Küstenblick – Coastal View

Read the audio guide

Ancient rock and the view towards a former coast

The Roter Hang above, the Rhine below: Coastal View invites you to see this familiar landscape differently. Where vineyards and river shape the scene today, there are traces of very different chapters in the Earth’s history.

The rock and the sea belong to different periods

The red sedimentary rock is around 280 million years old and belongs to the Rotliegend sequence. The sea of the Mainz Basin was much younger: about 30 million years ago, a subtropical sea flooded large parts of this region. The image of a coastline belongs to that later chapter, rather than to the time when the red rock formed.

Movements in the Earth’s crust transformed the landscape over millions of years. The sinking of the Upper Rhine Graben and movements in neighbouring blocks of rock created differences in elevation. The Odenwald lies to the east, while ancient red rocks are exposed on this side. Their weathering helped form the soils in which today’s vines grow.

Explore the vineyard sites with your eyes

At the northern end of the Roter Hang, where the Rhine disappears from view, the audio guide points out a solitary tree and a cross. Follow the landscape southwards from there: Rothenberg, Pettenthal, Brudersberg and Hipping lie before you. Their different aspects and soils make the vineyard sites of the Roter Hang so interesting. Your Wine Experience has begun.

This reading version clarifies geological dates that are mixed together in the recording. For the later marine history, see the Natural History Museum Mainz ↗; for the Rotliegend, see the association’s geology article, pages 26–27 ↗ (both in German).