Grunewald

The area of Grunewald forest (32 sq.km/12.5 sq. mi) lies east of the Havel between Heerstrasse and the Wannsee in the Wilmersdorf and Zehlendorf districts of Berlin. The name is derived from a hunting lodge built here in 1542 by Elector Joachim II and named "Zum grünen Wald" (Greenwood). The name of Grunewald came into use only in the 19th C. The earlier name was Spandau Forest (Spandauer Forst). The natural mixed forest of oak and beech has increasingly given way over the last 200 years or so to quick-growing species such as pine and birch, acacia and poplar. In recent years, however, planting has been designed to restore the original pattern. During the severe winters after the last war and during the Soviet blockade (1948/49) 70 per cent of the trees were felled by freezing Berliners, who had no other form of fuel for heating. Since then the woods have been completely replanted, and now house a wide range of birds and other wildlife, including fallow deer, roe deer, wild pigs (in the Saubucht) and moufflon. The Grunewald is traversed by an Ice Age melt-water channel with areas of moor and fen and three little lakes, the Pechsee, Barssee and Teufelssee. The total area of the nature reserves, containing rare species of plants and animals, is 111 hectares/274 acres. The Grunewald, originally a royal hunting reserve, was opened to the public only at the end of the 19th C. In 1915 it was acquired by the city. Numerous lakes in the eastern part (Hundekehlesee, Grunewaldsee, Schlachtensee, Krumme Lanke) and 9km/5.5mi of riverbank along the Havel in the west offer facilities for bathing. Other popular features are the Teufelsberg, the Grunewald Tower, the Schildhorn and Grunewald Hunting Lodge. Between Nikolassee and Grunewald runs the Avus, Germany's first motor-racing circuit, opened in 1921.