg. It is a spur castle, and its great luck is that no war ever destroyed it. The silhouette of walls and roofs you see still matches its medieval look from between 1200 and 1422. The old keep now serves as a lookout tower, and the castle grounds are free to enter.

   The name comes from the Old High German klingo, meaning mountain stream, gorge or rushing water, and refers to the stream ravines that join at the foot of the hill. It first appears in 1327 as the high Clingen above Stein.

   The castle is tied to everything you have seen today. Around 1200 Walter von Klingen, the protector and legal advocate of St. George's Abbey, built a residential tower on this spot, probably replacing an earlier wooden tower of the Zähringer, who held the office before him. The family later split into two branches. In 1359 one branch sold its share to Austria for lack of money and received it back as a fief, and in 1419 their heirs sold it to Kaspar von Klingenberg, lord of the Hohentwiel, the same hill the abbey had come from four centuries earlier. He bought the other half in 1433.

   As the lesser nobility declined, the Klingenbergs had to sell in 1457, and the buyers were the citizens of Stein themselves, who paid 24,500 guilders for the castle. Later it became an important end point in Zürich's chain of hilltop signal stations, with a bailiff installed up here. Standing on the hill above the bridge, the abbey and the square, you are looking at a town that ended up owning the fortress meant to watch over it.

   Hours

   Wed–Sun 10:00–23:00, Mon–Tue closed (restaurant)

   Price

   Free (castle grounds)

   Website

   burghohenklingen.com ↗

   Location

   Hohenklingen Castle on Google Maps ↗

Shorter Ways Through Stein am Rhein

The full route ends with a climb and includes one paid interior. If you want to skip either, these two versions keep the storyline intact.

Old town only, no castle climb

Stops: 1, 2, 3, 4

For anyone short on time or not keen on the uphill walk. You stay in the old town: 340 m and 5 minutes of walking from the bridge to Museum Lindwurm. The abbey is the only admission; with time inside the abbey and the museum, plan about two and a quarter hours, or half an hour if you only look from outside.

Everything free

Stops: 1, 3, 4, 5

For a no-ticket day. You still walk past the abbey on the way to Rathausplatz and see its exterior, then continue to the museum and up to the castle grounds, all without admission. The walking stays at 29 minutes; with the museum and some time on the hill, allow just over two hours.

How Long the Stein am Rhein Tour Takes, With and Without Visits

Of the 29 minutes of pure walking, 24 belong to the last leg: 920 m from Museum Lindwurm up to Hohenklingen Castle. Everything before that is a short stroll of a minute or two between stops, so the old town part feels more like browsing than hiking.

The realistic total is about three hours: roughly an hour inside St. George's Abbey for the cloister rooms and frescoes, about 45 minutes in Museum Lindwurm, a quarter of an hour on Rathausplatz, a few minutes at the bridge and half an hour at the castle. The old town version without the climb takes about two and a quarter hours with both interiors; the free version a little over two.

Before You Set Off in Stein am Rhein

• Start and finish: The recommended start is the Rhine Bridge, and the route ends up at Hohenklingen Castle, nearly 200 metres above town. You can join at any stop; just leave time for the way back down into the old town.
• When to go: St. George's Abbey and Museum Lindwurm both have seasonal opening times, so pick a day and time when the abbey is open if you want to see the frescoes.
• Admission: St. George's Abbey is the only stop with an entry fee, payable at the door. The bridge, Rathausplatz, Museum Lindwurm and the castle grounds are free.
• The climb: The final leg is an uphill walk of 920 m. Save some energy for it rather than spending everything in the old town.

Common Questions About Stein am Rhein