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Photo: Joeb07, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
Believe it or not, Leipzig applied to host the 2012 Olympic Games and while the application obviously failed (with London getting the nod) a few of the visionary ideas of these days were put into practice. Among them this world cup level canoe facility.
Kanupark Markkleeberg, built in 2006, is the second of two artificial whitewater canoe/kayak slalom courses in Germany, and the only one powered by pumps. The other German course is the Eiskanal in Augsburg, used in the 1972 Summer Olympic Games in Munich. Kanupark Markkleeberg is located on the southeast shore of Markkleeberger See, a lake south of Markkleeberg, a suburb on the south side of Leipzig. A former open-pit coal mine, the lake was flooded in 1999 with groundwater and developed as a water recreation area. The lake is part of the Leipziger Neuseenland, the largest landscape construction project in Europe, which is reclaiming formerly barren industrial and mining sites for recreational use.
© OpenStreetMap contributors
An assortment of mining equipment once in use in the area has been collected into an open-air museum.