Geopath Stop "The Stone That Came From Abroad"
The vertical, smooth wall on the bank of the pond catches the eye. It reveals the special technique used to extract the 380-million-year-old limestone. You didn't blast, you sawed! A "giant bicycle chain" — held by a crane — was wrapped around the entire rock face and propelled slowly by a motor (as seen in the 1964 photograph). So she ate more and more into the rock and finally cut off a smooth large disc. The 15 to 20 ton panes were then transported by truck to Stegenwaldhaus, where they were cut into 2 to 3 centimeter thin panes by 30 saws at the same time. Since 1775, the "marble" in Hof has been quarried and marketed throughout Germany under the trade names Fürstenstein, Theresienstein or Forellenstein (see photos of the tombstone made of Forellenstein at the Hof Hospitalkirche).
If the limestone here on the Eichelberg had human feelings, it would have felt uprooted in the truest sense. Because one day - he was shaken up violently again by an earthquake - it happened: he lost his footing and slid down the slope together with mud and boulders like in an avalanche - deeper and deeper until he finally landed on the bottom of the ocean hold came. He had ended up abroad forever.