The Stöberhai (720 m above sea level) is the highest mountain in the southern Harz and is located between Wieda and the Oder dam.
In 1872, the first single-storey inn was built on the hilltop, for which seven acres of forest were cleared. The first landlord was Karl Mast from the family of the later Jägermeister dynasty.
After fire damage, the “Berghotel Stöberhai” was built in 1889 with a lookout tower as the highest hotel in the Harz after the Brocken. The observation tower, whose platform had room for 60 people, offered a panoramic view of all parts of the Harz as far as the Kyffhäuser and Thuringian Forest. In 1922, the hotelier introduced the celebration of Walpurgis Night on the Stöberhai, following the example of the Brocken.
After the war, the hotel came under economic pressure as the previously numerous guests from Saxony, Thuringia and Berlin stayed away.
In the fall of 1951, an inter-zone bus operator from Berlin acquired the hotel, had it renovated and created a small zoo with native animals on the property. The purchaser set up a regular shuttle bus service from Berlin to the Stöberhai with accommodation and meals in the mountain hotel. When the narrow-gauge railroad Walkenried-Braunlage/Tanne was built in 1899, the hotel owner arranged for the Südharz-Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft (SHE) to set up a stop at Stöberhai station in the middle of the forest to facilitate excursions to the hotel. At his insistence, the railroad company also opened a small station building there for excursion guests in October 1900. Although the railroad station in the Weinglastal valley was only around 1.3 km away from the hotel at the time, there was still a difference in altitude of around 260 m between it and the hotel.
After several changes of ownership, the hotel ceased to be run in 1975 and fell victim to a major fire in 1980.
In 1967, the Bundeswehr erected a 75 m high reconnaissance tower on the Stöberhai, which contained sixteen floors and 750 m² of antenna masts, detection stations, operating rooms, offices, accommodation and a mess hall.
The radio interception station was used to listen in on military radio traffic in the GDR during the Cold War. Its facilities are the counterpart to the station on the Brocken operated by the Ministry of State Security of the GDR and the Soviet Union.
It was not until 2005, fifteen years after German reunification, that the tower was brought down by controlled demolition. This was preceded by a long dispute over the cost of removing the listening post.
The Stöberhai can be reached from Wieda, Bad Lauterberg, Bad Sachsa and the Odertalsperre dam via signposted hiking trails. A good starting point is the managed former Stöberhai railroad station, which can be reached via the road between Wieda and Braunlage.
