Anninka shares with us a fabulous day hike to the Saarschleife on the famous Premium Hike: the Saar-Hunsrück-Steig. She, her husband, and two godchildren explore a 17 km section of the trail, officially known as leg 2 from Hellendorf to Mettlach.
Anninka and her husband Tobias run the hiking and travel website tobinka. On their website, they share inspiration for hikes, cycle trips, city walks, and other exciting outdoor adventures around the world and provide detailed hiking and travel guides.
The Saar-Hunsrück-Steig in southwest Germany regularly ranks as one of the country’s best long-distance trails. Starting in Perl on the banks of the Moselle river, the trail then stretches 410 kilometers across the Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland region, past Idar-Oberstein and across the Hunsrück low mountain range, to Boppard on the Rhine river. A side trip branching off in Kell am See connects the trail with the historic city of Trier, a former Roman colony and one of the oldest cities in Germany.
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The Saar-Hunsrück-Steig
The Saar-Hunsrück-Steig is a certified Premium Hike, the highest distinction awarded to Europe’s most spectacular hiking trails by the Deutsche Wanderinstitut. As such, the route is exceptionally picturesque, well-signposted, and conveniently split into 27 legs.
The individual trail sections range between 9.2 and 29.7 kilometers in length and most make for great day hikes too. While you will not scale a snowcapped mountain, cross a desert, or follow a surf-thrashed coastline on this trail, the magnificent views of the Saar, Moselle, Rhine, and Nahe rivers along the way and scenic wilderness found in Hunsrück-Hochwald national park are nonetheless marvelous.
Leg 2: Hellendorf to Mettlach
With two of our godchildren in tow, aged nine and eleven, we tackled the second leg of the Saar-Hunsrück-Steig. Our reasons for choosing this particular leg were simple. For one, this trail section takes in what may well be the most famous landmark in the area: the Große Saarschleife at Mettlach, also known as the Great Bend in the Saar, where the Saar river makes a spectacular 180-degree turn.
Secondly, the trail description promised a mix of long, off the beaten track stretches of forest and rolling meadows in Saar-Hunsrück nature park.
And last but not least, the 17-kilometer stretch between Hellendorf and Mettlach was about the longest distance that the kids could handle.
A running start
On a Saturday morning in early March, we set out from Hellendorf towards Tünsdorf at a rapid pace. We were basically running (after the kids). It was only a couple of degrees above freezing, everyone was cold, and unsuccessfully at first, I tried to convince the kids that none of us would make it to the finish line running. When minutes later, we were all huffing and puffing (us more than the kids), they relented, and we continued at a more leisurely pace on a mix of dirt roads, farm tracks, and single-lane forest trails.
We all loved the magically quiet stretches through the woods and narrow single-file mud tracks with a thick layer of fallen leaves underfoot. Where the sun hadn’t touched the ground yet, the mud was still frozen, and the kids were jumping into puddles, cracking the thin layer of ice with joy. We passed by a small pond with large sheets of ice floating on its surface before the trail led us out of the woods and across some open fields.
The ease of Premium Hiking
Because this was our first time walking a Premium Hike in Germany, we had no idea how easy or difficult the trail would be to follow. In our experience, the effort put into marking and maintaining trails varies significantly between and within countries. This leg of the Saar-Hunsrück-Steig however is very well signposted and suitable even for someone with no prior hiking experience. Trail markers displaying the green and blue logo are set at regular intervals and point the way through fruit orchards, fields, and small farming villages.
Signs of Spring
Everywhere, we spotted the first signs of spring. Graceful white-and-green snowdrops, purple crocus, and bright yellow daffodils brushed color at the soft forest floor. The trail then climbed to a lovely lookout point as we approached Tünsdorf with long views across the enchanted Steinbachtal nature reserve that was the next highlight on our walk.
