Goethe Way
Goethe Way (German: Goetheweg) is the name given to a number of footpaths or trails that run through various regions in Germany and the Alps (e.g. through the Harz mountains, Thuringian Forest, Alps) as well as a railway station (Goetheweg station) on the Brocken Railway. They are all named after the German poet, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
The Goethe Way is one of the most frequented hiking trails in the Harz National Park. Around 200,000 people walk along this path every year to the highest mountain in the Harz, the Brocken. It follows the route probably taken by Goethe in climbing from Torfhaus to the Brocken on 10 December 1777. Goethe's exact route is however not known today.
Starting from Torfhaus, the Goethe Way runs along the Abbegraben stream past the Great Torfhaus Moor (Großer Torfhausmoor) heading southeast, to below the Quitschenberg mountain - and the crags of Luisenklippen before reaching the Kaiser Way (Kaiserweg). After a few hundred metres where it shares the path with the latter route, the Goethe Way branches off to the east. Following a northeastern curve over the Quitschenberg it circles the Brockenfeld Moor, the source of the rivers Abbe and Cold Bode. Shortly after the Eckersprung it crosses the border into Saxony-Anhalt. At the depot station the Goethe Way meets the Brocken Railway. Until the closure of the former border region by East Germany in 1961, the Goethe Way next ran on a straight line to the northeast over the Königsberg, past the Hirschhornklippen crags, and up to the summit of the Brocken. Today, the path runs along the "New Goethe Way" (Neuer Goetheweg) opened in 1991 running in an arc along the railway line up to the Brocken Road. Here, it crosses the natural tree line and reaches the Brocken plateau shortly after crossing the road.
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