Scaling the fairytale peaks of Saxon Switzerland in Germany

The dramatic landscape was beloved of Romantic painters and hardcore climbers. But the spa town of Bad Schandau provides a gentler introduction for skinny-calfed explorers

“Look at that on the rock. Do you know what it tells us?” Kristin Arnold, my guide in south-east Germany’s Saxon Switzerland national park, points at a large mass of light green moss growing on a boulder.

“It tells us that the air quality is great here,” says Kristin. “This moss doesn’t grow if there’s any pollution around.” She inhales deeply, causing the backpack buckles strapped across her chest to creak. It’s contagious, like a yawn. The chirrupping of unseen birds and drizzle on fern mix with the sounds of our breath as we fill our lungs with premium Saxony oxygen.