Waldkapelle

The Roman Catholic Waldkapelle stands on the edge of the village of Hinteranger, where the municipality of Schwarzenberg meets Klaffer am Hochficht in Upper Austria’s Mühlviertel. It sits among spruce and fir trees on a gentle slope above the Große Mühl river valley. The chapel marks the old border between Bavaria and Austria, a reminder of the region’s past. Local tradition says a wooden wayside cross once stood here before smugglers took the timber and left only the figure of Christ. In 1770 the first wooden chapel was built to protect that statue, and soon pilgrims came seeking healing.

The present stone chapel was erected around 1880–1885 under parish priest Theodor Wetterschlager. A new statue of the Virgin Mary was added and quickly became the focus of devotion. The building follows Gothic Revival lines with a polygonal apse and pointed windows under a steep pyramid roof. Inside, the walls carry colourful stencil paintings from the late 19th century, and a neobaroque altarpiece holds a dramatic late-19th-century crucifixion group. Votive pictures cover the chapel walls, each one a silent story of thanks for prayers answered.

Visitors step through a small porch supported by stone columns into a single chamber with a ribbed polygonal dome overhead. The altar stands at the far end beneath a painted backdrop of baroque embroidery. Sunlight filters through the narrow lancets, catching the gilt of the altarpiece and the bright blues and reds of the stencil work. Outside, the forest path leads uphill past mossy boulders and spruce trunks to a quiet clearing where the chapel appears framed by branches. The air carries the scent of resin and damp earth, and the only sounds are the wind in the treetops and the occasional call of a jay.