A trip with my dog to Mont St Odile in Alsace (France)

This March, I took a trip with my dog to Strasbourg. While we were there, we went to visit Mont St Odile in the Vosges mountain of Alsace. Aside from a monastery, this area is home to beautiful nature and some historic stone wall fortifications called “The Pagan Wall”.

Going hiking around Mont St Odile is definitely recommended. There are lots of hiking routes, and the area is really beautiful. My dog had a fantastic time. For more information on this visit, please see the details below.

If you are looking to spend more time in the Strasbourg region, I can certainly recommend the hotel that I stayed at. If you’re interested you can find my review here.

THE ROUTE

If you’re coming by car, I would recommend to park at the P3 parking lot which is free of charge. The hiking route starts that I followed starts directly from there. There are also some other parking options directly near the monastery.

Leaving the parking lot, there are two main route options – the south circuit and the north circuit.

I decided to follow the north circuit for this hike, as I wanted to see the Dreistein castle. Maybe I’ll come back to check out the south route another time.

The northern circuit takes you through a foresty area. There are many different paths, but thankfully the route is well sign-posted. Look for the two yellow crossed lines. This may be confusing to regular hikers, as an “x” usually means “this route does not continue this way”. However, in this case, we follow the “x” all the way.

After just a few minutes, the north circuit takes us to the first remnants of the historic stone fortifications.

In total, this structure called “The Pagan Wall” (Mur païen) is around 10km long and made up of large stone blocks. No one knows who built it, but recent research suggests that it may be of Celtic origin.

Of course, my dog immediately had to go and explore the wall. In general, my pup really enjoyed this area. So much to sniff and really fun and diverse territory. She had a great time!

After some time of following the northern circuit, you have the option to take a small detour to see the ruins of Dreistein castle, following the route denoted with a red “x”. Actually Dreistein was not just one castle – it was in fact three castles. That’s why it’s called “Dreistein” (three stones). Today, ruins remain of two of the castles.

It takes around 10 minutes to reach the castles, and I do recommend taking a look. However please be aware that it is not allowed to climb the castle ruins.

After the detour, we went back onto the yellow “x” route until reaching the “Mur Païen Porte Nord” waypoint.

There, instead of following the yellow “x” further along the “Sentir des Merveilles” we took the route indicating “Mt Ste Odile Direct 45 mins” because we were getting a bit tired.

However, at the following “Stollhafen” waypoint we went back on the yellow “x” route, as it now also pointed to the Mont St Odile abbey. So it ended up being just a very small shortcut. Near Stollhafen, we happened upon a gorgeous viewpoint. So worth it!

After that, it took just around 20 minutes to reach the monastery at the top of Mont St Odile. While dogs are not allowed inside, you can still get another nice view of the Vosges area by walking just to the left of the monastery.

There are also restrooms available outside the monastery – usage costs one 50cent coin and there is a coin change machine on site. Super convenient!

HOW LONG IT TAKES AND WHO IT’S FOR

The sign at the start of the route states the time for the north circuit at 2 hours. I think this is realistic overall, if you strictly stick to the yellow “x” route. For us, it took slightly longer than that, because we took the detour to see Dreistein castle as well.

Since there are many different routes available, you have many options to make your hike shorter or longer. If you enjoy being in nature and your dog likes to explore, this hike is for you!

Unfortunately, I do not think it is suitable for prams or wheelchairs.

THE BOTTOM LINE

This was a really nice hike to do with my dog. My pup definitely enjoyed it and we had some beautiful views along the way, while also learning a bit about the history of the area. If you are in Alsace, I can certainly recommend this hike with your dog!