Welcome to the Harz Portal, the home of Wikipedia information on the Harz, an important natural landscape and tourist destination in North Germany.
The portal gives a brief overview of the region, provides a road map for many of the articles about the Harz in English Wikipedia, and shows how you can get involved improving Wikipedia's coverage of the Harz.
The Harz is the second highest mountain range in Germany's Central Uplands after the Ore Mountains and extends across parts of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia. The name Harz derives from the Middle High German word Hardt or Hart (mountain forest). The Harz has the highest mountain in northwestern Germany, the legendary Brocken, which is 1,141 metres (3,743 ft) above sea level and was the site of a former Soviet listening post during the Cold War. The Harz also hosts the highest dam in Germany, the 106 m high Rappbode Dam. The region has a high level of snow and rainfall, and its network of lakes and dams provide drinking water to the surrounding towns and cities as well as flood protection. It is also a popular tourist destination with ski resorts such as Braunlage and Sankt Andreasberg and a major hiking trail network known as the Harzer Wandernadel. More...
The Harzer Wandernadel is a system of hiking awards in the Harz mountains in central Germany. Hikers (or mountain bikers) can earn awards at different levels of challenge by walking to the various checkpoints in the network and stamping their passbooks to record the visit. With 222 checkpoints in three federal states and across five districts in the Harz and with membership in five figures, the system has gained a following Germany-wide. (Full article...)
An indication of the natural state of the beech woods in the Harz is the return of the black stork (pictured)?
The Harz Narrow Gauge Railways, an old fashioned, steam and diesel-powered railway network is a very popular mode of transport, especially with tourists ?