I guess I’d have preferred a lush tree canopy, green grass, and the heat of summer to the winter tree skeletons, their branches bare, the fields turned brown by the cold, and the icy gusts sweeping across the hills. I’m a summer person with a great dislike for winter. Yet even I was pleasantly surprised by the beauty of the gently rolling forested hills and quiet valleys, the earthy scent of wet soil and rustling sounds of brittle twigs and autumn leaves. We’d just come back from Australia’s harsh outback wilderness, and I somehow found this scenery very soothing.
Lunch in Orscholz at the Cloef Atrium
Orscholz, just past the halfway mark, was our designated lunch spot. The trail bypasses Orscholz in the south, taking you from a rocky outcrop called Orkelsfels on the outskirts of town to Cloef Atrium Meeting and Visitor Center and further to Cloef lookout. We were all excited for the famous panorama of the Saar river doing its big twist, but it was already approaching early afternoon when we arrived in Orscholz. The kids were hungry, and having pizza was way more important than rushing off to see one of the great highlights of the Saar-Hunsrück-Steig: the Große Saarschleife, or the Great Bend in the Saar.
The best place to exit the trail for a bite to eat is at Cloef Atrium. The bistro at the event center itself offers lunch and dinner all week except on Tuesdays, and if you walk up Mius-Kiefer-Strasse for a couple of minutes, you’ll arrive at a large roundabout with two pizza places and a Rewe supermarket nearby.
Baumwipfelpfad – Treetop Walk to a fantastic view
After lunch, we rejoined the trail just to exit it again a minute later, at the entrance to the fabulous Treetop Walk Saarschleife (Baumwipfelpfad). Suspended 23 meters above the forest floor, this sturdy boardwalk seems to magically float through the treetops. Where the walkway emerges from the tree canopy, a 42m high semicircular lookout tower, modelled on the shape of the Saarschleife, offers the most magnificent views over the Saar river and its famous bend. On a fine day, you might even spot the Vosges mountains in the distance.
the Baumwipfelpfad overlooking the Saarschleife on the Saar-Hunsrück-Steig
I remembered coming here as a little girl with my sister and my grandmother. That was long before the Treetop Walk was built. We would spend time in an animal and fairytale park first, which is now closed, and then go to see the Saarschleife. At the time, I thought the river was boring compared to this gold-ass character in the park that features in a fairytale by the Brothers Grimm, ‘The Wishing-Table, the Gold-Ass, and the Cudgel in the Sack’. That life-sized plastic donkey was the park’s main attraction. My sister and I thought so, at least. One would feed the donkey money and in return get showered in chocolate coins wrapped in gold foil. We loved it. We fed that donkey all our pocket money and then pleaded with our grandmother for some more.
You can still feed the Goldesel at Schloss Ludwigsburg!
The new Treetop Walk is way more educational than the former fairytale park, of course, with information boards and activity stations along the walkway explaining the area’s fauna, flora, and geology. At the entrance, you can also purchase a fun little booklet with questions for the kids to answer along the way. The observation tower, too, was a favorite with the kids. We watched large boats navigate the narrow horseshoe bend and speculated about the ruins of Montclair Castle that sits enthroned on a small forested rise above the water. Enclosed by the river on three sides with long views up and down the valley, this spot, we concluded, was probably much sought after in the late Middle Ages when the fortress was built.
The Treetop Walk is just 1.25-kilometers long, but with kids in tow, a booklet to fill out, and a playground on the way, we spent close to two hours to complete the loop. Back at the entrance and again on solid ground, we followed the trail down into the Saar valley where it traces the picturesque bend of the river towards Mettlach.
Plan your trip on the Saar-Hunsrück-Steig
The Saar-Hunsrück-Steig has an excellent website to help you plan your day hike or long-distance trek on the trail. To hike section 2 of the Saar-Hunsrück-Steig to the Saarschleife from Hellendorf, you can take the bus from Merzig train station to Ortsmitte Hellendorf, Perl (direction Nenning). On weekends, you will have to reserve a spot on the Sammeltaxi at least an hour before you plan to depart (telephone: 06861 80255). Mettlach is connected hourly or more by regional train.