Osnabrück, the third largest town in Lower Saxony, is the only German city in the middle of a nature park, the UNESCO Geopark TERRA.vita. Offshoots of the park extend right into the town which means that many of its inhabitants can live close to nature. The town’s location between the Teutoburg Forest and the Wiehen Mountains and its proximity to the many surrounding spas make it the perfect place to enjoy leisure pursuits.
To the north of the city centre is the Altstadt (Old Town) of Osnabrück with the Romanesque cathedral of St Peter, many buildings from the classicist and rococo periods, numerous half-timbered houses in the Heger Gate district, and the historic market square that has an almost mediaeval atmosphere. The late Gothic town hall, which was completed in 1512 after 25 years construction work, is situated directly on the market square. Along with the town hall in Münster, it was the site of negotiations for the Peace of Westphalia which brought the Thirty Years’ War to an end in 1648.
That’s not the only reason why Osnabrück is also called the “town of peace”. Up to the present day it has been involved in peace activities, for example the award of the Erich Maria Remarque Peace Prize. In addition since 2001 Osnabrück has been home to the headquarters of the Deutsche Stiftung Friedensforschung (German Foundation for Peace Research) founded in 2000.
The Teutoburg Forest, which extends southwards from Osnabrück, will tempt you with its hundreds of kilometres of footpaths through beautiful natural landscapes taking in many places of interest. The Externsteine near Horn-Bad Meinberg for example: originally a pagan shrine, the sandstone columns towering to heights of up to 37m are today a Christian pilgrimage site – one of the rocks is decorated with the largest stone relief of its kind in North Germany, depicting the scene of Christ’s Descent from the Cross. The Hermann Monument near Detmold, erected to commemorate the battle in the Teutoburg Forest in 9 BC, is another popular destination for excursions.
The Wiehen Mountains to the north of Osnabrück offer idyllic, pristine nature that will lift every walker’s spirits. Above all it offers real treasures to visitors interested in biological evolution: whether it be the “Dinosaur Tracks Natural Monument”, where dinosaur tracks around 150 million years old are displayed in a quarry near Bad Essen, or on the banks of the Dümmer, the second largest lake in Lower Saxony where remains of Neolithic settlements were found, and they even unearthed an entire village – the Moordorf Hüde1.
