Haut-Koenigsbourg Castle

The castle stands at about seven hundred and fifty metres on a spur of the Vosges, and from the great bastion the view runs across vineyards and villages to the Rhine, with the Black Forest showing on the far side on clear days. The medieval castle here stood ruined and abandoned for two centuries. Between 1900 and 1908 the architect Bodo Ebhardt rebuilt it almost entirely, with painted halls, tiled stoves, a furnished keep and a working drawbridge, using the surviving evidence where it existed and informed invention where it did not. Whether that makes it a monument or a reconstruction is an argument nobody has settled, and the building is more interesting for it.

What you actually see

• The bastion terrace - the Alsace plain, the Rhine and the Black Forest beyond.
• The painted rooms - interiors invented and furnished around 1900.
• The keep and drawbridge - the reconstruction at its most confident.
• The approach through the forest - beech woods and sandstone outcrops on the climb.

When to go

April to October gives the clear air the view needs; haze in high summer often swallows the Black Forest entirely, and the best distance comes after rain or in autumn. This is one of the most visited monuments in France, and midday in July means slow queues through narrow rooms. Winter brings closures for snow and ice on the road.

Honest expectations

Almost nothing you walk through is medieval, and visitors expecting original fabric leave disappointed. The car parks fill by ten in summer and the last stretch of road becomes a crawl. Rooms are small, the route is one way with no overtaking, and the terrace is cold and windy even in June. Interior light is poor for photographs.

Nearby

The Alsace vineyards and villages below, the Sainte-Odile ridge north and Selestat's medieval library.