Brocken

The summit is marked by a rock - the Brockenstein - with a plate stating "Brocken 1142 m" (1 m more than the real altitude). You usually have to stand in line for a little while to take a photo next to it. The Brockenstein is the middle point of a big, open area like a roundabout named the Gipfelrondell or Brockenuhr (Brocken clock) with 30 bronze plates embedded in the ground showing directions and distances to different viewpoints. It depends on the weather conditions if you will see the destinations - the furthest such one is Kahle Asten in the Rothaargebirge in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, 163 km to the southwest. The plates also show some destinations that are too far away to see like Rome.

Due to the exposed location of Brocken, the treeless subalpine zone begins already at 1100 m. For instance in the Alps similar conditions can be found above approximately 1800-2000 m ASL. These conditions makes it possible to have a garden with Alpine plants, presenting plants growing at high altitudes from all over the world. The garden was established already in 1890 by professor Albert Peter from Göttingen, and today it's maintained by the park authorities together with the universities of Halle and Göttingen. The park is visited by guided tours only. Year-round there's a daily tour of the Gipfelrundweg summit path (1.6 km or 1 mile and the route isn't equipped with ramps for the mobility impaired) starting from the Brockenhaus at 12:30 every day which also includes the garden. From mid-May to mid-October there are also tours of just the garden on weekdays at 11:30 and 14:00, starting at the weather station.

The Brockenhaus is the visitor centre housed in a building that once was a signal interception station of the East German intelligence agency Stasi. There's a viewing platform on the roof, and many different exhibitions in the building related to Brocken's history, nature and geology.

The first building at the Brocken, the "little cloud house" is a rest hut built in 1736 and still standing. It's not used as a rest hut (instead head to the adjacent hotel) but more of a monument and dwarfed by the modern buildings around it.

The 53 m high old television broadcast tower nowadays houses the hotel. It has a glass viewing platform reachable by elevator. The semi-globe on the top houses a radar station of the German air traffic control authority.

The steel tower is a 123 m high broadcasting tower built by the GDR.

The weather station tower was built in 1895. If you'd like to learn more about the station and weather observation, contact the German weather service beforehand and they'll be happy to give you a tour of the station.

These are two smaller granite cliffs at the southern side of Brocken. According to legend, at Walpurgis night (30 April) witches will gather there and the devil will preach to them. The cliffs are in the protected area so they can't be climbed but there are good views of them from the Gipfelrundweg.