Eagle's Nest & Berchtesgaden Tour from Salzburg

The Eagle's Nest (Kehlsteinhaus)

The Kehlsteinhaus was built in just 13 months in 1937 and 1938 on the ridge of the Kehlstein mountain and presented to Adolf Hitler for his 50th birthday. Allied soldiers nicknamed it the Eagle's Nest, and unlike most of the Obersalzberg complex it was not destroyed by the bombing raid of April 1945.

Today the house is run by a charitable foundation and serves as a mountain restaurant and viewpoint, with information panels on its past. Is the Eagle's Nest worth visiting? For the combination of 20th-century history and one of the finest panoramas in the Alps, yes; on a clear day you can see far across Bavaria and Austria, and a short trail leads to the summit cross.

The Kehlstein Road and the Brass Lift

Reaching the house is part of the adventure. The Kehlstein road, blasted into the mountainside in the 1930s, climbs about 700 metres in 6.5 kilometres with a single hairpin bend, and it is closed to private cars, so the last stage is made by special mountain buses from the Obersalzberg.

From the upper bus stop, a tunnel leads 124 metres straight into the rock to a lift with polished brass walls, which rises another 124 metres inside the mountain to the house. Many visitors want to know how to get to the Eagle's Nest on their own; with this tour your guide handles the route and the timing so you can simply enjoy the ride.

The Obersalzberg and Its History

The Obersalzberg was a quiet mountain village of farms and guesthouses until the 1930s, when it was turned into a fenced second seat of power for the Nazi leadership. Most of its buildings were bombed in 1945 and later demolished, and the area is now wooded again.

Nearby, the Obersalzberg Documentation Center presents the history of the site and the dictatorship in a sober, factual way. Our guide sets the Eagle's Nest in this context, explaining what happened here and why the place is remembered today, so the visit is informative and respectful rather than a sightseeing curiosity.

Berchtesgaden and the Bavarian Alps

Berchtesgaden is a historic market town in the far south-east corner of Germany, surrounded on three sides by Austria and dominated by the Watzmann, at 2,713 metres one of the highest peaks in the country. Salt has been mined here since 1517, and the national park around the emerald Königssee protects some of the most beautiful mountain scenery in Europe.

A Berchtesgaden day trip from Salzburg takes only about half an hour each way by road, which is why this tour fits into a morning. The best time to visit the Eagle's Nest is from late spring to autumn, as the road and house are usually open only from May to October, depending on snow.