Heuweiler

Apologies in advance for the poor quality of the photos; I took them with my "Handy" (cell phone).

Having covered southeast Freiburg pretty well on Tuesday, I decided to explore northeast Freiburg today. As usual, I looked at my map before setting off. A path along the train tracks would take me straight out of town. Straight, as in no turns, as in really hard to mess up this time. Seemed pretty safe.

Oh my goodness, this is a gorgeous part of the world. Tree-lined city paths yielded to fertile farmland. The corn was high, the grass was green, and the storks and crows were happy. And lo, off in the distance was scenic Heuweiler, with its pretty church rising on a hill above the farmhouses. How could I resist? I was rewarded for turning east: along the road were stone markers dating from 1792, indicating the then-border between Austria and Baden.

Once in Heuweiler, it was easy to follow the rolling hills back south, with verdant forest on one side, vineyards on the other, and everything the most stunning, radiant green I've ever seen.

The trail signs started mentioning "Ruine Zaehringer Burg," with a symbol that looked like a rook from chess. Castle-like ruins? How could I resist? Instead of heading directly back into town, I followed those tempting signs, uphill and downhill, into woods and out, through farms and villages, past cows, a dalmatian, and some mighty tempting apple, pear, and plum trees (I hadn't brought any water or snacks), until, at last, I came to the top of a hill and found the tower. What remains dates from the 13th century; the rest was destroyed in a battle in 1525.

I arrived home after four hours and 13 miles, and I didn't get lost even once.

I meant to do that (or, Getting lost, take 2)

One of the problems with living in a pretty city surrounded by beautiful forest-covered mountains with endless hiking trails is that, for the navigationally impaired, the hills all tend to look the same.

Yesterday I decided to explore the neighborhoods in the southern part of Freiburg. I jogged past the Altstadt and over the Dreisam into Wiehre, then into the woods on the other side of the valley and around the diminutive Waldsee. I continued through a city park and came to what I thought was the big soccer stadium--the badenova Dreisamstadion where Freiburg tied Hamburg 1:1 on Sunday. Back into the hills I shifted from jogging to hiking and figured if I generally veered left, I'd be back home relatively quickly.

Near what was supposed to be the end of my journey, I emerged from the woods atop a hill to admire the view of the Muenster, but below me, Freiburg was nowhere to be seen. Thanks to the mapping and navigation options on my trusty Garmin Forerunner 205, I learned that my internal compass was seriously broken--apparently I had never turned left--and that to get home I needed to go 4305 miles due west (ah, that'd be Durham, NC). I eventually arrived back in Herdern with 10 miles of pavement and trails behind me, having seen places I never would have thought to visit otherwise: Kappel, from afar, and Littenweiler; Freiburg's older Möslestadion (had it been the badenova Stadion, I'm sure I wouldn't have gotten lost); and some mean-lookin' Hello-Kitty style Ninja graffiti along the Dreisam.

Getting lost

Last night, I got out my list of formal-you pronouns and phoned Herr Professor D. at his private number to talk about organ lessons. Even with the list, I panicked under the pressure of declining formal-you-accusative (Sie) and formal-you-dative (Ihnen), but deftly recovered by avoiding all sentences that required either. It was a pleasant conversation, and hopefully I will be back in the organ swing of things by the time we meet in person in September.

With little to do today between dropping Elias off and picking him up, I decided to figure out a new running route. My friend Robin has observed that running is a great way to get to know a new place. To that, I'll add, so is getting lost, which I'm quite adept at in Germany despite my Garmin GPS toy.

One of the many lovely things about our neighborhood is that you can be halfway up a small mountain and in the middle of the woods within about a fifteen minute hike. I carefully studied my city map before setting off and planned a mostly flat, 4-mile jogging loop. I hiked up to the fitness trail in the woods, and double checked the map posted there (which says, sunnily, "Exercising twice weekly makes you fit!"--an odd piece of advice for anyone with the energy to hike to the trail in the first place).

There are many more trails in the woods than are shown on the maps, and at one three-way intersection with five trail signs pointing in four different directions, I took the far left rather than the near one and zig-zagged a few miles down the other side of the hill, finally emerging near the University Sports Complex, considerably farther from home than planned. Fortunately, Freiburg is filled with helpful landmarks, including the Dreisam river, which I followed back into town. The path along the river is beautiful, with babbling brook, weeping willows, grassy playgrounds (one with a zip line!), gorgeous tall houses (think Chicago brownstones with a European flair), and fit students everywhere--all of which made getting lost on a leisurely afternoon well worth while.

Stefan has also been enjoying the easy access to mountains. Yesterday after dinner, he rode up Schauinsland--40 kilometers round trip, with an elevation difference of ~900 meters. He said there must have been fifty other cyclists on the road with him. I asked if he had passed any, and he said no, but that several had passed him. "Freiburgians are really fit," he explained--and this is from a guy who bikes to work every day and rides metric centuries a few times a month back home.