Harzen

Flemming and I had a big programme for the day in Ballenstedt: we wanted to visit the World Heritage town of Quedlinburg, to go hiking The Devil’s Wall, and to have time to relax and do nothing 🙂 We started from Quedlinburg.

This town is known for having around 2,100 timber-framed houses from the Middle Ages! Exceptionally well-preserved, with outstanding architecture, they were such a pleasure to look at!

There were many interesting details – on the houses, doors, pavements. I took lots of pictures. Some of the streets were crowded, others – empty and quiet; and all of them were beautiful.

The house below is from 1660. Probably not much is left from that time, but looking so good.

The Quedlinburg Abbey and Castle were undergoing maintenance, so we couldn’t visit them, but a small part was open for public. We climbed up – and a delightful view over the town opened up:

There was a small garden with flowers, benches under the trees, and many people came there to have a nice break:

The only small part of the Abbey we could see from there was this one (it is otherwise huge):

Flemming and I continued back to the town, visited a church, got lost in the labyrinth of small streets…

It was very fine to be in Quedlinburg, but The Devil’s Wall was calling. We drove there, to the nature reserve called Teufelsmauer.

The entrance to the hiking path was difficult to miss:

The legend has it, once God and Devil fought for power on Earth. They agreed to divide the land in two if the Devil could build a wall between the Harz and the Harz foreland in just one night before the first rooster crow. But shortly before sunrise, a maid with her rooster was on the way to the market. When the devil heard the rooster crowing, he smashed the wall with rage. The remains are still visible today: