About Saarburg Waterfall
The Saarburg Waterfall was a charming urban waterfall spilling within the old town (altstadt) of the medieval city of Saarburg. While we tend to have negative perceptions of urbanized man-modified waterfalls, the developed surroundings actually added a bit of charm and atmosphere to the overall experience.
For starters, the waterfall was flanked by historical buildings including a water mill that diverted some of the water at the base of the falls to a waterwheel. The buildings were made in the traditional half-timbered style that really amped up the cuteness and charm factor. Such architectural styles seemed prevalent in all the German speaking countries we’ve visited so far (namely Germany, Austria, and Switzerland).

While there were many ways to reach the Saarburg Waterfall after leaving the car at one of several car parks in and around town, we’ll describe our walking route from the car park that was near the Alt (Old) Saarburg (see directions below).
From the car park, we walked beneath the bridge supporting the L132 road, then we followed the narrow street called Staden through the lower extremes of Old Saarburg. After roughly 200m along this relatively quiet street, we then reached a fork. Keeping straight at the fork led us to a dead-end right a mill. Going left at the fork led us up a narrow, twisting, and sloping alleyway before we eventually arrived at an overlook about 50m or so up this climb.

There were pedestrian bridges across the Leukbach, which allowed us to experience top down views of the waterfall from both sides. There were also more cafes and shops on the opposite side of the watercourse so one could relax and soak in the ambience of the historical center of the medieval city with the sounds of the waterfall itself.
Overall, we spent less than an hour away from the car though it’s easy to spend more or less time here (possibly in less than 30 minutes) depending on how much time you’re willing to spend here.
Finally, something that we noticed regarding German and Austrian waterfalls was that there tended to be many different spellings or pronunciations referring to what we’re calling the Saarburg Waterfall. Thus, you might see the falls referred to as (der) Wasserfall Saarburg or Saarburg Wasserfall, which would be the way German speakers would refer to it.
The Saarburg Waterfall is situated in the heart of the city of Saarburg. While there are many ways to reach this landlocked city, we’ll describe how we did it from the city center of Trier.
From the Trier Innenstadt (city center), we drove northwest along Nordallee then Lindenstrasse (or Lindenstraße) before turning left onto the busy B49 road along the Moselle River. It became the B51 after about 3km.
Once on the exit, continue downhill before turning right once again. Then, as the road heads back towards the underside of the bridge, the car park will be on the left.
We actually took a different route than the direct one described above. From where the B51 started and the B49 ended, we then continued on the B51 for another 10km. Then, we took the exit for Tawern and followed the K112 Road for about 6km to its junction with the L135 Road. Turning left onto the L135 Road, we then kept on this road for the next 5km as we entered the town of Saarburg.
At the roundabout, the GPS then had us take the second exit (instead of the third exit which would have been better; more on that later) towards Auf dem Graben. We then followed Auf dem Grabel for about 150m before turning left onto Kunohof (which seemed to be a restricted traffic area, but since we were early enough, I guess we managed to drive through it without difficulty).
made us drive down, which was actually more suitable as a pedestrian walkway right around the Saarburg Waterfall
This drive from Trier took us about 40 minutes.
Now in hindsight, taking the L135 Road into Saarburg, we should have gotten off the third exit at the roundabout to get onto Graf-Siegfried-Strasse (Graf-Siegfried-Straße) and follow this road for about 400m to the next roundabout. Turning right at this roundabout, we’d then enter the tunnel and look for the exit on the left shortly after leaving the tunnel. Then, we’d descend the ramp and turn right to get to the car park beneath the bridge.
Finally, for some geographical context, Saarburg was about 24km (under 30 minutes drive without traffic) southwest from from Trier, 46km (under an hour drive) east of Luxembourg City, Luxembourg, 119km (under 90 minutes drive) southwest of Cochem, 151km (over 90 minutes drive) southwest of Koblenz, and 208km (2.5 hours drive) west of Frankfurt.
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Back and forth left to right sweep then back at the waterfall and surroundings from the lowest viewpoint
Sweep looking right down at the falls from the lookout on the opposite side of the channel
Long video checking out the falls from two diferent spots with the last spot at the lowest viewpoint with a decent sweep showing the mill and the falls
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