Elisabethpfad 3 (Köln – Marburg)

At a Glance

• Start / Finish: Cologne Cathedral / Elisabethkirche in Marburg; the Camino Ninja map starts in Cologne and ends in Marburg an der Lahn
• Length: 167.5 km according to the Camino Ninja map; depending on the publication, the Elisabethpfad e.V. gives 165, "approx. 170" or "approx. 180" km
• Duration: 8 stages, averaging just under 21 km
• Elevation: not recorded in our database for this route; according to the association, from 53 m in Cologne to over 340 m in the Siegerland
• Highest point: not recorded in the database; according to the association, the Haincher Höhe between Hainchen and Rittershausen; the source of the Dill just to the south lies at 567 m
• Landscape: the Königsforst, the rolling hills of the Bergisches Land, Hauberg coppice woods and half-timbering in the Siegerland, juniper heaths in the Hessian Hinterland
• Operator / Waymarking: up to the Haincher Höhe the Landschaftsverband Rheinland (the Rhineland regional authority), in Hesse the Elisabethpfad e.V., Marburg; toward Marburg the 10 × 10 cm Elizabeth sign, toward Cologne the yellow scallop shell
• Traces of St. Elizabeth: the waymark with its motif from the Elizabeth Window in Marburg, the Elizabeth altar in Marburg's Kugelkirche, the Elisabethkirche with its golden shrine
• Accommodation: inns, guesthouses, vacation apartments, youth hostels in Cologne and Marburg, a few simple sleeping spaces in parish halls (bring your own sleeping bag); no network of pilgrim hostels
• Connecting routes: in Cologne the Westphalian Way of St. James, Nijmegen – Cologne, the Way of St. James Cologne – Aachen, the Via Coloniensis and the Way of St. James on the Left Bank of the Rhine; in Marburg Elisabethpfad 1 and Elisabethpfad 2
• Best time: May to October; pilgrim booklet with stamp boxes, final stamp in the sexton's office of the Elisabethkirche, no Compostela

Overview

The Elisabethpfad 3 is the westernmost and longest of the three Elisabethpfade that converge on Marburg, and the only one that starts at a World Heritage Site. You set out from Cologne Cathedral, whose foundation stone was laid in 1248 and which was only completed in 1880, and walk to the Elisabethkirche, begun in 1235 and consecrated in 1283. Put another way: you're walking from Germany's most famous Gothic building to one of its oldest, started thirteen years earlier. In between lie four upland landscapes and a long-distance road older than both churches.

The trail is new; the route is not. As far as Siegen it follows the Brüderstraße (literally "Brothers' Road"), the medieval trade route between Cologne and the iron country on the Sieg. It was waymarked in 2007, the Elizabeth Year marking the saint's 800th birthday, by the Landschaftsverband Rheinland together with the Deutsche St. Jakobus-Gesellschaft (German St. James Society) and the Elisabethpfad e.V. Since then it has been two things at once: heading east, you're on a pilgrimage to Elizabeth; heading west, you're on a Way of St. James to Cologne—with connections all the way to Santiago.

Other Names

Officially the route is called Elisabethpfad 3, or E3 for short, in full Elisabethpfad Köln – Marburg. In the opposite direction, St. James societies list it as Jakobsweg Marburg – Köln. For the section to Siegen the old names have survived: Brüderstraße, Kölner Landstraße and, seen from the Siegerland, Siegener Heerstraße.

Who It's Ideal For—and Who It's Not So Ideal For

Ideal if you live in the Rhineland and want a pilgrim week without a flight: you step off the train in Cologne and start walking, and regional trains stop along the way in Overath, Siegen and Marburg, so you can split the trail or cut it short. Ideal, too, if old roads appeal to you: sunken lanes, toll stations and castles along the Brüderstraße tell you how people traveled here 500 years ago.

Honestly, though, it's not for you if you want to rely on the waymarks. In central Cologne the signs are regularly removed, and between Siegen and Marburg pilgrims reported gaps in 2023 and 2024; without an app or a guidebook you'll get lost. Not for you if you're looking for pilgrim community like in Spain—you'll meet hikers, rarely pilgrims. And not for you if you expect flat days: the Bergisches Land and the Siegerland go up and down constantly.

Route & Landscape

Cologne to Denklingen (km 0–59.8): From the cathedral the trail crosses the Rhine to Deutz (km 1.9), where around 1002 Archbishop Heribert founded a Benedictine abbey inside the Roman fort. Via Kalk and Brück, where a hospital for "arme kranke Pilger" (poor sick pilgrims) is documented in 1439, you head through the Königsforst past the Bethanien children's village (km 12.6). Via Untereschbach and Heiligenhaus (km 23.9) you come into the Agger valley at Overath (km 28.3) and climb to the pilgrimage church of Marialinden (km 32.0). Beyond Federath the Brüderstraße crosses the Großer Heckberg at 356 meters, then Drabenderhöhe (km 42.2), Elsenroth and the half-timbered village of Eiershagen (km 58.1), and finally Denklingen (km 59.8) with its castle.

Denklingen to Siegen (km 59.8–97.7): Beyond Erdingen the countryside grows quieter: Crottorf Castle near Krottorf (km 71.6), Friesenhagen (km 73.4), the Wildenburg and the Alte Schanze near Hohenhain, once a toll station. Freudenberg (km 79.8) with its Alter Flecken, rebuilt on a grid after the fire of 1666, is the Siegerland's half-timbered postcard. Via Oberfischbach (km 85.1) and through the Siegen city forest you reach Siegen (km 97.7).

Siegen to Marburg (km 97.7–167.5): Beyond Siegen the trail climbs to the pilgrimage chapel of the Eremitage above Niederdielfen (km 105.1), then via Anzhausen and Irmgarteichen to Hainchen (km 116.5) with its moated castle. On the Haincher Höhe you cross into Hesse, along a border that has run here since 1815, and over the watershed: the Sieg flows west, the Dill and Lahn south and east. Via Rittershausen (km 124.3) and Ewersbach (km 127.1) in the Dietzhölze valley, the trail continues across the Hörlebach valley to Steffenberg and Obereisenhausen (km 140.6), then via Herzhausen, Diedenshausen and Dilschhausen (km 155.4) and Elnhausen (km 158.8) through Marburg's old town to the Elisabethkirche.

Stages, Terrain, and Difficulty

We show the route in 8 stages; the distances come from the Camino Ninja map, calibrated exactly to 167.5 km. The association divides its 8 sections differently, with overnight stops in Köln-Brück, Marialinden, Denklingen, Oberfischbach, Niederdielfen, Steinbrücken and Dilschhausen. If you'd like to split the last stage, stay overnight in Dilschhausen or Elnhausen.

1. Cologne → Heiligenhaus (23.9 km) — Across the Rhine to Deutz, through Kalk, Brück and the Königsforst, past the Bethanien children's village; lots of city and asphalt at the start, then forest.
2. Heiligenhaus → Drabenderhöhe (18.3 km) — Through the Agger valley to Overath, up to Marialinden and over the Heckberg, the first real climb.
3. Drabenderhöhe → Denklingen (17.6 km) — Sunken lanes, scattered hamlets and the linden trees of the Oberbergisches Land, via Elsenroth and Eiershagen to Denklingen Castle.
4. Denklingen → Freudenberg (20.0 km) — The loneliest stretch of the Brüderstraße, via Crottorf, Friesenhagen and Hohenhain into the Siegerland; few places to stop for food.
5. Freudenberg → Siegen (17.9 km) — Via Oberfischbach and through the city forest into town; time for the Nikolaikirche and the Oberes Schloss (Upper Castle).
6. Siegen → Hainchen (18.8 km) — Up to the Eremitage, via Niederdielfen, Anzhausen and Irmgarteichen to the foot of the Haincher Höhe.
7. Hainchen → Obereisenhausen (24.1 km) — Over the watershed into Hesse, through Rittershausen, Ewersbach and the Hörlebach valley; book accommodation in advance.
8. Obereisenhausen → Marburg (26.9 km) — The longest stage: via Herzhausen, Diedenshausen and Dilschhausen, over the Stackelberg and through Elnhausen to the Elisabethkirche.

Technically nothing is difficult, but the trail is never flat. According to the association, it climbs from 53 meters in Cologne to 250 meters at Marialinden and 356 meters at the Heckberg, reaching its highest section at the Haincher Höhe. After rain the sunken lanes turn muddy.

Elizabeth Hosts a St. James Pilgrim—Right on Your Waymark

Take a close look at the sign before you set off. The 10 × 10 centimeter waymark that guides you toward Marburg shows Elizabeth taking in pilgrims and strangers—a motif from the Elizabeth Window in the choir of Marburg's Elisabethkirche, made around 1248. In six medallions the window depicts the works of mercy from the Gospel of Matthew: "I was a stranger, and you took me in." In the medallion with the strangers, the guest wears the scallop shell. So for a week you follow a picture of a saint hosting a pilgrim of St. James—and if you walk in the opposite direction, you follow the shell itself.

