Glacier Mill Field

Visible from afar, under free-standing linden trees, a wooden footbridge leads over a strange-looking rock formation - the Glacier Mill Field in Reit im Winkl. The rocks at the Wimmerkreuz are also known as the Glacier Garden.

Many know this place with the picnic table, the wayside cross, the grazing cows in summer, the cross-country skiers in winter, the wide view to the west to the Unterberghorn and the Kaiser mountain. But who knows the background to these gray stones?

The glacial mills at Wimmerkreuz were formed during the last ice age, the Würm ice age, about 10,000 to 12,000 years ago.

The area of today's Reit im Winkl was covered by a thick layer of glacial ice, the Achen glacier. The movement of the glaciers ground underlying rocks smooth and rounded them. "Grindstones" (rubble and gravel) and meltwater from the glaciers formed spiral-shaped cavities in the ice, the glacier mills. The grindstones also contributed to the continuation of the glacial mills in the rock (also called "barrows") lying beneath the ice.

The smoothly polished rocks and the glacier mills in the rock are still visible today and are known as the Glacier Mill Field in Reit im Winkl.

Traces of the Würm Ice Age can be found throughout the Alps. Glaciers gave the typical landscape of Upper Bavaria its present form with mountains, valleys and the flat Alpine foreland with numerous lakes.

Our tip: sit for a while on one of the benches, close your eyes, and travel back in your mind to the Ice Age!

From the Tourist Information you can reach the Glacier Mill Field (on foot or by bicyle) in a few minutes (car park Frühlingsstraße).

These tours pass the Glacier Mill Field