Liechtenstein
Liechtenstein Trail
Walk an entire country in five days, 75 kilometres from Balzers to Schaanwald.
The Liechtenstein Trail crosses a whole sovereign state on foot: 75 kilometres from Balzers in the south to Schaanwald in the north, through every one of the country's eleven municipalities. Five daily stages carry you over meadows, vineyard slopes and village streets while a nation's history plays out on your phone.
The trail opened in May 2019 for the principality's 300th anniversary, and its LIstory app narrates 147 stations along the way, turning churches, ruins and factory sites into one continuous national story. The five stages run from 10.3 to 19.4 kilometres each, between roughly three hours and five and a half on foot, with the second stage dropping from Triesenberg's mountain terrace into the capital. This is a village-to-village cultural walk rather than an alpine traverse: the paths cross meadows, woodland and stretches of asphalt, restaurants and beds wait in the villages, and luggage transport can be booked so you walk light. Start in any municipality you like; the country is small enough that the trail hands you all of it.
Solo
Walking an entire country alone is a quiet, complete experience: each stage ends in a different village, and the LIstory stations give the solitary hours a narrator.
Couple
Five days across a nation together, with luggage sent ahead, village hotels each night and the novelty of finishing a country the way other trips finish a valley.
Friends
A group crossing of a sovereign state is a story that keeps its shape for years; the village stops and Gasthaus lunches keep the social thread running through every stage.
- The 75-kilometre route links all eleven municipalities over five daily stages from Balzers to Schaanwald.
- Created for the principality's 300th anniversary in 2019, the trail is narrated by the LIstory app's 147 history stations.
- The stages range from a 10.3-kilometre mountain-terrace-to-capital day to a 19.4-kilometre lowland finish.
- Restaurants and accommodation line the route, and bookable luggage transport lets you walk stage to stage unburdened.
Order Käsknöpfle, the national cheese Knöpfle heaped with roasted onions, in the Gasthäuser the route threads through.
Where the route crosses Vaduz it passes the princely Hofkellerei, whose tastings pour the Herawingert estate wines a few steps off the trail.
Cuetzalan
Mexico
Clouds drift through steep market streets above coffee, caves and forest paths.
Kamikochi
Japan
A river the colour of glacial flour through an alpine valley closed to private cars.
Cape Breton Highlands
Canada
From the Skyline Trail's cliff decks you watch for whales; moose live on the plateau behind.
Vaduz
Liechtenstein
A capital small enough to cross on foot, its reigning prince asleep in the castle overhead.
Schellenberg
Liechtenstein
Schellenberg keeps two ruined castles on one ridge; the bigger one lets you barbecue inside.
Alte Rheinbrücke
Liechtenstein
A 135-metre timber tunnel over the Rhine; somewhere inside it, you change countries.
Fürstensteig
Liechtenstein
A path hewn into the Alpspitz face, wire ropes between you and the Rhine Valley.