It fits better than it looks. In 1228 Elizabeth founded a hospital outside the gates of Marburg and cared there for the sick and for travelers until she died on November 17, 1231, at the age of 24. Pope Gregory IX canonized her at Pentecost in 1235, and on May 1, 1236, her remains were elevated. Her cult reached the Rhineland right away: the brothers of the Teutonic Order's house in Marburg commissioned her biography in 1236/37 from Caesarius of Heisterbach, the Cistercian from the Siebengebirge hills who had attended the cathedral and collegiate schools in Cologne. Pilgrims were on the Brüderstraße anyway: the bell of the chapel in Rittershausen, cast around 1500, bears the pilgrim badge of St. Quirinus in Neuss. In the church of Oberhörlen and on the tomb of Landgrave Louis V in Marburg's Marienkirche, St. James stands in pilgrim's garb.

Then came the break. Landgrave Philip the Magnanimous, Elizabeth's descendant, introduced the Reformation in Hesse and abolished the veneration of saints and pilgrimages in 1527; in 1539 he had her bones removed from the shrine. That a trail to her tomb was waymarked almost 470 years later as an ecumenical joint project of the Catholic Rhineland and Protestant Hesse, of all things, is the real punchline of the E3. So don't count on a Compostela, but on a destination that has been receiving pilgrims for almost 800 years. And look for the window with the shell-wearing pilgrim in the choir of the Elisabethkirche—that's where the original of your waymark hangs.

Highlights Along the Way

• Cologne Cathedral (start) — choir consecrated in 1322; a major pilgrimage destination since 1164, when the relics of the Three Kings arrived.
• Alt St. Heribert, Deutz (km 1.9) — church of the abbey founded around 1002 by Archbishop Heribert inside the Roman fort of Divitia.
• Overath (km 28.3) — the parish church of St. Walburga, given to Siegburg Abbey around 1064 by Archbishop Anno II, a stop for the Hildesheim pilgrims of 1489.
• Marialinden (km 32.0) — pilgrimage church with two Pietà images.
• Denklingen (km 59.8) — castle from 1404 on the Brüderstraße, and the Antoniuskirche, shared by Catholics and Reformed Protestants from 1662 to 1880.
• Freudenberg (km 79.8) — the Alter Flecken, a half-timbered town rebuilt in strict order after the fire of 1666.
• Siegen (km 97.7) — the Nikolaikirche with the gilded little crown on its tower, the Oberes Schloss; birthplace of Peter Paul Rubens, born in 1577.
• Eremitage near Niederdielfen (km 105.1) — pilgrimage chapel from 1677 to 1685 on the Grimberg, with pilgrimages on Good Friday and on the Sunday after July 2.
• Haincher Höhe (near km 116.5) — watershed of the Sieg, Dill and Lahn, state border between North Rhine-Westphalia and Hesse; below it the moated castle of Hainchen, first mentioned in 1290.
• Elisabethkirche Marburg (finish) — begun in 1235, consecrated in 1283; Elizabeth Window from around 1248, golden shrine, stamps in the sexton's office.

Brüderstraße or Brückerstraße? How a Trade Road Became a Pilgrim Trail

Where the name comes from is still disputed, and both answers make good stories. One: Brüderstraße is a garbled Brückerstraße, named after the bridge over the Flehbach in Köln-Brück; as "Brückerstraße" it is documented in 1386. The other: the brothers traveled it—monks, missionaries and Cologne's confraternities of St. James on their way to Santiago. The records leave the choice to you. In 1464 a source calls the stretch between Denklingen and Erdingen the "alde broeder straisse," the old Brothers' Road. And the link between Deutz and the Siegerland really did begin with brothers: between 1079 and 1089, two brothers gave Deutz Abbey seven estates on the Sieg.

The rest is iron and politics. In 1224 Archbishop Engelbert of Cologne and Count Henry of Nassau divided the young town of Siegen between them; Cologne had one of the great iron markets of the Empire, and the road was its supply line into the ore district. Castles and tolls lined it, from the Wildenburg around 1239 to Denklingen in 1404. In 1489 a group of Aachen pilgrims from Hildesheim rode along the road, spent the night in Siegen, Overath and Cologne and stopped for lunch in Denklingen—their travel log is the oldest pilgrim record for this route. With the construction of the Cologne–Olpe highway from 1823 to 1834, the Brüderstraße lost its traffic; the sunken lanes near Elsenroth are its traces. In 2007 the Elisabethpfad gave it a second purpose.

