Bacher Lay


The Bacher Lay is a nature reserve in Germany, which covers an area of 44.7 hectares in the county of Westerwaldkreis in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. It is a geotope of the Westerwald-Lahn-Taunus Geopark

Location

The Bacher Lay is a disused basalt quarry, which is situated between Bad Marienberg and Nisterau on the Black Nister, a tributary of the Great Nister. Its name is derived from the formerly independent hamlet of Bach, now part of the municipality of Nisterau; "lay" in this instance means 'quarry'. The area lies within parts of the parishes of Bad Marienberg, Bach, Eichenstruth and Stockhausen-Illfurth.
The Bacher Lay is characterised by a mighty, almost vertical, basalt rock face, which was produced as a result of basalt quarrying. The nearby "Pfaffenmal", an 18-metre-high columnar basalt cone which looks like a charcoal burner's pile, is also worth seeing.
From the town centre of Bad Marienberg to the Bacher Lay it is about 4 kilometres on foot.

Nature reserve

The Bezirksregierung Koblenz passed a legal ordinance on 28 October 1996, in which the conservation aim is described as follows:

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