Discover Flums: Culture and Mountain Scenery

When choosing a hotel in Flums, your travel interests may be the deciding factor: Gräpplang Castle Ruins combine medieval history with views, churches and chapels showcase different aspects of architectural and art history, and the Sarganserland Mask Museum is dedicated to regional traditions. Flumserberg, which is linked to Flums, offers another distinct experience. You can group the places and themes according to the focus of your stay, without combining them into a single tour.

Gräpplang Castle Ruins and the landscape

Gräpplang Castle Ruins are an important cultural heritage site with a medieval history and are freely accessible to the public. From the ruins, you can look out across the Sarganserland and the surrounding mountains. History and views come together here: you can choose the ruins as a destination if you are interested in medieval buildings, while also enjoying the landscape. The panorama encompasses both the Sarganserland region and the mountain scenery.

The municipality of Flums includes the Schilstal valley as far as the southwestern border with the canton of Glarus, part of the Seeztal plain through which the Seezbach flows, and the western slope of the Alvier range. These landscape features differ from the view at the castle ruins: they describe several parts of the municipality rather than a single vantage point. They provide an overview of the valleys mentioned and the slope of the Alvier range.

Churches and historic art

St. Justus Church is surrounded by a cemetery wall. Its furnishings include a late Gothic death lantern, historic grave slabs and wrought-iron grave crosses. Frescoes in the nave and choir date from between 1452 and 1490. Archaeological excavations in 1932/33 also uncovered the remains of an estate, several graves from the Migration Period and the foundations of an early church. The church thus brings together visible features of its furnishings and an archaeological history reaching back to earlier uses of the site.

St. Jakob Chapel was built around 1100, possibly earlier; its nave dates from between 1400 and 1450. The chancel houses a copy of the stained-glass painting Madonna and Child, described as Switzerland’s oldest stained glass. The original was taken to the Swiss National Museum in Zurich in 1889 and replaced with the copy. The dates point to a different focus from the frescoes at St. Justus: the chapel’s origins go back much further, while the nave and church paintings are assigned to specific later periods.

Masks and regional traditions

The Sarganserland Mask Museum displays 150 historical and contemporary wooden masks illustrating typical regional traditions. The exhibition is divided into three rooms. The museum was established in 2006 in the basement of Flums Town Hall. The collection brings together masks from different periods and the regional customs associated with them. Group visits are available by appointment; arrange your visit in advance, as visiting arrangements may change.

Activities at Flumserberg

The Flumserberg ski and hiking area is linked to Flums and is also partly located within the municipality of Quarten. In winter, activities include carving, skiing, snowboarding, sledding, winter hiking and dog sled rides. The range extends from skiing and snowboarding to winter hiking and dog sled rides. For mountain bikers, SwitzerlandMobility Tour Alp Fursch Bike No. 478 starts in Flums. Flums is therefore explicitly the starting point; the tour offers another way to explore the region by bike.

When planning your trip, you can consider cultural history, regional traditions and activities at Flumserberg as distinct areas of interest. For visits to the Mask Museum, remember to arrange a group appointment.

Discover more destinations: Bad Ragaz, Mels, Flumserberg, Sargans, Oberterzen, Walenstadt, Vilters-Wangs, Tannenheim.

See the regional travel overview: Sarganserland.