The Rügen limestone cliffs in the Jasmund National Park - World Heritage Site

katrin-lux (71)in Pinmapple • 3 years ago

Hey guys,

today it's about one of the most beautiful Baltic Sea islands - Rügen. Fortunately, Rügen is not that far away from the place where I visited my sister, Rostock - by car it takes less than 1.5 hours drive to visit the island.

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And why to Rügen of all places?? Well, Rügen is THE Baltic Sea island in Germany. It has an incredibly beautiful nature (but I'll get to that later;). Rügen is also the largest island in Germany, if you look at the area alone. And it is the most populated island in Germany. It is located in the same state as Rostock, in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The best way to get to Rügen is to pass the Hanseatic city of Stralsund. Via Rügendamm and Rügenbrücke, Rügen is connected to the mainland via Strelasund.

I liked Rügen incredibly well, and especially what the island is so famous for: there are an incredible number of bays and lagoons (so-called Bodden and Wieke). In addition, you can admire many smaller peninsulas and protruding headlands. In general, Rügen is very characterized by water and hills. This is due to Rügen's history in the ice age.
And one type of tree you can find here in masses: Beech trees. Because of this and also because of the white chalk cliffs (which I also found very fascinating), UNESCO declared the Jasmund National Park on Rügen a World Heritage Site in 2011.

I'm really not exaggerating when I say that I enjoyed the nature here more than any other place. Such beautiful beaches were otherwise only in Australia - even if the comparison may be a bit lame, because it was just a completely different kind of beach and nature ;)

And the Jasmund National Park is exactly what i I would like to show you today. Since we just made a day trip to Rügen (but after this I decided to want to see much more of Rügen soon), we did not have too much time and have chosen the greatest sight of Rügen: the World Heritage Site, the Jasmund National Park.

The formation of the chalk cliffs

Jasmund National Park is one of the most popular sights on the whole island of Rügen. And not for nothing: because here you can find the so famous chalk cliffs.
But why are there these chalk cliffs at all?
In the past, together with the Danish island of Møn, which lies on the opposite side of the Baltic Sea, Rügen was part of a large plateau of chalk limestone. This was pushed to the earth's surface by tectonic movements. This land mass has largely disappeared through erosion and faulting, leaving the two islands. That is why they have these unique chalk cliffs.

Jasmund National Park - impressive natural world heritage site

And now more about Jasmund National Park: Jasmund itself is one of the many peninsulas I just told you about. It is located in the northeast of Rügen. The whole peninsula can be called a nature recreation area. In it lies the 30 km² Jasmund National Park, named after the peninsula. And in it the landmark of Rügen: the chalk cliffs with the 118 meter high Königsstuhl ("royal chair"). The Königsstuhl is the highest and also most prominent elevation of the chalk cliff formation. If you have ever seen pictures of Rügen, then most likely the chalk cliffs with the Königsstuhl ("royal chair").
I was very interested in the name, so I did further research on the name ;)

Why is the huge chalk cliff called "Königsstuhl", "royal chair"?

According to what I could find out, it is not quite sure where the name comes from. But there are two theories for the origin of the name:
The first one is that in 1715 the Swedish king Charles XII would have led a sea battle against the Danes from the rock plateau. This battle seemed to have been so tiring for the king that he had a chair brought to him during the battle.
According to another legend, there was a contest: The one who was able to climb the chalk cliff from the sea side and sit on the chair placed on top would be elected king.
To be honest, I don't know which theory I like better. Maybe the one with King Charles, since it was really about a king. Who knows, maybe we will never know ;)

The Rügen chalk - fine-grained and porous

The nearest town to the Jasmun National Park is the resort town of Sassnitz. It is located about eight kilometers (on foot) away, south of the National Park Center Königsstuhl.
If you go closer to the chalk cliffs, something stands out directly: The chalk from the island of Rügen, which is also called Rügen chalk here (yes, the islanders are very proud of their chalk and I would be too ;)), is very fine-grained and the limestone also very porous.

Now I would like to tell you something about the chalk, because it is known THE landmark of Rügen. The chalk or the chalk structure is divided into twelve stages. Roughly, it can be divided into two layers, the lower layer and the upper layer. The uppermost stage is called Maastrichtian. This has the highest chalk quality. Such a high chalk quality can hardly be found elsewhere. Even today you can find many of these chalks on Jasmund. The Rügen chalk cliffs are also so popular because of their incredibly great location directly on the cliff coast (my first pictures show the great view, if you are in the Jasmuns National Park on the road you have there many such great views).
The cliff of the chalk cliffs falls directly on the beach of the Baltic Sea up to a hundred and more meters down, the beach itself consists of stones, as you can see well in the pictures and is relatively narrow.

How do you get to the Königsstuhl?

Fortunately, you cannot get to the center of the national park directly by car - this is prohibited for nature conservation reasons. Only coaches and local public transport run here.
If you drive to the island of Rügen by car like us and want to visit the Königsstuhl, then you can park the car on a public parking lot, which costs you little money. The parking lot is located in neighboring Hagen.
From the parking lot you can take one of the buses (you have to pay some money for this too). These buses go directly to the Königsstuhl National Park Center.
From there you just follow the signs, it is then only less than five minutes on foot to the famous chalk cliffs.

If you wanna get there without one of the buses (which is also highly recommended, because then you will see more of the world natural heritage;)) you can also take one of the hiking trails instead. It is about 2.8 kilometers from the parking lot to the Königsstuhl. You then walk through the forest area "Stubbenkammer" past the "Alten Torfmoor" to the Königsstuhl.
If you are already at the Sassnitz city harbor, you can also take the bus directly from there. It drives directly to the "Königsstuhl National Park Center".

What you should know beforehand: Access to the Königsstuhl costs money. For adults, as far as I can remember, it's € 9.50.

"Ernst Moritz Arndt view" in the Jasmund National Park - one of the most beautiful and popular viewpoints

As you can see, among other sights we were at the lookout point "Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Sicht" in the Jasmund National Park (I took the first three pictures from there).
It is the most popular lookout point on the chalk coast. We chose this lookout point because we only had a couple of hours to see the island. But if you are on Rügen for a longer time, I can definitely recommend you to visit the lesser-known places. The "Ernst Moritz Arndt view" is located on the high bank path on the chalk coast of the Jasmund peninsula in the north-east of Rügen. The lookout point was named after Ernst Moritz Arndt, the historian and writer of the Wars of Liberation against Napoleon, who was born on Rügen. The lookout point is located on a plateau-shaped chalk ledge.

What I was thinking about while we were walking along the chalk cliffs and what is actually not entirely harmless: the chalk can fall off from time to time. That happened in 1981, for example. That year around 150,000m³ of chalk rock broke off in the area of the "Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Sicht". The coast is constantly changing. I think that make them so special too. If you come to the same point again after 10 years, it might look so different that you won't even recognize it - and without human intervention. Thats nature.

What else you should know: At the moment the National Park Center Königsstuhl is unfortunately closed, but I hope that we will have the opportunity to visit these great chalk cliffs again in summer.

I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I enjoyed writing. I have been so fascinated by this nature on the day we visited Rügen. It is not called the most beautiful island in Germany by many for nothing. What do you say? Feel free to write your feedback in the comments. Until next time!

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#haveyoubeenhere #traveladvice #digitalnomads #budgettravel #travel #photography #life #blog #travelfeed #nature

3 years ago in Pinmapple by katrin-lux (71)

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travelfeed (75) 3 years ago

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