Mountain fires, burning displays & gourmet markets

Ahr valley customs around St Martin

Literally every child knows St Martin's Day at the beginning of November. All over Germany, groups of young and old children and adults parade through the dark streets with colourful, mostly home-made lanterns and sing St Martin's songs. Do you remember the popular children's rhyme "Laterne, Laterne - Sonne, Mond und Sterne"?

St Martin's Day celebrations have a long tradition in Germany. They go back to St Martin, a Roman soldier who shared his coat with a freezing and starving beggar on a cold winter's day. Martin then saw Jesus in a dream, who praised his good deed as a symbol of charity. To this day, St Martin's Day is celebrated as the patron saint of the poor and the legend is passed on to future generations.

The traditional processions with a horseman and a beggar at the head recreate the historical event of St Martin. Depending on the region, the St Martin's procession is followed by a big St Martin's bonfire, a "Martinsweck" (a little man made of yeast dough with sultana eyes and a pipe made of sugar icing) or a St Martin's goose dinner.

With impressive mountain fires, burning displays in the vineyards and cosy St Martin's markets, we cultivate a very special St Martin's tradition in the Ahr valley. It is not without reason that St Martin's Day is one of the most important dates in our annual calendar. The St Martin's Day events attract thousands of visitors every year.

Here we tell you what you can experience around St Martin's Day in the Ahr Valley and which special traditions we live and love.

Impressive & unique: St Martin's Day in Ahrweiler

St Martin's bonfire in the vineyards

Every year on St Martin's Day - 8 November 2025 - Ahrweiler is all about the traditional St Martin's bonfires. The four bachelor clubs of Ahrweiler impressively construct sensational mountain fires and burning displays in the vineyards around the historic red wine metropolis. With the ringing of the church bells at 5.30 pm, the bachelors first light their four Martins fires, which, at around 20 metres high, can be seen from afar as columns of fire. Afterwards, huge displays of thousands of torches are lit, beaming their messages from the slopes of the vineyards into the valley with local or topical references.

Even the Office for Rhenish Regional Studies in Bonn recognises that the Ahrweiler Martinmas tradition is valuable and worth protecting. The folklorists emphasise not only the competition between the four Huten (the town districts, formerly military and pasture districts), but also the competition for the most beautiful and original torchlight display in the vineyards around Ahrweiler. After the burning of the St Martin's bonfires, the lettering and motifs on the slopes of Ahrhut, Oberhut, Adenbachhut and Niederhut light up in an oversized display. The spectacle, which attracts onlookers from all over the region to Ahrweiler every year, lasts a good quarter of an hour. From 5.35 pm, the fires should "stand properly" for at least ten minutes. The lighting and development of the displays and their evaluation follows from 5.45 pm. The displays should also be clearly recognisable for ten minutes. The awards for the best mountain fires and the most beautiful displays will be announced at around 7.30 pm on the Ahrweiler marketplace. At the same time, the St Martin's procession starts at 6.30 pm and moves through Ahrweiler's old town.

History of a special Ahrweiler tradition

But where did the show fires begin? St Martin's bonfires have been around since time immemorial - but the fire displays in the mountains have only been around since the 1950s. And it was two Ahrhöde Jonge who can take credit for the basic idea of the torchlight display: Ernst Heuwagen and Erich Kohlhaas. They both found the previous rag torchlight procession from the St Martin's bonfire to the old town centre too boring. So in the early 1950s, they set torches on sticks in the hillside and lit up a display for the first time. The idea caught on. Other huts followed suit. Circles, crosses and Olympic rings were followed by the first lettering in the 1960s - still with torches in the slope. In the 70s, Klaus Bruckner came up with the idea of reusable multi-letters made from tyre irons. He developed iron frames that could be used for almost the entire ABC, similar to the lettering with LEDs in pocket calculators. The torches only had to be attached and lit. It works in a similar way today with the multi-letters made from roof battens.

Klaus Bruckner also became the spiritual father of alternate writing, which made moving diagrams possible, for example. From the mid-1970s, lettering flashed up one after the other in the Ahrhut, signalling anniversaries or events. An unrivalled highlight: in 1980, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Ahr Valley Railway, the bachelors had an entire train shunted along the slope of the Ahrhut.

But as quickly as the moving pictures appeared, they disappeared again: torches and materials were simply too expensive, as the bachelor clubs paid for the fire show out of their own pockets.

Traditional St Martin's markets & torchlight processions

St Martin's Day market of regional delights in Dernau

St Martin's Day is celebrated for a whole weekend in the WeinKulturDorf Dernau. The "St Martin's Market of Regional Delights" is an unforgettable festival that is now known far beyond the borders of Dernau and the Ahr Valley.

From Friday, 7 November to Sunday, 9 November, there are plenty of highlights on the programme: The traditional torchlight walk through the vineyards, including wine tasting, kicks off the event on Friday at 6.30 pm. The meeting point is at the Dagernova event hall in the centre of Dernau. At the same time, the winegrowers invite guests into their cosily decorated courtyards from 6 pm and treat them to Ahr wines, mulled wine and regional delicacies from the kitchen.

On Saturday, the St Martin's market of regional delights opens its doors to guests at 11 am. Exhibitors present a wide range of decorative items and handicrafts. The panoramic wine walk through the vineyards of Dernau also starts at 11 am from the Dagernova Vinothek. At 6 pm, the big torchlight procession with St Martin starts through the narrow streets of the village. The highlight: the impressive St Martin's bonfires of the five village communities, which are then lit high above the village in the vineyards.

On Sundays, the St Martin's market also attracts visitors to browse and enjoy from 11 am.

St Martin's market in Adenau

The small town of Adenau, not far from the Nürburgring, also celebrates St Martin's Day in style.

It all kicks off on St Martin's Saturday, 8 November, at 5.30 pm with a romantic torchlight procession. The starting point is at the DRK rescue centre in Adenau.

On 9 November, the local shops will be attracting visitors with numerous offers for the St Martin's Market with Sunday shopping and the closed main street will be lined with many stalls. There will of course be a children's carousel and a bouncy castle for younger visitors. Culinary delights from the barbecue, homemade waffles and the cafés and restaurants are looking forward to catering for the many guests.

A free shuttle bus service will take visitors from the car parks on the outskirts of the city to the car-free city centre.