1. History of the Kronburg Castle

The unique combination of castle ruins, inn, and convent invites you to stay and make a pilgrimage in both senses of the word. Kronburg is located in one of the most beautiful landscapes in Tyrol and provides an opportunity to interact with nature, people, yourself and God and to discover history.

KRONBURG’s Inn offers superior cuisine and neat, tasteful, stylish rooms. The place is also used for conferences, seminars and festivities, for a short visit or a longer stay. The castle ruin is a spiritual place, located on  the “Jakobsweg”, which gets its character from the baroque pilgrimage from the 17th century.

Pilgrimage, inn and convent are integrated into the harmony of nature to stimulate and enrich each other. The peace, which can be experienced here, flows into everyday life tasks and allows you to find things that are normally missed; peace, leisure, time to linger, to talk or to find yourself. The inn and convent are tailored to the specific characteristics of the location, of Christian culture and their values.

Kronburg is a spiritual place on the Way of St. James, marked by the baroque church of the 17th century. The pilgrimage, the inn and the cloister – integrated into the harmony of nature – fertilize and enrich each other.

1.1 History of the pilgrimage church

The pilgrimage church “Maria Hilf” was built as a chapel in 1673 and was expanded upon after receiving numerous donations from 1714-1717. The pilgrimage church that stands there today, now considered a baroque jewel, was built in 1717. As a church administration of the parish in Zams it therefore belongs to the Diocese of Innsbruck. There are some votive offerings near the entrance. Each of the pieces tells a story of wishes and prayers that have already been fulfilled.

The interior of the pilgrimage church Mariahilf
© http://www.kronburg-tirol.at

2. The hiking trail

The hiking trail is a round trip from the parking lot at the hospital Zams to the hamlet Rifenal and the ruin Kronburg.

• A altitude map based on our own GPX track
  Use WP GPX to upload the GPX track. It will then show the shortcode. Copy the shortcode below the mapsmarker shortcode.
• The duration, possible other routes.

2.2 Starting point

The trail in this post starts near the hospital in Zams. There is a paid parking lot near the hospital. Near the valley station of the Rifenalbahn is a stone parking lot, free of charge, with usually enough available parking spaces. Follow the B171 towards Imst, take the first right turning towards Schönwies, follow the road and keep right towards Gasthof Kronburg.

How to get there:

By car: From Wenns, drive out of the Pitztal to Arzl and Imst. Follow the B171 to Schönwiess and Starkenbach. At the roundabout, take the third exit to Zams, follow the signs “Hospital” (in German Krankenhaus), and cross the river Inn to the (paid) parking lots.

By public transport: There is a bus connection from Wenns to Imst and Starkenbach. From there, it takes 60 minutes to reach the Kronburg Castle.

2.3 Turn-by-turn directions

Free parking lot Rifenalbahn
© www.skiresort.de

From the (paid) parking lot at the hospital Zams,  walk in northern direction to the Inn and follow the bike path, right down a piece,  downstream Inn to the signposted junction to the right, up to the hamlet Rifenal. Steep uphill follow the signs, after a pavilion and several crucifixes on the trees the hamlet Rifenal is reached.

Through the hamlet and after the last houses left along a lane, in easterly direction slightly downhill. Now  the Kronburg castle is in front. Pass the Kronburg creek and up into the green saddle with the monastery and the inn Kronburg. Behind the inn, the hiking trail goes up the narrow path to the castle Kronburg (at a height of 1066 m), where a magnificent view is awaiting, and benches invite to linger.

2.4 Duration

For people used to heights it takes 1,5 hours walking from the hospital to the Castle Kronburg. The whole round trip takes 3 hours. When enjoying the scenery more relaxed, taking photos, or taking a break at the Kronburg inn, it will take more time.

3. Recommended maps for this region:

4. Photos

Here photos taken by ourselves will be put. They should be uploaded from Lightroom to the website with the NextGen gallery plugin. Then photo gallery can be added here by pressing the green button from the toolbar above.if no photos available leave the following remark for the time being:

ACTION: UPLOAD PHOTOS

5. Useful links

Add here only usefull links for the visitors of the website. Links to sources used for this post need to go in to the custom field information source.