Wasserburg

Wasserburg occupies a peninsula almost enclosed by a great bend of the Inn. Its bridge was the only crossing for some distance in either direction, and its position where land and river routes met made it a flourishing trading town. Salt from Berchtesgaden and Bad Reichenhall arrived by cart and was loaded onto boats for transport along the Inn.

The town's privileges sustained this commerce into the nineteenth century. Merchants and shipowners grew wealthy from routes connecting Wasserburg with Austria, Italy and the Balkans, and until the seventeenth century the town served as a port for Munich. The houses and churches of the old town recall the prosperity of a river crossing whose importance extended far beyond the loop of water that protected it.