What this page is
9 photographs from two days in June 2015, filed under the region rather than a town because that is how they came to us. Working back from what is in the frames, most of them are Todtnau: the chairlift base station with the coaster carts racked beside it, the twin onion-domed church on the slope behind, and the town seen from part way up the lift line.
One of them is a lake over a roadside barrier, and we have left it unnamed. There is an obvious candidate in this part of the forest, and an obvious candidate is not the same as knowing.
One more is indoors, at a window table with a rendered building and trees outside it. We cannot say which building, so we do not. It sat on the Burg Hohenzollern page until 17 September 2026 on the strength of its caption alone; the camera roll puts it between the lake and the Hasenhorn on 22 June, which is this day and not that one.
The Hasenhorn, which is the reason to stop
A double chairlift goes up out of the town, and a 2.9 km coaster comes back down on rails, with a brake you control yourself. It is the longest thing of its kind in Germany and it is the sort of attraction that converts a teenager who has been dragged around three old towns that week.
The lift and the coaster run daily to 1 November, 10:00 to 16:30. The thing to know before you build a day around it: tickets are sold only at the ticket office on site — there is no advance booking, which cuts both ways. Nothing to reserve, and nothing to fall back on if the line is long or the weather closes it. Checked 16 September 2026 against the operator.
The town, and the shape of the valley
Todtnau is a working valley town rather than a preserved one: a square with an inn on it, a church above the roofs, and forest coming down both sides close enough that the place is in shade early. It takes about twenty minutes to see, which is the correct amount of time, and it is pleasant precisely because nobody has arranged it for visitors.
The point of the Black Forest is the driving between places like it. The roads climb and drop between valleys, the views arrive without warning at a lay-by, and our lake photograph is exactly that — taken over a guardrail because that is where the view was.
How long?
A day, as a drive. The lift and the coaster take a couple of hours with the line; the rest is road.
It sits in Germany's south-western corner, close to Basel and to the French border, which makes it a good day between Basel and Alsace rather than somewhere to base a week. In December the same corner is market country, and Freiburg im Breisgau — half an hour away — is one of the ten towns on that page.
Would we send you here?
As a driving day with the coaster in the middle of it, yes — especially with older children, and especially on a day when you want the car and not a station. As a base for several nights, no. The Black Forest rewards moving through it, and a week in one valley is a week of the same valley.
And because you cannot book the lift ahead, this is a day that wants a wet-weather alternative written down before you set off.
