I am always happy to visit a site that featured prominently in one of my high school history books. Malbork Castle (or the Marienburg in German) is one of them. The seat of the Teutonic Order it was a key driver for Germans migrating eastwards. It’s also closely tied to Prussian history and as such as part of the Gerrman nation state origin myth. The first king of Prussia (technically King in Prussia) was a high master of the Teutonic Order. Blessed by Luther he converted to Lutheranism and became a worldly ruler. In the process he also took possession of all church possessions. Finding faith seems to have its advantages.

The site itself is surprisingly large. I think you can easily spend multiple hours exploring all the ins and outs of the castle. But you will hardly be on your own. This is very popular with tourist groups and the amenities of a medieval castle (even a very large one) get strained quite quickly. Still, this certainly features with the best castles on the list.

Getting There

There are more or less hourly trains connecting Malbork to Gdansk and the rest of Poland. From the train station it’s a 15min walk to get to the castle.

I came in from Gdansk where I had spend too much time at the ticket booth of the train station and missed a train. I continued to Elblag which is a nice contrast to Gdansk. From Elblag I ventured on to Augustow for the tentative site Augustow Canal (4-5:30h bus ride). I wanted to also visit the prospective site Elblag canal, but didn’t manage due to lack of time.