Discover Wasserlosen through several themes: a wayside shrine route, churches and collections in the municipality, and traces of earlier settlement. When planning your visit, it is worth distinguishing between the village of Wasserlosen and the municipality’s other districts. This will help you keep track of where the individual sights and routes are located.
Wayside Shrine Route and Choosing Your Distance
The northern route is about 51 kilometres long and passes 67 wayside shrines. Its circular route runs through Wasserlosen and Greßthal. Blue signs marked “Bildstockweg” indicate the route, which follows paved cycle paths almost throughout. The route, signage and wayside shrines give the tour a clearly defined theme, without requiring you to piece together a list of several individual sights.
The northern route can be extended with an eastern loop, adding 29 kilometres and 42 more wayside shrines. This lets you weigh up the shorter or extended option based on the stated distance and additional stops. No walking or cycling time is specified, so plan the distance to suit your own schedule for the day.
Churches, Collections and Local History
The village of Wasserlosen is home to the Catholic Church of St Simon and Jude, dating from the time of Julius Echter (1602). Other churches are located in the municipality’s districts: St Cyriacus in Schwemmelsbach was built to plans by Balthasar Neumann. The pilgrimage church of Maria von der Tann is in Rütschenhausen. These places represent different ecclesiastical highlights within the municipality, without conflating their locations.
In Greßthal, a district of the municipality, the parish museum is housed in a Baroque rectory. Its historical library contains more than 400 specialist books for the clergy, mostly from the 18th and 19th centuries. The archaeological section introduces the region’s prehistory and early history; the museum also preserves the parish treasury, spanning more than 550 years of parish history. The building, library and collections thus offer different insights into local church and regional history.
The German-American Postwar Museum in Rütschenhausen explores a different historical topic. The exhibition covers more than 600 square metres and displays hundreds of objects from the final phase of the Second World War and the postwar period that followed. If you are interested in much earlier settlement, the deserted medieval village of Höchstadt in the Reichthal valley near Wasserlosen is in the surrounding area: it was settled from the Neolithic period through to the Middle Ages.
Routes and Places in the Municipality
For a walk in one of the districts, the Kohlenbrennertour is an option: it is a circular hiking trail in Wülfershausen. The municipality of Wasserlosen’s favourite spot is also located there, in a peaceful, picturesque setting just behind the Vierzehnheiligen Chapel; there is a reclining bench at the spot. The route and this resting place are two distinct ways to explore Wülfershausen during your stay.
The geographical distinction also matters when planning your journey: the A7 motorway runs through the municipality of Wasserlosen. When making specific plans, therefore, take your particular destination within the municipality into account.
Regional Context Within the Schweinfurt Destination
The wider Schweinfurt destination offers a broader setting for cycling and hiking tours across the district. Its cycle network extends for more than 800 kilometres, and the district also has an extensive network of hiking trails. This is a different scale for regional planning than the northern route, which is about 51 kilometres long. For a closer look at wayside shrines, the Franconian Wayside Shrine Centre in Egenhausen offers a distinct experience: its modern permanent exhibition on the cultural history of wayside shrines covers about 90 square metres.
Public transport is also organised regionally. Main and secondary routes, school buses, city buses, rail services, routes operated by other transport authorities and the callheinz mobility service connect Schweinfurt district with the Mainfranken region. When no bus or train service is available, callheinz takes passengers from a callheinz stop to a connection with a regular public transport service or directly to their destination. Timetables, availability and booking conditions may change, so check these details before travelling.
Discover more destinations: Michelau Im Steigerwald, Röthlein, Gochsheim, Wipfeld, Oberschwarzach, Hundelshausen, Waigolshausen, Sulzheim.
Go to the main travel overview: Schweinfurt.
