Zauberwald
The enchanted forest in the mountaineering village of Ramsau- Open at all times
- Ramsau
At Zauberwald near Hintersee, the vision of a pristine mountain forest has become reality. Formed thousands of years ago by a dramatic rockslide, nature transformed enormous boulders into a wildly romantic landscape. The rockslide also created Hintersee. Ever since, water flowing out of the lake has carved its way through Zauberwald, cutting deep channels between the rocks.
How Zauberwald was formed
Several thousand years ago, around 15 million cubic meters of rock broke loose between Schärtenspitze and Steinberg in the Hochkalter massif and plunged more than 1,000 meters into the valley. The massive boulders piled up below, damming the Ramsauer Ache and creating Hintersee. This event shaped the striking landscape of Zauberwald, which stretches from Marxenklamm Gorge to Hintersee.
The mountainside between Schärtenspitze and Steinberg has been identified as the area where the rockslide broke away. Across a width of about 400 meters, a layer of rock 70 to 100 meters thick came loose. Around 12 to 16 million cubic meters of rock crashed into the Blaueis valley and surged up the opposite slope. Even today, boulders can be found as high as 160 meters above the valley floor. Only some of the rock remained there; most of it continued farther down the valley. It was not until the debris reached Klausbach at the mouth of the valley that it finally came to rest, leaving deposits of boulders and rock debris up to 40 meters thick on the valley floor.
In total, the rockslide material descended about 1,300 meters in elevation and traveled 3.7 kilometers. Today, the age of the rockslide is known with considerable accuracy. A piece of wood buried during the natural disaster was discovered in a borehole and dated to around 3,500 years ago, placing the event in the Bronze Age.
You can explore Zauberwald along a walking trail originally created in 1896/97 by the Verschönerungsverein Ramsau, a local village improvement association. The trail did not receive its present name until the 1920s, when the name “Zauberwald,” meaning “Enchanted Forest,” became established.
