Oberammergau Travel Guide

The Oberammergau Passion Play was first performed in 1634 and is the result of a vow made by the inhabitants of the village that if God spared them from the effects of the bubonic plague then sweeping the region they would perform a passion play every ten years. The play is now performed in years ending with a zero, except 1984 which was the 350th anniversary, and involves over 2000 actors, singers, instrumentalists and technicians, all residents of the village.

About half the inhabitants of Oberammergau will take part in the once-a-decade Passion Play in 2010. This means that over 2,000 villagers will bring the story of Jesus of Nazareth to life for the audiences that flock in from around the world. The play starts with Jesus entering Jerusalem, continues with his death on the cross and finishes with the resurrection. As ever, this is an extraordinary community enterprise.

The play starts at 2:30pm and, including a three-hour interval, ends at 10:30pm; performances take place between mid-May and early October 2010.

The main emphasis of the Oberammergau Museum is on woodcarving. Carving has been carried on in Oberammergau for over 500 years, and so the collection displays a wide range of examples of art and handicrafts from gothic to modern times. In the largely authentically maintained and historically furnished rooms on the first floor - the museum in the museum, so to speak - a wide variety of toys, figures of saints, crucifixes and delicately carved genre scenes are on display.

The exhibition The 20th Century shows exhibits of contemporary woodcarving, modern sculpture and painting. It is supplemented by media presentations and a databank in which over 1400 Oberammergau carvers and artists are registered.

The Crib Collection includes magnificent Oberammergau cribs, such as the famous historical church crib on which generations of local carvers worked and which King Ludwig II once admired.

In 1955 the local council acquired a large part of the important collection of verre églomisé works (pictures behind glass) belonging to the Murnau master brewer Johann Krötz (1858-1919) to add to the numerous verre églomisé works that the museum already possessed.

Hours: Tuesday - Sunday 10am - 5pm.

Admission: 4 € Adults, 3.50 € Concessions, 1 € Children 6-18 years old.

The Ettal abbey, with a community (as of 2005) of more than 50 monks, and another 5 at Wechselburg, is one of the largest Benedictine houses and a major attraction for visitors. In the tradition of the Ritterakademie the abbey has established a secondary school (Gymnasium) specializing in the humanities and modern languages, with a boarding house. Ettal also runs a brewery and distillery, a bookshop, an art publishing business, a hotel, a cheese factory joint venture and various other small businesses.

Ettal Abbey was founded on 28 April 1330 by Emperor Ludwig in the Graswang valley. Legend has it that Ludwig's horse genuflected three times on the site of the original church building, where a statuette of the Virgin Mary now stands. This statue soon became an object of pilgrimage. The church is dedicated to the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin.

In 1898, the buildings were acquired by Baron Theodor von Cramer-Klett and in 1900 given to the Benedictines of Scheyern Abbey, who re-founded the monastery here. The abbey church of the Ascension was declared a basilica minor in 1920.

Linderhof Palace is the smallest of the three palaces built by King Ludwig II of Bavaria and the only one of which he lived to see completion.

The gardens surrounding Linderhof Palace are considered one of the most beautiful creations of historicist garden design. The park combines formal elements of Baroque style or Italian Renaissance gardens with landscaped sections that are similar to the English garden.

Hours: Open daily April 1 -October 15th 9am-6pm; October 16 - March 31st 10am-4pm.

Admission: 7 € Adults, 6 € Concessions, Children under 18 admitted free. In the winter months the gardens are closed and admission is 1 & euro; less.