How Pilgrims Find Their Way onto This Path

Cologne is a hub of the Camino network, and several routes arrive or begin here. Coming from the north, you reach the city on the Westphalian Way of St. James or on the Nijmegen – Cologne route, and at the cathedral you can turn east toward Elizabeth instead of south. The other Cologne connections continue west and south:

• Way of St. James Cologne – Aachen — the classic route toward Belgium and France
• Via Coloniensis — from Cologne through the Eifel toward Trier
• Way of St. James on the Left Bank of the Rhine — south along the left bank of the Rhine

The Elisabethpfade form a small network with a shared destination, looked after together by the association:

• Elisabethpfad 1 (Frankfurt – Marburg) — from Frankfurt via the Taunus, Wetzlar and Altenberg Abbey, the oldest of the three
• Elisabethpfad 2 (Eisenach – Marburg) — from the Wartburg, Elizabeth's first home, also since 2007
• Elisabethpfad 3 (Köln – Marburg) — this trail, the longest, on the Brüderstraße through the Bergisches Land and the Siegerland

Continue the pilgrimage?

In Marburg you've reached the destination, and from here only the two sibling trails continue. Heading east, the Elisabethpfad 2 takes you to the Wartburg in Eisenach and onto the Via Regia there; heading south, the Elisabethpfad 1 leads via Wetzlar to Frankfurt. If you walk the E3 in reverse, you finish at Cologne Cathedral, right at the start of the Way of St. James Cologne – Aachen toward Santiago.

Preparation & Practical Information

Pilgrim booklet and app. The Elisabethpfad is not an official Way of St. James, and there is no Compostela here. The association issues a pilgrim booklet with stamp boxes that serves as your pilgrim passport; you collect stamps in churches and parish offices along the way, and the final stamp in the sexton's office of the Elisabethkirche. Best to order it in advance from the association's pilgrim shop so it reaches you in time. If you're heading toward Cologne and on to Santiago, you're better off taking a credencial. With the Camino Ninja App you carry the map and track offline—more than just convenient given the gaps in the waymarking; the easiest way to plan the route is right in the app, where you put together your stages and plan suitable accommodation along with them.

Accommodation. The association keeps an online accommodation list. Some parishes take in pilgrims with their own sleeping bag in the parish hall. Between Denklingen and Freudenberg and in the Hessian Hinterland between Ewersbach and Dilschhausen options are thin—call at least a day ahead here.

Season and guidebook. A good time is May to October. The association's Pilgerführer 3 (pilgrim guide no. 3) came out in a new edition in January 2023, with 14 maps at 1:50,000 and QR codes. The Elisabethkirche is open daily from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. from April to September, and until 4 p.m. in winter (as of October 2026).

What the journey will cost you

The formalities are cheap: the association's pilgrim booklet from 1.20 €, the 104-page Pilgerführer 3 for 15.80 €, admission to the cathedral and the Elisabethkirche free (as of October 2026). The nights cost more: according to the accommodation list, a vacation apartment in Hainchen costs 25 € per person without breakfast and 27 € with, plus 10 € for final cleaning; for inns and guesthouses in the Bergisches Land and the Siegerland, budget 50 to 90 € for a single room. The Marburg youth hostel charges adults aged 27 and over 47.80 to 57.30 € with breakfast, and you'll need a DJH (German Youth Hostel Association) membership (as of October 2026).

Budget 65 to 90 € per day for a room, breakfast, provisions and dinner; with a parish-hall bed and self-catering on some days, around 30 €. Honestly, that makes a week on the E3 roughly twice as expensive as on the Camino Francés—but the Deutschlandticket takes you to the start and back home from the finish.

Getting Here

To the start. Cologne main station stands right next to the cathedral and is served by ICE trains from all over Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands; from Cologne/Bonn Airport the S-Bahn takes about 15 minutes into the city.

Along the way and from the finish. In Overath the Oberbergische Bahn line stops on its way to Cologne, and Siegen has regional express connections to Cologne, Giessen and Frankfurt. Marburg is on the Main-Weser railway, with regional trains to Frankfurt and Kassel; getting back to Cologne takes about three hours via Giessen and Siegen or via Frankfurt. The Deutschlandticket, at 63 € a month (as of October 2026), covers all regional trains and buses.

• Rail: bahn.de — connections to Cologne, Siegen and Marburg, Deutschlandticket
• Trail and accommodation: elisabethpfad.de — Elisabethpfad e.V., accommodation list, pilgrim guide and pilgrim booklet