Freiburg and vicinity photo dump

Elias joined us in Freiburg eight days ago, and tomorrow he and I start an 8-day hike to the Bodensee. We'll be following the historic Querweg most of the way. Created in 1935, the route is typically hiked in seven or eight days, from Freiburg to Konstanz. We're adjusting the route at the end by taking a ferry from Wallhausen to Ueberlingen, where Stefan will pick us up. By dropping Konstanz and crossing the lake, we'll save him about an hour of driving.

Unlike the weather forecasts in Bayern 3.5 weeks ago, the forecast for this week in Baden Wuerttemberg is looking sunny--and quite warm. I'll be trading out my long-sleeved shirts and jackets for sleeveless Ts and a lot of sunscreen.

E and I took several beautiful hikes this past week, most of which were longer than most of our Querweg days, so we're feeling decently prepared. 

These included a hike to Staufen...

We saw mounds and mounds of dandelion floof en route to Staufen

Measuring the dandelions...

Komoot told us to go 20 meters past the bridge, cross the creek, then backtrack
20 meters on the other side to meet the point where the bridge crosses the creek.

But why...?

Alchemist Dr. Faust perished when he blew up his hotel room in Staufen.

Burgruine

...and a hike over the Rosskopf to Sankt Peter...

I climbed the first flight of stairs for proof of
concept; Elias climbed all the way to the top.

Green energy atop Rosskopf

E says in the U.S., these would be Little Free Libraries...

...and a relatively short but strenuous hike up the local mountain, Schauinsland.

Beware: tree branches can fall in the woods.

When there's a good view down, E does this thing...

...where he tosses rocks in the air and takes photos of them.

The trail was pretty steep in places. We ascended 0.7 miles over ~9.5 miles.

I climbed halfway up this lookout tower, which was
possible due to a complex loophole in the Rules of Acrophobia. 

View from the restaurant at the top.
Germany often has restaurants at the tops of places. 

Stefan took the Seilbahn up.

We took the Seilbahn down together. There are detailed rules
about cable travel too in my unwritten Rules of Acrophobia.

One other hiking highlight of the week: fabulous tree sculptures by Thomas Rees on the Skulpturenpfad WaldMenschen between Freiburg and Guenterstal.

Minimalist hiking

We were in Freiburg for two reasons: first, so I could give some writing workshops at the university, and second, so Elias could reconnect with friends. Elias had a swimming date set up for Tuesday afternoon, and my workshops began Wednesday morning, so we seized last Tuesday morning as an opportunity for what became our only long hike: 20km from our little Ferienwohnung, up to the windmills atop Roßkopf, through the woods, and down to St. Peter.

I became a minimalist shoe convert last year, after reading Born to Run, and even though I schlepped my hiking boots across the ocean with me, I thought, "the trails around here are so easy, so well-maintained, so flat, and so barely rocky: I shall prove that my feet prefer Stems to Stiefel."

Our apartment was about 50m from a trail head--one of the joys of staying in the Herdern neighborhood. Getting to the top of Roßkopf was mainly a matter of going up the hill and aiming in more-or-less the right direction, since for any hiking destination around here, there are usually ten different more-or-less parallel trails to choose from. Our choice shortly led us to this sign; can you believe we went left?

An hour or so later, we reached the top of Roßkopf and paused for lunch under one of the windmills.

Another few hours past scenic vistas and through the woods...

...and we arrived in St. Peter, where I had zero time to acquire any photographic proof because we had to run the last bit in order to catch the bus back to Freiburg for Elias's swimming date.

The result of the Stems experiment: ouch ouch ouch. Two days later, however, my feet had completely recovered, which suggests the first long hike of the year in Stems on well-kempt, soft, slightly rocky German trails is much like the first bicycle ride after a year of not riding: once the relevant tender parts are broken in, you're good for the long haul.

Schumann Wahlfahrt

You'd think that because 2010 is the 200th anniversary of Robert Schumann's birth, every organ concert this year from here to Berlin would feature at least one of the composer's intriguingly unidiomatic organ works, in the same way organists celebrated Felix Mendelssohn's 200th Jubelaeumsjahr last year. Of course, Mendelssohn wrote a lot more music for the organ than Schumann did, and his holds together better, and it isn't so stormily melodramatic or--how should I say it--puppy-doggishly confident. But with such a small opus, it would seem easy enough to play all of Schumann's organ works, from the brilliant cream-of-the-crop to the so-so ones--and be done with them, just for the record.

Alas, this is not to be. The baroque church in St. Peter is offering a series of six summer organ concerts, and would you believe this past Sunday's was the only one to program anything by Schumann? Knowing this in advance, of course we had to go.

