Althörnitz is a small settlement in the Zittau Mountains, best known for its 17th-century baroque palace, now an elegant hotel surrounded by a historic landscape park. It's a place where the history of alchemy, Meissen porcelain and Saxon nobility blends with the gentle landscape along the German-Czech border.

The area charms visitors with its calm, rolling terrain typical of the Zittau Mountains foothills. The palace park, designed by Eduard Petzold, a student of the famous Pückler, changes character with every season: in spring and summer the old trees offer cool shade, in autumn their colours reflect in the ponds, and in winter the whole place takes on a quiet, fairy-tale atmosphere. It makes a pleasant base for hiking trips into the Zittau Mountains.

How to get there

• Bertsdorf-Hörnitz — reachable by local road, easy 10-15 minute walk to the palace
• Zittau — about 20 minutes by car, a good base for further hikes in the Zittau Mountains

Practical information

• Althörnitz Palace has operated as a hotel since 1996
• The historic palace park is open to visitors
• Two octagonal towers flank the palace entrance, one added in 1853

Legend has it that in the cellar of the older tower, the builder's son conducted alchemical experiments together with Ehrenfried von Tschirnhaus, which ended in a laboratory fire and the frightened villagers driving the mysterious scholar away.