Passau is a city in Lower Bavaria. It is also known as the Dreiflüssestadt (“City of Three Rivers”), as the river Danube is joined by the Inn from the south and the IIz from the north. We visited this city in October 2025.
St. Stephen’s Cathedral is a baroque church from 1688.
Since 730, there have been many churches built on the site of the current cathedral. The current church was built from 1668 to 1693 after a fire in 1662 destroyed its predecessor, of which only the late gothic eastern side remains.
In 1662, a devastating fire consumed most of the city. Passau was subsequently rebuilt in the Baroque style.
From 1892 until 1894, Adolf Hitler and his family lived in Passau. The city archives mention Hitler being in Passau on four occasions in the 1920s for speeches.
As the story goes... There was once a young boy walking along the Danube to the bridge. He somehow slipped and fell into the water. A passerby saw the kid in distress, jumped in and saved him. That boy was Adolf Hitler.
In November 1933, the building of Nibelungenhalle (Hall of the Nibelungs) was announced. Intended to hold 8,000 to 10,000 guests, and another 30,000 in front of it, in 1935 the hall also became quarters for a unit of the Austrian Legion..
Beginning in 1934, these troops had occupied a building that belonged to Sigmund Mandl, a Jewish merchant. That building, in turn, was referred to as SA barracks.[12]
Göttweig Abbey
Göttweig Abbey is a Benedictine monastery near Krems in Lower Austria. It was founded in 1083. In the middle ages the abbey was a seat of learning with a library and a monastic school. The abbey went through a period of decline during the 15th and 16th centuries and in 1580 it was mostly destroyed by a fire. Under a new abbot brought in from Melk Abbey the monastery was rebuilt and restored. After another fire in 1718 the abbey had to be rebuilt again.
The new building includes the largest Baroque staircase in Austria with a fresco that is considered a masterpiece of its era. Today the abbey is renowned for its library which holds a valuable collection of books, manuscripts, coins and antiquities.
- Ger
Zland Times 