title: Romantic Road
text: # Romantic Road
  
  The Romantic Road (German: Romantische Straße) is a "theme route" devised by promotion-minded travel agents in the 1950s. It describes the 460 kilometres (290 mi) of surface roads between Würzburg and Füssen in southern Germany, specifically in Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg, linking a number of picturesque towns and castles. In medieval times, part of it was a trade route that connected the center of Germany with the south. Today, this region is thought by many international travellers to possess "quintessentially German" scenery and culture, in towns and cities such as Nördlingen, Dinkelsbühl and Rothenburg ob der Tauber and in castles such as Burg Harburg and the famous Neuschwanstein.
  
  With about five million overnight stays, four to five times that number of day visits and around 15,000 tourist jobs generated by the route, it is an economically important southern German travel destination.
  
  ## Along the route
  
  from north to south:
  
  * Würzburg
  * Holzkirchen (Unterfranken) (new itinerary since 2016)
  * Urphar (new itinerary since 2016)
  * Wertheim (new itinerary since 2016)
  * Tauberbischofsheim
  * Lauda-Königshofen
  * Bad Mergentheim
  * Weikersheim
  * Röttingen
  * Creglingen
  * Rothenburg ob der Tauber
  * Schillingsfürst
  * Feuchtwangen
  * Dinkelsbühl
  * Wallerstein
  * Nördlingen
  * Harburg
  * Donauwörth
  * Augsburg
  * Friedberg
  * Kaufering
  * Landsberg am Lech
  * Hohenfurch
  * Schongau
  * Peiting
  * Rottenbuch
  * Wildsteig
  * Steingaden and Wieskirche
  * Halblech
  * Schwangau, Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau
  * Füssen
  * Würzburg
  * Wertheim
  * Rothenburg ob der Tauber
  * Nördlingen
  * Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau
  * End of the Romantic Road at Abbey St. Stephan in Füssen
  