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Bad Laasphe
The town Bad Laasphe is situated in the upper Lahn valley in the district Siegen-Wittgenstein. The town area is located southeast of the main ridge of the Rothaar Mountains, which is a part of the Rhenish Slate Mountains. In the north, the town borders onto the town Bad Berleburg and the community Erndtebrück, in the east onto the town Biedenkopf in Hesse, in the southeast onto Breidenbach, in the south onto Dietzhölztal and in the west onto the town Netphen.
The highest mountain in the town area is the Kompass with a height above sea level of 693,9 m, near the district Heiligenborn. It is the highest mountain of the Rothaar Mountains. At its edge, the brooks Bernshäuser Bach, Sohler Bach-Fischelbach, Gonderbach and Ilse have its source. Near Lahnhof, a small eastern district of Netphen, respectively southwest of the Lahnkopf, has the river Lahn its source.
The village, first mentioned in around 800, was in the early 13th-century a part of the earldom Wittgenstein and received its town charter before 1277. Subsequently, the town got a town wall with two gates and six towers, which were torn down in the early 19th-century. The name derives from 'Lassaffa', which means as much as Lachswasser or Lachsgewässer (salmon water).
Wilhelm Scheffer, called Dilich, noted in his 'Hessischen Chronica', which was printed in 1605: 'At the Lahn, on a high mountain and rock lies the Wittgenstein Palace. Beneath the same, in the valley at the Lahn, lies the oldest small town of the earldom, called Lasve.'
Since 1960, Laasphe has been a Kneipp health resort. Since the 1st of January 1984, the town Laasphe Bad Laasphe. Due to the innovative proposal preparations and the local ambiance, Bad Laasphe was included in the association of German Kneipp health spas and resorts in the group 'Kneipp-Premium Class' in 2000.
The town area is being crossed by the Bundesstrasse 62. The only railroad line in the town area is the Obere Lahntalbahn, which stops in Oberndorf, Feudingen, Bad Laasphe and Niederlaasphe. A train runs to Marburg hourly and every two hours a train goes to Erndtebrück. The town is further connected to the bus network of the Verkehrsgemeinschaft Westfalen-Süd.
Bad Laasphe offers its visitors a variety of sights; as for example the nearly completely preserved historical old town with its half-timbered houses, continuous cobble roads, fragments of an old town wall, the old town fountain and the Protestant town church from the 13th-century. High above the town is Wittgenstein Palace, situated, destination and starting point of many hiking paths. Through the area of the town Bad Laasphe runs also the Rothaar climb, created in 2001. Furthermore, there are numerous theme hiking paths, like the 'myths- and legend path', the 'human & dog adventure path' or the ' fairy tale hiking path Kleiner Rothaar'.
