Special Interests

Alternative Therapies: Visit the Feng-Shui Park at Lalling. Or the Silberberg Clinic at Bodenmais, including cave therapy in part of the old mine. Kneipp Therapy is popular in many places here.
Beer: Bavaria and Bohemia share a love of beer. On the German side of the border, there are breweries in most towns and some villages. Many different varieties to try. The breweries in Zwiesel and Teisnach have regular tours. In the Czech Republic, few local breweries are left in the area but 2 of the most famous Czech breweries are within reach - Plzen, the home of Pilsener beer and Ceske Budejovice, home of the original Budweiser beer (not to be confused with the American version) actually called Budvar. Both breweries have tours and shops. Note: if you want to buy beer to take home, do not buy it from the Asian stalls as they are expensive - supermarkets are much cheaper!
Cars & Bikes: the village of Kollnburg has a private Motorbike museum and Niederalteich has the private Gerhard Neumann museum. BMW factories can be visited.
Castles: Czech Republic has the largest concentration of (unruined) castles in Europe. We recommend the nearest and best. In Bavaria, there is the ruined Weissenstein castle at Regen and Schloss Egg near Deggendorf. There is also the castle at Passau and the Thurn & Taxis chateau at Regensburg.
Glass: Bavaria and Bohemia also share a strong history of glassmaking. View the history at the Glass Museum in Frauenau. Visit glass shops along the Glasstrasse, especially Joska in Bodenmais, the Theresienthal complex and former Schott factory in Zwiesel and extensive shopping complexes at Spiegelau and Arnbruck.
History: visit a Celtic village, view Roman remains at Passau and Regensburg and visit the various museums along the Danube - the northern boundary of the Roman Empire in this region. Near Regensburg is the monument built by King Ludwig 1 to the successful defeat of Napoleon. There was almost no fighting in this area in the 2nd world war so there are no battlefields to visit. However, there are 3 interesting features to this area: the 'iron curtain' stretched across the middle of the railway station in the village, the mainly ethnic German Sudetenland which Hitler annexed after the Munich agreement was just across the border in the Czech Republic and when this area was liberated by the Americans in 1945, they actually progressed as far as Plzen in the Czech Republic before withdrawing behind the German border - there is a monument to the 'liberation' by the Americans in Plzen and a liberation festival there in early May each year. Berchtesgaden, with its various Hitler relics, is 3 hours drive from here. The Dachau concentration camp site is on the edge of Munich.

Nature: The Bavarian Forest National Park was the 1st National Park in Germany and covers a large area from Bayerisch Eisenstein along the Czech border to the South. The policy of the National Park is to 'let nature be nature'. In the core of the National Park, nature is allowed to take its course, which means that the Borkenkaefer is allowed free access to the trees, which it kills. The effect of this can be seen on the Rachel and Lusen mountains - to the left if you take the road to Frauenau and Spiegelau. If you get closer, you can see that the forest is already starting to regenerate itself. Around that core area is the area where strenuous efforts are made to control the Borkenkaefer in order to prevent it from destroying the whole forest and migrating to privately owned land around. There are National Park information points at Ludwigsthal and Neuschoenau. Also at Ludwigsthal are animal enclosures with wild horses, an ancient breed of cattle, wolves and lynx. There are wildlife parks at Lohberg and Neuschoenau. On the Czech side of the border is the Bohemian Forest - the Sumava National Park.
Schnaps: Baerwurz is the most typical of the Bavarian Forest schnaps but there are numerous other varieties produced from roots, herbs and fruit. There are numerous producers and museums to visit.
Sheep Farm: visit the sheep farm at Rinchnach
Wild West: visit the Pullman City wild west ranch

Contact us

Bavarian Forest Holidays
Waldschmidtstrasse 1
94252 Bayerisch Eisenstein
Germany
Tel. (Germany) +49 (0)9925 90 32 04 (UK) 07976 403434
Email: pyrabelisk@btinternet.com