Malerweg Day 6 - Neumann Mühle to Schmilka

When you share a Matrazzenlager in a hut with several other people, one of whom sniffles and coughs and sneezes all night long, you might feel inspired to arise very early and go for a backpack-less walk in the fresh air before breakfast, so I took Carly up the nearby Lorenzstein for a photo shoot.

The drop behind her was precipitous, but Carly didn't bat an eye

Check out the zigs and zags in the rock!

Ta da! 3.75 miles and 500 ft elevation gain before breakfast

After breakfast, it was time to wrap up this six-day hike.

Bark beetle devastation

I took a detour to climb up the Kleinstein--only about 100 feet above the trail, and well worth seeing. 

Y'all. Don't leave TP on the trails. Get a Kula Cloth.

Yep. So very worth it.

From the Kleinstein, I zipped along the trail, eager to see the sights and then get back to Dresden. Eventually I caught up with the very loud quartet of macho men who had also spent the night at the Neumann Mühle and had headed out half an hour before me. I had been intermittently hearing their voices from afar for much of the morning. The trail (here called the "Roßsteig") then headed steeply uphill, so after some polite conversation, I increased my pace and left them in the proverbial dust. 

At the top of the ascent, I made another short but worthwhile detour to enjoy views of the Goldstein.

My next destination on the trail was the Katzenstein. I looked at it from a variety of angles, but couldn't figure out where the cat was supposed to be.

Is that a paw to the left?

Wee shroom

Approaching the top of the hill, I intentionally left the Malerweg one last time. I was very close to the national border and wanted to put a foot into the Czech Republic, so I descended most of the way to Schmilka along a trail enabling that.

Almost at the top

Local maximum. Time to head down.

The border was marked with stones set about 100 m apart. I took a photo of this one in Czechia...

...and also in Deutschland...

...and also in both countries at once.

The descent continued through the Erlsgrund (hold on! Erl? Like Erlkoenig? How did it take me until right now to learn that Erlen means "alder"?).

iNaturalist thinks this nest might have been made by a European wren

When I reached Schmilka, I walked through town (so busy! so vibrant!), hopped on a ferry across the Elbe, and caught a train back to Dresden.

It's a wrap! Looking west down the Elbe.

Ta da! 10 miles, 2,333 ft elevation gain

Ta da! The whole shebang: 96.6 miles, 15,738 ft elevation gain

Familiars of the gods

I needed to run some errands in Munich last week, and took advantage of the train ride in to take a long walk from Marienplatz to Pasing, passing through the grounds of Schloss Nymphenburg en route. I was delighted to pass this statue of Mercury holding a caduceus with a worshipful chicken by his left foot. (I googled "Hippocrates chicken" before figuring out this was Mercury; I should have noticed the wings on his feet.)

Mercury is the herald of the gods, and roosters are the heralds of the morning.

A little further west in the sculpture garden stands a goddess taking a selfie, with a clingy bird-like creature at her feet. Is that what a sculptor comes up with, if they've never seen an eagle in real life? I googled "diana eagle nymphenburg," and eventually landed on Proserpina with the owl Ascalaphus. I guess I'm relieved that the bird is not supposed to be an eagle, but this is a pretty freaky owl. 

Ascalaphus tended the orchards of Hades, and was the tattle-tale who let the gods know Proserpina had eaten some pomegranate seeds during her captivity. In response, Proserpina's justifiably incensed mother Demeter buried him under a rock; after Hercules rescued him, Demeter turned Ascalaphus into an eagle-owl (Eurasia's species of horned owl, genus Bubo along with the American horned owl). 

Perhaps the sculpted owl is supposed to look human-ish, with furrowed brow and lip-like beak? I'm guessing the sphere in the owl's lion-like paw is a pomegranate. Odd bird.

Iceland Day 8: Botnsvatn take two and whale watching

Our last day in Húsavík, we went back up the hill to Botnsvatn and hiked around the lake again, this time with J and E.

The light greens are mosses; the emerald greens are lupines. Hear the lupines dehiscing here.

We heard loons before we saw them, then spent 20 minutes trying to catch them in photos.

In the afternoon, with much less wind than on our first attempt on Sunday, we went on a puffin-and-whale watching tour out of Húsavík.

Our first destination was Lundey (Lund = puffin, ey = island), where some 220,000 puffins come to nest every year. In mid-August, they collectively head out to sea for the winter.

Click on the photo and squint to see several puffins in the water

Icelandic law requires tourists to wear insulated suits for whale watching. The tour company we went with hasn't lost anyone overboard in their 25 years of operation, but still, 7-10^oC water is cold, and it was windy enough that we very much appreciated the extra layers.

From Lundey, we headed across the fjord in search of humpback whales. All of the whale watching boats cluster wherever people see whales; I don't have photos of the clusters, but did get some photos of whales.

Looking south. No whales yet, but a sailboat...

Another sailboat

Another whale watching boat and a humpback whale. The whale is longer than the boat, but mostly hidden under the water.

I learned it is hard to take photos of distant whales and puffins from a rocking boat, so that's all you get to see, dear readers.

After the tour, S and I headed up to Húsavík's geothermally heated outdoor hot pools for a quick soak. Bare bones but toasty and beautiful, especially for the brief time before a tour group descended.

Sunset from the hill where the hot tubs sit. There be whales out there...