Painters' Way
Malerweg
An eight-stage, 116 km walk through the sandstone towers and table mountains of Saxon Switzerland, following the routes of the Romantic painters.
At a glance
- Starts in
- Liebethal (Pirna)
- Ends in
- Pirna
- Length
- 116 km
- On foot
- ≈ 5–6 days
- Countries
Germany
About the trail
Saxon Switzerland, the Elbe Sandstone Mountains south-east of Dresden, drew travellers and painters in the decades around 1800, among them artists now counted among the inventors of Romanticism. The Malerweg, opened and waymarked in 2006, roughly follows the route that they and their companions took until the middle of the 19th century.
It starts in Liebethal near Pirna and crosses Saxon Switzerland National Park to the Bohemian border, passing the Bastei and the Schrammsteine, then returns along the left bank of the Elbe over the table mountains, by the Pfaffenstein and the fortress of Königstein, to Pirna. Over 116 km the route climbs about 3,600 m.
The regional tourist board divides it into eight stages with about 46 hours of walking. Walkers can stamp each stage in a Malerweg hiking pass and receive a certificate at the end, and hosts along the trail may carry the label 'Wanderfreundlich am Malerweg'.
No source gives the days on foot, so they are worked out from the length at 20–25 km a day.