We didn't have access to a car, so first we walked 1.5 miles to the Hauptbahnhof, took a train to Kirchzarten, caught a bus to Stegen, misunderstood the driver and got off one stop too late, near Eschbach, guessed we might find a trail behind a recently-mowed hay field, and ended up at a creek. Since Stefan was the only one of us wearing waterproofed shoes, he gallantly carried me and Elias to the far bank. There we followed a path covered with a lifetime supply of sheep poop until it disappeared in a field. We waved to the sheep across the fence, then switchbacked through the waist-high grasses and flowers until we found a logging road that went directly up the Berg.

The logging road eventually ended at a huge pile of sawed up pine trees--uncharacteristically untidy for Germany--so we descended a bit and took an alternate route: a muddy wildflower- and weed-covered road that ended at a fence in a field of stinging nettles and raspberry brambles. After squeezing through a gap in the fence, we comforted an understandably distraught, scratched-up, stinging-nettle-zapped Elias, decided we'd have better luck bushwhacking through pine branches, and retraced our steps. Trail-less, we continued upward around branches, over sticks and moss-covered rocks, through thinning brambles and nettles, until at last we reached a graded gravel road. There, Elias and I traded right socks, as his was threatening to give him a blister, and we briefly admired that my size 10 foot fits into the sock of a nine-year-old boy.

When the gravel road met up with a mostly paved one, Elias offered a sacrificial gelatin-free gummi bear to a patch of stinging nettles, and it was relatively easy going after that. We followed the ridge for a few more miles, eventually encountering fourteen stations-of-the-cross markers that led us down to St. Peter.

Looking at the photographs above, taken from the ridge, you're probably thinking the hike was pretty easy. I didn't take any pictures of the miserable bits with the evil expanse of stinging nettles. The photo to the left, taken at a small open spot with a wee tilting chapel surrounded by the sourest blackberries in the world, hardly does justice to the incline.

We arrived in St. Peter about 20 minutes before the concert, and stopped off at a little cafe across from the church for the quickest and tastiest Kuchen inhalation ever. Then into the church we went for some Buxtehude, Couperin, and--bestill my beating heart--Schumann.

Johannes Götz played Schumann's B-A-C-H fugues numbers 5 and 2 and the canon in A-flat, and I learned that I am not the only organist baffled by certain aspects of these pieces. It's no wonder Clara Schumann was able to build an entire career out of being the only person who could properly interpret her husband's musical genius. I'm certain that despite their bizarreness, these pieces can be played convincingly, and I'm giving myself the rest of 2010 to figure out how to play the B-A-C-H fugues in a way that, short of leaving me satisfied, at least doesn't make me irritated.

As an encore, Götz played a transcription of Schumann's Lied, "Im wunderschönen Monat Mai," which ends inconclusively on the dominant of the submediant. In nontechnical terms, that means that most of the audience sat in stunned silence waiting for the piece to end, not realizing it already had.

After the concert, we headed to our favorite Italian restaurant and ate gnocchi on the balcony, watching storm clouds roll in over distant Freiburg. Then: a bus to Denzlingen, a train to Herdern, and a rainy walk to Urbanstrasse, and we were home. All in all, quite a fine day.

Topziele

Today we successfully checked off two more items on the Oh-Shoot-We-Still-Need-to list by visiting two TOPZIELE (must-see activities) listed in our Schwarzwald-Sueden magazine. In the morning, we revisited the beautiful Baroque Kloster in St. Peter and took a guided tour of the Festsaal, the library, and the church. The knowledgeable guide, eyes a-twinkle, waxed fondly about the history of the monastery-turned-seminary, explaining how religion, geography, local politics, and Enlightenment progressivism intertwined with the paintings, architecture, and sculptures throughout the buildings.

Then it was on to the Vogtsbauernhofmuseum in Gutach im Kinzigtal. The museum is closed for the winter, but this weekend hosted a Weihnachtsmarkt. My main purpose in going was to see authentic Schwarzwald Bollenhuette, which Stefan insists translates as "round lumps hats," but which might be described more elegantly as "pom-pom hats" or "ball hats." We have only seen real Bollenhuette in action once, from afar, at the closing awards ceremony at the senior world roller figure skating championships. But we've seen photographs of them, most often on milk cartons, butter wrappers, and yogurt containers, upon which the Bollenhut logo proclaims "this quality product came from the Black Forest."

Bollenhuette are part of the traditional Tracht in Gutach. They feature a straw hat laden with wool pom-poms. Unmarried women wear red pom-poms; once a woman is hitched, she wears black pom-poms. The feminist semioticist in me has a lot to say about bright red blooms and deflowerings, but is restraining herself at the moment as this is a family blog.

