The Hohe Acht () is the highest mountain ( ) in the

Eifel The Eifel (; lb, Äifel, ) is a low mountain range in western Germany and eastern Belgium. It occupies parts of southwestern North Rhine-Westphalia, northwestern Rhineland-Palatinate and the southern area of the German-speaking Community of ...

mountains of Germany. It is located on the boundary between the districts of

Ahrweiler Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler () is a spa town in the German Bundesland of Rhineland-Palatinate that serves as the capital of the Ahrweiler district. The A61 motorway connects the town with cities like Cologne and Mainz. Formed by the merging of the ...

and

Mayen-Koblenz Mayen-Koblenz is a district (''Kreis'') in the north of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Neighboring districts are (from north clockwise) Ahrweiler (district), Ahrweiler, Neuwied (district), Neuwied, Westerwaldkreis, district-free Koblenz, Rhein-Lahn ...

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; german: link=no, Rheinland-Pfalz ; lb, Rheinland-Pfalz ; pfl, Rhoilond-Palz) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the ...

Geography and geology

The Hohe Acht is located in the

High Eifel The High Eifel (german: Hocheifel (Ost) or ''Hohe Eifel'') forms part of the Eifel Mountains in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The landscape here between Adenau, Mendig and Daun rises to a height of 747 m. The region is not to be c ...

east of

Adenau Adenau () is a town in the High Eifel in Germany. It is known as the ''Johanniterstadt'' because the Order of Saint John was based there in the Middle Ages. The town's coat of arms combines the black cross of the Electorate of Cologne with the l ...

. The mountain is a

Tertiary Tertiary ( ) is a widely used but obsolete term for the geologic period from 66 million to 2.6 million years ago. The period began with the demise of the non-avian dinosaurs in the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, at the start ...

volcano A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates are ...

, whose cone is composed of

Lower Devonian The Early Devonian is the first of three epochs comprising the Devonian period, corresponding to the Lower Devonian series. It lasted from and began with the Lochkovian Stage , which was followed by the Pragian from and then by the Emsian, w ...

rock and whose summit is made of

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanite, aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the planetary surface, surface of a terrestrial ...

Emperor William Tower

In 1908/09 the Emperor William Tower (''Kaiser-Wilhelm-Turm'') was erected on the Hohe Acht. The occasion for the construction of this stone

observation tower An observation tower is a structure used to view events from a long distance and to create a full 360 degree range of vision to conduct long distance observations. Observation towers are usually at least tall and are made from stone, iron, an ...

, based on plans by the

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

, Freiherr von Tettau of

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

, was the silver wedding of

Emperor An emperor (from la, imperator, via fro, empereor) is a monarch, and usually the sovereignty, sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife (empress consort), ...

William II and Empress Augusta Victoria as well as the commemoration of Emperor

William I William I; ang, WillelmI (Bates ''William the Conqueror'' p. 33– 9 September 1087), usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first Norman king of England, reigning from 1066 until his death in 1087 ...

The tower is high and its walls are one metre thick at ground level. The work was carried out by master masons, Karl and Johannes Leidinger, from

using local stone. The cost of construction was 18,000

marks Marks may refer to: Business * Mark's, a Canadian retail chain * Marks & Spencer, a British retail chain * Collective trade marks, trademarks owned by an organisation for the benefit of its members * Marks & Co, the inspiration for the novel '' ...

. The tower has been a protected monument since 1987. The Emperor William Tower offers a superb view across the whole Eifel (including the mountains of

Scharteberg The Scharteberg is a mountain, high, near Kirchweiler in the district of Vulkaneifel and is one of the highest peaks in the Eifel region of Germany. On the summit is the Eifel Transmitter which belongs to SWR and is used for FM radio and telev ...

, Döhmberg, Michelsberg, Hochthürmerberg,

Schöneberg Schöneberg () is a locality of Berlin, Germany. Until Berlin's 2001 administrative reform it was a separate borough including the locality of Friedenau. Together with the former borough of Tempelhof it is now part of the new borough of Tempelh ...

, the nearby

Nürburg Castle The Nürburg is a ruined hilltop castle in the German Eifel Mountains near the village of Nürburg south of Adenau in the district of Ahrweiler in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate. It stands within the famous North Loop, or Nordschleife, of t ...

and

Hochkelberg At the Hochkelberg is one of the ten highest mountains in the Vulkan Eifel in Germany. It is a former stratovolcano, at the southern foot of which lies the Mosbrucher Weiher, an explosion crater lake or maar. Below the summit of the Hochkelbe ...

