Auwaldtour – hiking favourites in Dresden Elbland

...Today I went on a hike with my hiking friend Wandermeus near Zabeltitz near Großenhain, a "floodplain forest tour". A beautiful, impressive and scenic tour. It didn't look good with resting places, very few benches, but it was still nice. 👍😄 The weather was also fine, we walked a lot in the shade or in the forest, with a pleasant breeze 🌬️. In open areas where the sun was beating down more roundly 🌞 you could really start to sweat 🥵. Tour: Zabeltitz, Zabeltitz Baroque Garden, Raden, around the ponds of Frauenhain and Pulsen through the floodplain forest, always along the Geisslitz (Roeder Canal), Goerzig, further through the floodplain forest, over the Zabeltitz fork weir of the Geisslitz (Roeder Canal) to Zabeltitz and to Zabeltitz train station. 🤠🙋🥾🥾😅😅

A "finished" tour advertised in Komoot. It is generally highly recommended, but in summer you have to pack the family pack of Autan if you don't want to be completely sucked dry by mosquitoes at the lakes. One point is incomprehensible to me, however: the original route leads along the country road to Görzig. At first I wanted to avoid the country road and walk parallel on forest and field paths, but according to Komoot it looked as if one of the paths was a dead end. So we first walked along the country road, on which there were already a few vehicles. But the country road then made a bend and we were almost run over because two cars were overtaking us at high speed. Then we turned onto the next forest path. I should have done that straight away, it wasn't a dead end :-). So for anyone who wants to do the tour, avoid the country road and go straight into the forest. Otherwise a great tour with lots of greenery, water and scenery.

Today we hiked through the autumnal floodplain forest. It was very beautiful, but a little sun would have been nice.

At Susanne's request, we decided on a tour with little elevation gain. The scenic route is highly recommended and very unfrequented, not to mention largely deserted. Luckily, mosquito season hasn't started yet, otherwise you'd be completely wiped out by the marshy lakes. What I don't understand... The officially signposted route takes you along a country road for a long stretch, with a curve. It's a nice walk, but potentially life-threatening. But there's a very appealing alternative that then leads back to the original route. In Görzig, instead of following the signs along the country road, simply walk straight ahead towards the sports field and then along the fields. Two mysteries remain: Why was Lake Röder dry, and what are those three shark fins on the weir for? As a less pleasant souvenir, Archie brought home a meadow tick. That's really the species' name; today they're called meadow ticks.

The baroque garden is located to the west of the palace and the old palace. It is bordered to the east and north by the Grosse Röder. In the west and south, a small park wall separates the baroque garden from the Röderauwald Zabeltitz. Like the Großsedlitz baroque garden a few years earlier, it was laid out in 1728 by August Christoph von Wackerbarth, modeled on the park at Versailles Palace. Johann Christoph Knöffel, who also implemented baroque design elements from his teacher Zacharias Longuelune, was consulted for the planning and execution of the garden. The center of the complex is the palace. From the terrace, the view leads over the ground floor, the mirror and bottle pond to the open landscape. Linden avenues and hornbeam hedges form a visual accompaniment to the right and left of the mirror pond until the end of the garden. The arrangement of the pools, paths and lawns as well as the hedges and trees in the middle section reveals the strict regularity of the Baroque design. There is a sculpture between the ground floor and the mirror pond. The figures Apollo and Diana stand between the mirror and bottle pond. They were erected around 1800. To the left of the palace there are some meadows separated from the paths by hedges. They were formerly used as a playground for skittles and bowling games, but are no longer suitable for this today. Eastern of the two vases On the left of the parterre there is a triangular bosquet with a statue of Flora and two monumental vases. All three statues were erected in 1770. In the middle of it there used to be a so-called Great Salon made of wooden slats, which existed earlier but was demolished at the end of the 19th century. Group of figures “Giant Children”, still in the left bosquet at the time the picture was taken, which was historically incorrect On the right of the parterre there is a mirror-inverted bosquet of the same construction, but in which the figural group of giant children stands instead of the large salon. It was created in the workshop of Johann Gottfried Knöffler and consists of a boy and a girl three times life size, sitting on a rock and holding a cornucopia that serves as a fountain. swan house To the left of the mirror pond is the Inselteich with the Elisabethinsel and the pavilion. The island pond was created from a pond system that already existed in the 16th century and surrounded the previous building of the palace. When the park was laid out in 1730, it was given its present form, but was then divided by a causeway. In contrast to the other two ponds, it is not structurally enclosed. Around the year 1800, Xaver von Sachsen had the dam removed and the Elisabethinsel formed from the masses of earth. Even then, swans were purchased for the Inselteich, for which a little house was built on the pond. A bridge to the island was built in the second half of the 19th century. The pavilion on Elisabeth Island, built around 1795, was described by the art historian Cornelius Gurlitt as follows: "Eight strong wooden columns support the Chinese roof. Instead of the capitals, palm leaves made of sheet iron and coconuts between them. The roof with strongly curved and pointed sheet metal covering carries a vase in the middle. Inside, the ceilings are painted with Chinese figures, dragons, birds, and flying fish on a white background. In the center four dragons joined by their tails, arranged in a rosette fashion.” It was destroyed by a fallen tree in the 1950s and replaced ten years later by a replacement structure that falls far short of Gurlitt's description. On the left behind the island pond there are fish farms that are still in use today. They come from a ditch that surrounded the complex before 1728. Behind is a boulingrin that used to be used for games. To the left of the bottle pond is the wilderness. It is intended to resemble a forest and was built in the style of English garden art, just like today's island pond with Elisabeth Island and the former pavilion. To the right of the mirror and bottle pond is a small stage for village festivals and behind it the Great Röder. It feeds all three ponds and the fish farms to the left of the island pond.[8][18][19] Numerous information signs in the baroque garden provide information about the history and the builders of the Zabeltitz palace and park. In the recent past, work in the baroque garden has focused on the reconstruction of various parts of the garden. Carp farming is practiced in the ponds today. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zabeltitz#Barockgarten

Magnificent avenues, hedgerows, pleasure groves: the Zabeltitz Baroque Garden near Meißen invites you to take a relaxed stroll. Artistic sandstone figures set accents. The splendor of the park is reflected in large bodies of water. Court architect Johann Christoph Knöffel designed the strictly symmetrical Baroque garden in 1728 on behalf of the Imperial Count August Christoph von Wackerbarth. The palace, built on the site of the former moated castle, forms a charming ensemble of Baroque and Renaissance architecture with the "Old Castle". Today, festive events are held in the magnificent castle hall. In the Baroque palace, couples can get married at the registry office and then celebrate. Numerous rooms and a café are available for cultural events and conferences. https://www.schloesserland-sachsen.de/de/schloesser-burgen-gaerten/barockgarten-zabeltitz/ The Röderauwald Zabeltitz nature reserve is located in the Saxon town of Großenhain on the northern border of the Meißen district. The 283.0 ha area with the NSG number D 103, which belongs to the Großenhainer Pflege natural area, extends west of Zabeltitz, a district of Großenhain, along the Große Röder and the Kleine Röder. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%B6derauwald_Zabeltitz