The holiday region Bolzano and environs is full of secrets, legends and curiosities: The cairns are one example. In Val Sarentino on Hohe Reisch, a 2000 m high mountaintop, there are over 100 random stone cairns, some small, others as tall as people. They stand there like soldiers and greet the hikers.

But how did the cairns get there?
Were the cairns once used as signposts? Did herders build them here to while away the time? Do they point to meetings of witches or to some Celtic cult? Rock carvings and flint stone equipment do indeed point to the Stone Age and to the Middle Ages.

Witches cult
A court document from 1540 confirms this origin, and that some 500 years ago the site was a place of witches dances and satanic ceremonies. Ancient engravings even point to this viewpoint having been a Celtic worship site many centuries ago.