Meditative mood at Jasmund Bay on the island of Rügen

by Silva Wischeropp

This photographic landscape shot of a remarkable coastal formation, directly on Jasmund Bay , located in Jasmund National Park, was taken in the late summer evening hours shortly after sunset on 4 August 2013.

Germany's smallest national park is located on the Jasmund peninsula, which is part of the island of Rügen. On the approximately 300 square kilometres, the original beech forest, called Stubnitz, is characteristic and forms an impressive coastal formation north of the harbour town of Sassnitz above numerous chalk cliffs and bays. Particularly exposed chalk cliffs such as the 118-metre-high "Königsstuhl" or the "Kleine Stubbenkammer" have also become motifs for numerous engravings and paintings. Caspar David Friedrich's painting "Chalk Rocks on Rügen" from 1818 became a world-famous work of Romanticism. The Wissower Klinken also gained some notoriety, but were largely destroyed after a major demolition in the winter of 2005. Due to the special geological circumstances, the national park became a habitat for rare animal and plant species.
Water-filled depressions, hollows and finally kettle bogs developed from ice-age dead ice holes, in whose extensive surroundings black alder, wild pear and orchid species can be observed, as well as kingfishers, peregrine falcons and white-tailed eagles. Visitors can find out more at the central contact point at the Königsstuhl in a multimedia presentation.

In recent years, there have unfortunately been repeated cases of shoreline erosion on the chalk coast. One cause is high precipitation: The rain seeps away, accumulates in front of impermeable layers and causes instability. Heavy north-easterly storms are also a danger to the trees that stand on the edge of the high bank. Cracks in the forest floor can then be an omen of imminent demolitions.