Schmale Heide

The Schmale Heide (literally "Narrow Heath") is a 9.5-kilometre-long and roughly 2-kilometre-wide bar between the Baltic seaside resort of Binz and the village of Neu Mukran near Sassnitz on the German island of Rügen.

The shape of the heavily segmented coastline of Rügen was the result of interplay between variations in the mean sea level and rebound processes following the last ice age, the Weichselian glaciation.

It is believed that the region of the present-day West Pomeranian Baltic Sea coast after the last ice age glacial advance (the North Rügen-East Usedom Step) has remained ice-free and largely part of the mainland for about 13,000 years.

During intermediate phases the currents and waves deposited material – in thicker layers than today – made of flint nodules (paramoudra) which were washed from the chalk cliff of the Jasmund Peninsula.

The landscape of the Schmale Heide - in contrast to the Schaabe - has been strongly affected since the 1930s by the construction of the Nazi "Strength Through Joy" resort of Prora and subsequent decades of military use with its associated infrastructure.