Galgenberg-Weg HRW 10

We start our circular walk at the Röthlein parking lot on the B 85 (railroad bridge, outskirts of Rothenkirchen) and walk carefully over the railroad bridge, crossing the main road again with caution at the beginning bend. We soon reach the castle with its new, protective roof.

Shortly afterwards, we turn right and follow the narrow local roads straight ahead out of town to a road, the Alte Heeresstraße. We follow it uphill and pass the site of the former castle to the Galgenberg with its cross and magnificent view. A short detour takes us back to the Heeresstraße via the former place of execution.

We walk through light wooded areas, past a cross, to the heights, where we enjoy the views until we come to a farm track that leads downhill to Förtschendorf on the right. We follow it downhill through an open valley landscape, which is partly lined with wooded areas, until we reach the village in the Haßlachtal valley, where greywacke was once quarried in the hard stone works.

In the village, we turn left, then right through the railroad underpass. Before the exhibition pavilion with the historical equipment, we head uphill to the left and past the last house into the forest. Now we reach a meadow path in the forest, quite steeply uphill, which leads us uphill past a large, wooded field onto a road. A Corpus Christi greets us from a tree on the left over by the forest.

We soon turn right briefly through a section of forest to walk uphill again on the same path along the edge of the forest to the heights with wide views. We can see the three wind turbines of Hirschfeld with the first houses of the village on the plateau and the wooded slopes and heights of the western Franconian Forest.

On reaching the top, we pause at the simple iron cross that stands on a sandstone base between two lime trees on the Hoher Weg. - "Now farewell, my dear homeland" - Teuschnitzer may once have thought here, perhaps even sung, when it was time to say goodbye to their beloved homeland for a long time or even forever and go to war.

This was also experienced after the First World War by those Teuschnitzer who, obeying necessity, sought their fortune in the New World. They were accompanied by relatives and friends on their way to the train station in Förtschendorf. The soldiers also said goodbye here on their way to the front, many of them probably for good.

We walk straight ahead through a beautifully structured landscape slightly downhill, with a view to the left upwards to the Teuschnitz floodplain. Finally, we walk along a paved farm track to the fire extinguishing pond in the once historically important town of Teuschnitz at the lower end of the village.

We take a short detour to the nearby roadside and pause at the murder cross on Teuschnitz Torberg, the place where, according to legend, the municipal servant innocently met his death shortly before the town became safe. A legend about the murder cross tells this story. After the detour to the murder cross, we continue straight ahead up the narrow side street and cross the main road to Nebelgasse. Here, too, we recommend a detour to the town center with its town hall and church. However, our main circular hiking trail now leads us together with the Burgenweg via Nebelgasse on a field and forest path through beautiful fields and woods up the same path for a long time. On the way, we pass the Teuschnitz gallows hill, where the gallows once stood in an open area, visible from afar, to deter passers-by from committing crimes.

Once we have reached the top, we walk on for a short while until we have a beautiful view of Wickendorf and the Teuschnitz valley. There we turn right and walk downhill on a dirt track through the fields and past the edge of a forest into the beautiful valley landscape of the Teuschnitz to the charming village of Wickendorf. We walk along the Frankenwaldbach stream to the left until we reach the former schoolhouse. Here we leave the main road and the Burgenweg and continue through the elongated village, reaching the forest after the sawmill. We walk uphill in the forest on a near-natural path to a height denuded by Kyrill (2007) and further downhill to a fork in the valley floor. We keep right on a dirt track uphill to the heights and the road. We follow it to the left, after a few meters together with the Burgenweg for almost 200 meters in the direction of Marienroth.

We leave the road and walk straight ahead uphill on a road to the 616 m high Pfaffenberg with the transmission mast near Marienroth. As the altitude increases, the views become wider and more impressive!

The coat of arms of the nearby church village of Marienroth symbolizes the village: the three lilies as the symbol of St. Mary indicate that the place was named after her, the colors gold and blue are reminiscent of the Langheim monastery, whose monks Christianized the mountain villages from Teuschnitz and finally sold the place to the Bishop of Bamberg in 1388. The St. George's Cross refers to St. George, the patron saint of the church, and the two flails symbolize the agricultural character of the village.

We leave the Burgenweg to the right before the mighty transmission mast and descend through the forest to a forest path, which we follow to the left to Marienrother Platz, a wide path spider. We then follow the pleasant forest path downhill to the right through beautiful high forest with individual fir trees until we reach the B 85 in the valley. We reach our starting point again at the Röthleins hiking parking lot.</p