Discover Aschaffenburg – the city and the Spessart

City experiences and Spessart nature

Aschaffenburg combines urban discoveries with a wide range of opportunities for excursions in the district. Johannisburg Palace and Palace Square are less than a ten-minute walk from the railway station. In the district, by contrast, forests, cycling routes and hiking opportunities offer many ways to get outdoors. When planning your vacation, it therefore makes a difference whether you mainly want to experience the city or spend time on the trails in the Spessart.

Aschaffenburg railway station is served by regional trains, Regional Express trains, InterCity trains and InterCityExpress trains. There are also specific points of reference for a stay within the city: Palace Square and Johannisburg Palace are less than a ten-minute walk from the station. Tours of the old town and Schönbusch English Landscape Park are adapted to the needs of people with limited mobility. If you would like to make these tours a focus, you can include them as a separate part of your city exploration.

Cycling between the Main Valley and the High Spessart

The district offers routes with different characteristics for cycling trips. The family-friendly MainRadweg runs through the Main Valley in the Aschaffenburg district and is well signposted. The Kahltal-Spessart cycle route, which passes through the district’s attractive landscapes, is also signposted. In the eastern High Spessart, four challenging cross-country routes are signposted as Bikewald-Spessart routes. When choosing a cycling tour, you can therefore distinguish between the MainRadweg, a route through the district’s landscapes, and the explicitly challenging trails in the High Spessart.

The “Denk mal – Rad mal” app offers cycling adventures in nature throughout the district, combined with stories, quizzes and information about places of interest. This adds another way to plan a cycling trip alongside the signposted routes: stories and puzzles along the way. If you enjoy including stories and places of interest in a shared outing, this is an alternative to the challenging cross-country routes.

Hiking and landscapes

The Spessart in the Aschaffenburg district is part of Germany’s largest contiguous mixed forest area. Spessart Trails 1, 2 and 3 pass through the district; they have been awarded the German Hiking Association’s “Qualitätswege Wanderbares Deutschland” quality certification four times. The Eselsweg is described as a multi-day tour. There are also more than 30 hiking routes along the cultural trails of the Archaeological Spessart Project. The three Spessart Trails hold the quality certification mentioned above.

In the vicinity of Aschaffenburg, hiking, Nordic walking and cycling tours are possible around Mespelbrunn. High-level trails offer views of the Spessart floodplains. The history of Mespelbrunn Water Castle also gives the surrounding area a special cultural connection: in more peaceful times, later generations transformed the forbidding walls of a moated castle into a romantic Renaissance palace. Mespelbrunn Water Castle and Alzenau Castle are mentioned as cultural attractions for visitors.

Local cuisine and suitable bases

Numerous inns and hotels in the district serve Franconian specialties and Äppelwoi from local cider presses. Around the growing areas near Alzenau and Großostheim, you can sample Franconian wines. Further afield in the region, in the Kahlgrund, a strong distilling tradition is widespread, with a high concentration of distilleries and many award-winning fine spirits. The culinary offerings range from Franconian dishes and Äppelwoi to Franconian wine and the fine spirits of the Kahlgrund.

When choosing a holiday apartment, you can consider which experiences you want to shape your stay: the palace and old town in Aschaffenburg, cycling or hiking in the district, or local cuisine and wine. The places and attractions mentioned are not all based in the same location, so choose your accommodation according to the destination that matters most to you.

Discover more places

You can also take a closer look at the places Kahl, Kleinkahl, Laufach, Kleinostheim, Krombach, Goldbach, Hösbach, Aschaffenburg, Mespelbrunn, Alzenau, Geiselbach, Schöllkrippen, Haibach, Bessenbach, Mömbris, Sommerkahl, Wiesen, Rothenbuch, Rohrbrunner Forst, Karlstein am Main, Johannesberg and Großostheim.

For the overview of the wider region: Bavaria.