Insights into the history of the earth? No problem in the Rennerod area. The "Butterweck" near Rennerod doesn't sound like a geological research project - but it is still a unique geotope in the Westerwald Geopark. As the knowledgeable Westerwald hiker has long known, the upper Westerwald is a basalt plateau and the basalt rock is omnipresent. It is no coincidence that the high western forests have been given the nickname "basalt heads". While the columnar basalt was mined in many quarries in the Westerwald, the spherical basalts from the "Butterweck" are an absolute rarity. The name "Butterweck" is derived from the shape of the stones, which reminded the local population of this type of pastry. In terms of geological history, dear visitors, you can take a look back at this point in the Tertiary, a geological epoch that began around 67 million years ago and lasted until 1.5 million years before the Common Era. In a sub-section of the Tertiary, in the so-called Miocene (25 to 10 million BC), the roof and bed basalt deposits were formed, as well as the lignite deposits of the High Westerwald. The spherical basalt is a rare form of weathering of basalt and formed on the edge zones of lava surfaces. So what you see here is of volcanic origin. The rocks from the "Butterweck" are offshoots of a solidified lava flow. In 1978 the "Butterweck" was designated as the geographical center of the Federal Republic of Germany and made Rennerod widely known. It remained so until the reunification of Germany in 1990.
Insights into the history of the earth? No problem in the Rennerod area. The "Butterweck" near Rennerod doesn't sound like a geological research project - but it is still a unique geotope in the Westerwald Geopark.
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