Five Days in Limpach: Tuesday

For Tuesday (12 May 2026), the forecast was chilly but dry, with high winds moving busy clouds fast across the otherwise blue sky.

10C/50F isn't warm, but of course we had not only brought shorts and t-shirts for hiking but also outfits suitable for this kind of temperature.

As usual, the first picture of the day was from our patio.

Soon after breakfast, we set off directly from our door, as before. 

This time, from a booklet with local walks and hikes, we chose one that was called "Wildromantische Tobeltour". Part of that tour we'd already done in 2023, but that one was shorter (around 9 km as opposed to 13.7 km this time) and lead through some hamlets that weren't part of this year's hike. 

You can compare this tour with the 2023 one here.

The signposts started near Limpach's church and vicarage. No horses there today, and Sunday's festive decorations were all gone.

Looking back towards Limpach after descending the hill leading down from the village towards the first Tobel.

This was my favourite part - a flowering meadow, sheltered among gentle wooded hills.

Old barn at Benistobel - I took a picture of that in 2023 as well.

This is the view you'd have if you lived at Benistobel.

Benistobel consists of the large old barn (in the foreground), a few other farm buildings and three or four houses, two of which are holiday lets - ideal for families with small children.

It was very, very quiet; over the entire distance we only met a handful of people, two of them on bikes. Birdsong and our occasional conversation were the only sound, along with the wind in the trees, which was rather blustery at times.

When I come across such remote places like the lone farms dotted in the various tobels (a Tobel is a narrow valley), I always wonder what it must be like to live there all the time, with no noisy neighbours and no heavy road traffic, but also with no shops, no school where children can easily walk to, no restaurants and other amenities. 

The peace and quiet is very appealing, but the impracticality of it all would make things too inconvenient for me - you can't just pop down the road to the bakery when you have forgotten to buy bread, for instance, and how long would it take for an ambulance to arrive in case of an emergency? But I guess that those who live so remotely would go nuts in a town or city, if given the choice.

Anyway, we greatly enjoyed the hike, and returning to the flat, donned our bathrobes and crossed the lane between our building and the hotel where we relaxed in the spa until it was time to get dressed for dinner.

Five Days in Limpach: Monday

The weather forecast for the next few days was rather dismal, and indeed it had started to rain on Sunday evening, but all things considered, Monday (11 Mai 2026) wasn't quite as bad as expected.

View from our patio at about 8:00 that morning...

...and ten nminutes later: A glimpse of blue sky and sun!

One of the nice things about this particular hotel is that guests can have breakfast until 11:30 - that's much later than most other places, and although we never really wait so long before we have ours, it is nice to know that we don't have to be up and about early-ish unless we want to.

The entire day went by at a leisurely pace, partly spent in the spa with suprisingly few other people. In between two rounds in the sauna, we rested and read; it was very cosy and relaxing.

We had booked a back & shoulders massage each for mid-afternoon (all in view of the "bad weather day", since on a dry day those times would probably have interfered with the day's hike), and by the time we were finished, it had brightened up and stopped raining.

Of course we took the chance and went for a little walk around the village, just under an hour, and then changed for dinner which was again really delicious.

This is the building next to the hotel where our flat is on the ground floor; you can just about see the kitchen window in the lower right corner. The patio and garden are at the back of the house. There are other flats in the building, and the mother of the hotel owner & chef lives in one of them.

Afterwards, we looked through our "proper" wedding pictures together - the photographer had sent us the link to an online album, and we sorted through the pictures, deciding on which ones to keep, which ones to delete and which ones to send to family and friends. It is amazing how much time one can spend over something like that!

It was considerably cooler than before at about 15C/59F, and a chilly wind made it seem even cooler. But for tomorrow, no more rain was forecast, and we were looking forward to another hike.

Five Days in Limpach: Sunday

Sunday (10 May 2026) was not only Mother's Day in Germany, but also a very important day for the village of Limpach: Every year on the second Sunday in May, they celebrate St. Georg (George in English, but without the last "e" in German), their patron saint.

Every inhabitant of Limpach is automatically a member of the Georgs-Bruderschaft ("George's Brotherhood"), meaning they help and stand by each other.

