Stolpen Castle and Saxon Switzerland National Park, Saxony, Germany

The last day of the conference was actually a field trip to (sort of) three castles. Basalt and sandstone: the first providing the building materials for a hilltop castle and the latter providing spectacular pinnacles that long ago supported a fortress castle. The conference provided the opportunity to visit these sites in a field trip, followed by a dinner at another castle closer to Dresden.

View from Stolpen Castle – the one made with basalt columns

Most visitors to Stolpen Castle are interested in the “torture” part of the displays in the castle, so our group was a bit unusual. How many tourists happily look at the rocks? Basalt seems an unusual stone to build a castle!

The shape of the columns must have made construction of the walls easier.
We guessed that the blocks at the end of this were more recent than the original – from the 13th century.
Workers dug a well to get water to the castle – at about 1 to 1.5 cm a day – yikes!
Stolpen Castle is on a hilltop outcrop of a basalt flow with well developed columnar joints. It is said to be the type locality of basalt. The basalt columns provided building stones for the castle walls that could withstand attacks better than other materials.

The fun part of wandering around a castle built of basalt was all the cool (temperature) rooms in every direction. This was important because we walked up a hill to get to the castle, and we were all hot.

We visited the lapidary area in the lowest portion of the castle, where rocks were shaped into regular hexagons and other works are done.

Outcrops of columnar basalt and walls of the castle
Actually a beer garden but featuring basalt columns as decor
Clare found where the wine was cellared
Complex mechanism for unlocking the lid of a chest
This relief used to be over the entrance
The Countess Cosel became mistress to Augustus the Strong after he showed the strength of the castle walls. This is an amusing artist’s interpretation of the legend!

Saxon Switzerland National Park is a beautiful area with a castle built in the Middle Ages on top of extremely steep outcrops of sandstone. Our entire group of field trip participants climbed down the stairs and across the bridges to get to the castle ruins.

Saxon Switzerland National Park is Germany’s only rock National Park. It features pinnacles of Cretaceous sandstone and the remnants of a castle fortress. Some dizzying heights indeed!
The rocks formed these columns in a similar way to the columns in Bryce Canyon NP in the US, except that the sandstones at Bryce are much softer.
Views of the sandstone pinnacles and looking down upon the Elbe River

Our third castle of the day was where our group had dinner together. Great food, great conversation. From there, Brian and Clare took a tram to Dresden.

The conference dinner was held at Lingnerschloss castle above the Elbe River to the east of Dresden.
View from Lingnerschloss toward Dresden and the full moon rising adjacent to the Frauenkirche dome from our hotel room

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