It was an alien world, the remains of which lie buried beneath the foothills of the Alps today: the landscape of the Upper Freshwater Molasse, a water-rich alluvial area 17 to 5 million years before our time.

The exhibition Molassic Park – an expedition to Bavaria’s apes, prehistoric elephants and subtropical forests takes us back to a time when the Ries crater was formed 15 million years ago.

Extraordinary fossils from various sites in Bavaria bring the fauna and flora of the freshwater molasse to life in the exhibition and are brought to life in large-scale landscape reconstructions by the well-known Spanish palaeo-artist Mauricio Antón. A special highlight are the sensational finds of the great ape “Udo”, which were discovered a few years ago.

Time affects and touches us all. Its constant flow carries the relics of the past like flotsam into our present. It determines the shape of our planet and the rhythms of life. On a journey through time and space, the exhibition provides answers to a number of questions about the phenomenon of time, which also plays a central role in the RiesKraterMuseum.