The castle of Saint-Ulrich is located on the heights of the municipality of Ribeauvillé, in the Haut-Rhin, 17 km north-west of Colmar. Built on a spur at 530 m altitude, it is the largest and best preserved of the three castles overlooking the Strengbach valley and the locality. Also called Rappolstein, Gross Rappolstein, or Ukrichsburg, it dates from the middle of the 13th century.
The castle of Saint-Ulrich classified since the nineteenth century owes its current name to the chapel it houses, dedicated to the saint who was bishop of Augsburg in the tenth century. Residence of the lords of Ribeaupierre until the fifteenth century, it was also a military support point and a garrison was assigned during the Thirty Years War (first half of the seventeenth century). Meanwhile, the castle had been remodeled, benefiting from the addition of a wing of imposing proportions sheltering two superimposed rooms lit by rows of semicircular semicircular windows, overlooking the Levant. Gradually abandoned from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, it is even partly burned.
Its remains include the square dungeon and the main building of the twelfth century, a room known as knights of the thirteenth, the entrance in the form of barbican and the walls of the fourteenth and finally the chapel of St. Ulrich fifteenth century.
From a distance, its silhouette overlooking the hill retains an impressive and romantic appearance. It is accessed via a hiking trail using the GR5 (departure from the Place de la République). The course presents difficulties. It takes two and a half hours to walk. In addition to the beauty of the site and the building, these efforts make it possible to benefit from an incomparable point of view...
Free entrance, open every day. Information on +33 3 89 73 23 23.
