Hoheneck Castle is a medieval castle above Ipsheim. The castle is situated on the slopes of the Franconian Heights, a small, forested, hill range (Frankenhöhe Nature Park), high above the valley of the Aisch. To the east of the castle are the extensive forests of the Franconian Heights, part of the Hoheneck Forest. At its base is one of the few wine areas in Middle Franconia.
Hoheneck was first mentioned in 1132. In 1381, Arnold von Seckendorff sold Hoheneck with its property and forest to the Nuremberg Burggraf Friedrich V. A few years later, he established the Oberamt Hoheneck. In 1462, the castle was burned down during the war between Margrave Albrecht of Brandenburg and the Hochstift Würzburg.
The City of Nuremberg acquired the castle in 1953 and it is the only castle owned by the city, as the Nuremberg Castle is owned by the Free State of Bavaria. Since April 1984 the Youth Castle serves as a youth education centre for the Youth Council of Kreis Nuremberg.
The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.