We did not see anyone wearing a Bollenhut this afternoon, but we had a fine time nonetheless. Stefan helped Elias and Zoe basteln (make handicrafts) in a hands-on workshop, where the toys they built had little to do with traditional Black Forest crafts, but where the activity itself (basteln) was about as German as you can get. There is nothing more fun or wholesome for German kids--with the possible exception of soccer--than basteln. Stefan still has an impressive scar on his hand to proudly show for his own happy childhood basteln experiences.

We also enjoyed some Gluehwein inside an old farmhouse at the Vogtsbauernmuseum. Every available seat was occupied by friendly folk having a cheery time in the cozy, low-ceilinged, fireplace-smoke filled room. When newcomers locate an empty spot, they ask the people already sitting at the table "ist hier noch frei?" ("is this spot still free?"), and then squash in next to them to share in the general conviviality. Like basteln, this is a thoroughly German experience.

In the evening, we went to Elias's third grade class Christmas party. To the parents' delight, the children sang the Christmas carols they've been learning at school. According to the party line, everybody enjoys spending school time learning these songs because everybody is Christian--except for the minority Muslims, Jews, and atheists, of course, whom the system has yet to figure out a way to acknowledge.

Freiburg to St. Peter

As a community, St. Peter came into existence with the founding of a monastery in the late 11th century. The present baroque church dates from the 1720s. While the exterior of the church is rather reserved, the recently renovated interior is bright, airy, and ornate--the best of the baroque.

Because my husband is kind and generous, and because he's finally back after a two-week stint in California, I was able to hike from Freiburg to St. Peter today. I didn't intend to do that when I set out for a walk early this morning. Had I planned on it, I would have taken the topo map that includes St. Peter, rather than the one that includes the Rhine valley; I would have headed to St. Peter directly from Herdern, rather than first walking a few miles north to Zaehringen; and I would have brought some water along. But thanks to my handy GPS device, my cell phone, and Stefan's willingness to meet Elias after school and then come pick me up, a spontaneous idea became a reality. And so this morning I ended up tromping along the Kandelhöhenweg, a trail that follows mountain ridges and connects Freiburg to St. Peter.

The early part of my hike was on the path beside the train tracks from Herdern to Zaehringen; this was because I initially meant to revisit Heuweiler. But at a T-intersection, a road veering east beckoned, and I headed through Wildtal instead. This turned out to be quite worthwhile, because otherwise I never would have gotten to see the American Saloon and Buffalo Ranch located in the figurative middle of nowhere deeper in the valley.

Where the paved road ended, the forest trails began, and I headed to the top of the nearest ridge, the Wildtalereck, and then on to the next highest point, the Hasenkopf (608m).

I had phoned Stefan from Wildtal to make sure that if I ended up on the wrong side of a ridge or broke a leg or something, he could be home in time to meet Elias after school. I was passing a sign that mentioned St. Peter and half seriously/half jokingly suggested we meet there for lunch; but Stefan said he needed to work. Oh well. Then, past the Hasenkopf, as the first Kandelhöhenweg sign appeared on the trail, Stefan called back and suggested we meet in St. Peter after all.

But St. Peter wasn't on my map, and I hadn't been following any signs toward St. Peter since Wildtal. Stefan googled "Kandelhöhenweg," looked up my GPS coordinates in Google Earth, and got me headed in the right direction. After that, I was able to follow trail signs the rest of the way.

A fascinating feature about trail signs in the Black Forest is that the distances they indicate have very little to do with the distances you actually traverse. For example, a sign might say that St. Peter is 8km away. A mile later, the next sign will tell you St. Peter is still 8km away. Half a kilometer further on, your destination might have drifted an additional kilometer away or leapt a few kilometers closer. It is encouraging to find a sign that tells you St. Peter is a mere 2.4km away, but somewhat disheartening, after you emerge from the woods and walk an additional twenty minutes down the road, to encounter a sign that tells you that you are no closer--or that St. Peter would be equally close if you went back the way you just came.

As I approached St. Peter, the forest gave way to verdant meadows dotted with horses, cows, and sheep. At last, the two towers of St. Peter's baroque church poked out over a hill, and the town gradually came into view down below.

It was a lovely day for a hike. All morning, the weather alternated between rain and commendable efforts at sunshine, and the trail varied beautifully, ranging through grass covered meadows, along rocky leaf-strewn ridges, through evergreen and deciduous forests, and along muddy logging roads, with occasional vistas of the valleys down below.

I waited for Stefan near the Kloster square. He drove up, looking debonair in his spiffy biking duds and with his road bike in the back seat of the car. After lunch, I drove home and he went for a 62km ride through the Schwarzwald. There's a lot to be said for being on sabbatical.