The Uffe is a river in the states

Lower Saxony Lower Saxony (german: Niedersachsen ; nds, Neddersassen; stq, Läichsaksen) is a German state (') in northwestern Germany. It is the second-largest state by land area, with , and fourth-largest in population (8 million in 2021) among the 16 ...

and

Thuringia Thuringia (; german: Thüringen ), officially the Free State of Thuringia ( ), is a state of central Germany, covering , the sixth smallest of the sixteen German states. It has a population of about 2.1 million. Erfurt is the capital and larg ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. The Uffe has its source on the Großer Bockstalskopf in Lower Saxony, a subpeak of the Ravensberg mountain, and flows through the town of

Bad Sachsa Bad Sachsa is a town in the district of Göttingen, in Lower Saxony, Germany. The town was one of the few municipalities in West Germany that imported electric power from former East Germany. This was done via Neuhof Substation. Geography Bad ...

down to the village of (belongs to Bad Sachsa). From there the Uffe is known as the ''Sachsengraben'' ("Saxon Ditch") and continues to the village of (belongs to Hohenstein). The stream then sinks into the gypsum

karst Karst is a topography formed from the dissolution of soluble rocks such as limestone, dolomite, and gypsum. It is characterized by underground drainage systems with sinkholes and caves. It has also been documented for more weathering-resistant ro ...

, before reaching the River Wieda beyond the village of (belongs to Hohenstein). The Wieda, too, regularly dries up behind the hamlet of Wiedigshof. Until the middle of the last century the Uffe divided in the village of Neuhof. The main stream flowed towards Klettenberg and Holbach where its

water power Hydropower (from el, ὕδωρ, "water"), also known as water power, is the use of falling or fast-running water to produce electricity or to power machines. This is achieved by converting the gravitational potential or kinetic energy of a ...

was used in several mills. This stream is still called the Uffe today. The branch running towards Branderode is called the ''Sachsengraben'' and passes the villages of Branderode and Obersachswerfen before discharging below Schwinden into the Wieda, which flows into the Zorge downstream of Schwinden. The waters of the Zorge pass down the

Helme The Helme is river in central Germany that is about long and which forms a left-hand, western tributary of the Unstrut in the states of Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt. Course The river rises in Thuringia south of the Harz mountains in the dis ...

Unstrut The Unstrut () is a river in Germany and a left tributary of the Saale. The Unstrut originates in northern Thuringia near Dingelstädt (west of Kefferhausen in the Eichsfeld area) and its catchment area is the whole of the Thuringian Basin. ...

and

Saale The Saale (), also known as the Saxon Saale (german: Sächsische Saale) and Thuringian Saale (german: Thüringische Saale), is a river in Germany and a left-bank tributary of the Elbe. It is not to be confused with the smaller Fränkische Saale, ...

into the

Elbe The Elbe (; cs, Labe ; nds, Ilv or ''Elv''; Upper and dsb, Łobjo) is one of the major rivers of Central Europe. It rises in the Giant Mountains of the northern Czech Republic before traversing much of Bohemia (western half of the Czech Repu ...

. Today the Uffe has no direct route beyond Neuhof (a

sewage farm Sewage farms use sewage for irrigation and fertilizing agricultural land. The practice is common in warm, arid climates where irrigation is valuable while sources of fresh water are scarce. Suspended solids may be converted to humus by microbes an ...

intervenes) and it now begins in front of a bridge (Branderode - Klettenberg road) about 5 metres above the ''Sachsengraben''. Due to the lack of a link to the 'main' Uffe, it is usually dry there, is filled by springs and flows through the villages of Klettenberg and Holbach, by the B 243 federal road, onto the

Ichte Ichte, in its upper course also called Steinaer Bach, is a river of Thuringia and Lower Saxony, Germany. The Ichte springs east of the Oder Dam as Steinaer Bach in Lower Saxony. After the confluence of the Hellegrundbach, the river is called I ...

. Between Bad Sachsa and Neuhof, the Uffe flows immediately past the foot of the Sachsenstein, a former

coral reef A coral reef is an underwater ecosystem characterized by reef-building corals. Reefs are formed of colonies of coral polyps held together by calcium carbonate. Most coral reefs are built from stony corals, whose polyps cluster in groups. Co ...

in the

Zechstein The Zechstein (German either from ''mine stone'' or ''tough stone'') is a unit of sedimentary rock layers of Middle to Late Permian (Guadalupian to Lopingian) age located in the European Permian Basin which stretches from the east coast of Englan ...

Sea. Here, by a section of the

South Harz Railway The South Harz Railway (german: Südharzstrecke or ''Südharzbahn'') is a railway line through the German states of Lower Saxony and Thuringia. It runs from Northeim to Nordhausen, via Herzberg am Harz, Bad Lauterberg-Barbis, Bad Sachsa, Walkenr ...

, are the ruins of the {{ill, Sachsenstein Castle, de, Burg Sachsenstein.

External links

Gypsumm karst and disappearing streams
(in German) Rivers of Lower Saxony Rivers of Thuringia Nordhausen (district) Rivers of the Harz Rivers of Germany

See also

External links