), as well as the

Siebengebirge The (), occasionally Sieben Mountains or Seven Mountains, are a hill range of the German Central Uplands on the east bank of the Middle Rhine, southeast of Bonn. Description The area, located in the municipalities of Bad Honnef and Königswin ...

and its

Großer Ölberg The Großer Ölberg (also: ''Oelberg''), at 460 metres above sea level, is the highest hill in the Siebengebirge range in Germany. It is located in the borough of Königswinter near the village of Ittenbach and south of a subpeak known as the ''K ...

and, in conditions of good visibility, as far as the

Westerwald The Westerwald (; literally 'Western forest') is a low mountain range on the right bank of the river Rhine in the German federal states of Rhineland-Palatinate, Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia. It is a part of the Rhenish Massif ( or Rhenish ...

, the

Taunus The Taunus is a mountain range in Hesse, Germany, located north of Frankfurt. The tallest peak in the range is ''Großer Feldberg'' at 878 m; other notable peaks are ''Kleiner Feldberg'' (825 m) and ''Altkönig'' (798 m). The Taunus range spans ...

, the

Hunsrück The Hunsrück () is a long, triangular, pronounced upland in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is bounded by the valleys of the Moselle-Saar (north-to-west), the Nahe (south), and the Rhine (east). It is continued by the Taunus mountains, past ...

and the

Lower Rhine The Lower Rhine (german: Niederrhein; kilometres 660 to 1,033 of the river Rhine) flows from Bonn, Germany, to the North Sea at Hook of Holland, Netherlands (including the Nederrijn or "Nether Rhine" within the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta); al ...

Walking and winter sports

There is a network of

footpath A footpath (also pedestrian way, walking trail, nature trail) is a type of thoroughfare that is intended for use only by pedestrians and not other forms of traffic such as motorized vehicles, bicycles and horses. They can be found in a wide ...

s around the Hohe Acht; at many places there are good views over the Eifel landscape. In winter the Hohe Acht has good

winter sport Winter sports or winter activities are competitive sports or non-competitive recreational activities which are played on snow or ice. Most are variations of skiing, ice skating and sledding. Traditionally, such games were only played in cold area ...

facilities including prepared

cross country skiing Cross-country skiing is a form of skiing where skiers rely on their own locomotion to move across snow-covered terrain, rather than using ski lifts or other forms of assistance. Cross-country skiing is widely practiced as a sport and recreation ...

trails,

toboggan A toboggan is a simple sled traditionally used by children. It is also a traditional form of transport used by the Innu and Cree of northern Canada. In modern times, it is used on snow to carry one or more people (often children) down a hill o ...

runs and

ski lifts A ski lift is a mechanism for transporting skiers up a hill. Ski lifts are typically a paid service at ski resorts. The first ski lift was built in 1908 by German Robert Winterhalder in Schollach/Eisenbach, Hochschwarzwald. Types * Aerial l ...

Motor racing

Very close to the Hohe Acht on a high volcanic cone is

. A section of the ''North loop'' (''Nordschleife'') on the

Formula 1 Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The World Drivers' Championship, ...

racetrack at the

Nürburgring The is a 150,000 person capacity motorsports complex located in the town of Nürburg, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It features a Formula One, Grand Prix race track built in 1984, and a long "North loop" track, built in the 1920s, around t ...

is known as the ''Hohe Acht''. File:HoheAchtBasalt.jpg, Basaltic blocks on the summit of the Hohe Acht File:Hohe Acht Kaiser-Wilhelm-Turm.jpg, Summit rock on the Hohe Acht with the Kaiser Wilhelm Tower behind File:Hohe Acht Turm.jpg, Kaiser Wilhelm Tower File:HoheAchtTurm.jpg, On the Kaiser Wilhelm Tower

References

Sources

* d'Hein: ''Nationaler Geopark Vulkanland Eifel. Ein Natur- und Kulturführer''. Gaasterland Verlag, Düsseldorf 2006,

External links

WDR Winter Sport Tip – Hohe Acht

Rhineland-Palatinate Leisure Portal – Hohe Acht
{{Authority control Ahrweiler (district) Mayen-Koblenz Mountains under 1000 metres Mountains and hills of the Eifel Mountains and hills of Rhineland-Palatinate Monuments and memorials to Emperor William I Volcanoes of Germany