In addition, the exhibition documents the various geological eras using rocks, minerals, and a natural history cabinet with numerous items on loan from private collections.
Germany's first reef museum is located on 150 m² on the first floor of the historic railway station building. With the support of scientists from all over Germany, geologist Dr. Hans-Joachim Gregor from Olching near Munich has traced the origins of the Gerstetter Alb, which took place when the climate here was still tropical. A wide variety of marine animals populated the warm waters with their rich reef landscape, comparable to the underwater world of the Indian Ocean, the Red Sea, or Australia's famous Great Barrier Reef.
Since July 2004, the Reef Museum at Gerstetten train station has also been the official GeoPark information center for the European Geopark Swabian Alb, providing comprehensive information about the geological history of this unique landscape.
The “UrMeerPfad” (Primeval Sea Trail), a 14 km long themed trail on geology, takes hikers and cyclists from Gerstetten railway station (start) to the Heldenfinger Kliff, the coastal cliff of the primeval sea, and provides information on the history and geological history of the Alb plateau around Gerstetten.
