Bromberg

The Bromberg rises near Altdorf in the Böblingen district as the highest point of the Schönbuch, a forested hill region of the Keuper uplands in Baden-Württemberg. Its wooded ridge stretches about four kilometres from north-west to south-east within the Schönbuch Nature Park. The southern slope drops steeply down to the Goldersbach valley, while from the north the mountain appears much less prominent. The summit plateau is capped by Rhätsandstein, a hard sandstone layer typical of the western Schönbuch. South-facing slopes expose the full Keuper sequence down to the Schilfsandstein, while the north side shows the Bromberg fault where older Keuper layers have slipped down to reveal younger Black Jura rocks. These fertile soils were cleared early and now form the Schönbuch clearing with villages such as Altdorf and Holzgerlingen. Visitors walk the forest tracks that lead to the summit where only the remains of the medieval hermitage chapel and its spring can be seen. A memorial stone marks the damage done by the 1990 hurricane Wiebke and the bark-beetle outbreak that followed. Nearby the small Birkensee, a rare transition bog, lies beside the Schaichhof Allee path. The Altbuchenhain Kapellenberg nature reserve holds ancient beech woods and the restored hermitage ruins, while the Diebsteig protected forest on the southern flank preserves an old wood-pasture of oak and hornbeam.