Horses have always been important in the rural area, for farming as well as for transporting goods and people. No wonder, therefore, that the celebration involves riding groups from Limpach and various nearby villages and hamlets who turn up in their finery, horses polished and groomed, for a special mass held on the green space behind the church and the vicarage, followed by the priest blessing the horses.

A procession with all the horses, several brass bands, pilgrims and dignitaries walks from Limpach to Höge, a distance of about 1.5 km, and back again. This is called Georgiritt ("George's Ride"), and all participants take great pride in it. Photos can be seen on the website of St. Georg, the church in Limpach; just scroll down until after the text.

In yesterday's post I showed you the decorations on the vicarage and the "gate"; all this was done for the Georgiritt. Also, on the lawn between the hotel and the building where our flat was, tables and benches had been set up, and by the time O.K. and I got up, almost all of them were full of people having sausages, beer and other drinks.

We woke up at around 7:00 that morning when the church bells started to ring, and from that moment on, the celebration was in full swing. The noise of brass bands, church bells, whinnieing of horses and chatter of the crowds were enough to draw anyone outside. Luckily, the sun was shining, and as the morning progressed, it was warming up.

 View across "our" part of the garden.

O.K. and I only stuck around for a little bit after breakfast; we had no intention to attend mass or have sausages and beer on the lawn - we wanted to go on the longest of the hikes we had in mind for this holiday: The Höchsten-Runde.

Höchsten literally means "highest", and it is indeed the highest hill in the area. We've walked that same tour twice in 2023, as I have described here and here.

The 18 km tour is well signposted and leads up and down hills, across meadows and through woodland. We found everything more or less as we remembered, but unlike previous times when we stopped for a shandy at the beer garden on the Höchsten, we decided to just drink from our water bottles and have our shandies back at the hotel, again on our own patio - the Höchsten beer garden was packed, and staff very busy because of all the visitors for Mother's Day.

I let the pictures speak for themselves:

Click to enlarge; on this and the next two pictures, you can just about make out Lake Constance and the Alps rising behind, with snow-capped mountains.

After returning to our flat and enjoying the shandy on our quiet patio, it was time to shower and change into suitable clothes for dinner, which was again delicious. 

The weather forecast was right: In the course of the evening, the wind picked up considerably, and later the long awaited rain began to fall.

Five Days in Limpach: Arrival

Saturday (9 May 2026), the day after our wedding, was the start of a short break at a hotel in Limpach where we've spent a May holiday before; if you're interested, the first of my 2023 posts about that holiday is here.

We took our time in the morning to get everything sorted. While my suitcase had never been unpacked since my arrival at O.K.'s on the 30th of April, O.K. of course had to pack his for our time away.

The day was as sunny and warm as the Friday, and after we'd said good-bye to my new mother-in-law and loaded the car, we left the village at about 1:45 pm. 

Almost exactly 2 1/2 hours later, we arrived at the hotel in Limpach, part of Deggenhausertal, 20 km from Lake Constance. The hotel's website is here (in German only), in case you want to have a look. All their food is organic (some of it comes from their own farm, which existed long before they opened the hotel), and the hotel, restaurant and spa are run on sustainable energy and a low-waste philosophy.

We were booked for dinner at 8:00 and used the time until that for a first short walk, taking in the beautiful meadows, picturesque church and views.

This is how we found our bedroom at the hotel flat!

The flowers were ours (not my bridal bouqet, but a gift from friends).

St. Georg is just up the road.

 Click to enlarge; on the horizon, you can make out the Alps with snow-covered mountains and a glimpse of Lake Constance.

The vicarage was adorned with garlands in view of a celebration the next day.

This gate was also put up for the celebration.

Looking back towards Limpach

There was still time to spare after unpacking, so we went up to the hotel bar and grabbed an Apérol Spritz each, which we took back down to our flat on the ground floor of a different building. Our own private sunny patio outside the French windows was the perfect place for that!

 

Dinner was as delicious as we know their meals to be, but we didn't last long after that; the restaurant was rather full, and the group of six at the table next to ours was talking rather noisily (for Neil: there was at least one Meist in that group). Instead, we retreated to our nice, quiet flat, looking forward to Sunday and our first full day here.