Mullerthal Trail, Luxembourg

The Mullerthal Trail is a famous 3-loop trail in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. Each loop is between 36km to 40km. In total the 3 loops combined span 112km. I have been wanting to do this trail for a long time: it is only a few hours drive from where I live in Flanders, which makes it ideal for a long weekend. Furthermore, the distance of each loop makes it a perfect training distance for my ultrarunning: I can run the loop with a minimal trail running vest and arrive back each day at the car with my camping gear. This plan was executed in the midst of the summer holidays with my ultrarunning buddy. After a few hours drive we arrived at 1PM at loop 3 which we were able run in about 5 hours, which gave us enough time to drive to Echternach and set up our tent on the local camp site. The next day we tackled loop 2. This loop is the toughest of the 3 which also showed in us being almost an hour slower than the day before on loop 3. However, it was also the nicest of the 3 loops with the most spectacular gorges and rock formations. The last day we started early with loop 1 which again ran rather smoothly with more open landscapes than loop 2 which was more in the forests.

While doing these loops hiking is also a beautiful experience, I preferred to run these as part of my ultrarunning training. Furthermore, I was also rather time constrained this summer so only having to take 3 days (including driving to and from Luxembourg) and run them was much more practical. The fact this hike is also not the most spectacular route, but a rather forested area similar to the Ardennes, I don’t mind having run and having seen less than you do with hiking. Although I like trail running more and more, I will still do hikes from time to time depending on the companions and the type of trek.

More information on the Mullerthal Trail can be found on the Mullerthal trail website