Most of the weekends that we spend at my place, I try to avoid us using O.K.'s car, as he already drives 300 km altogether to get here and back. But I longed for a nice walk/hike, and between two suggestions relatively close to home, we chose one that would take us through the Stromberg, an area of woodland and hills about half an hour's drive from Ludwigsburg.
With vineyards, woods and fields, the area looks similar to O.K.'s, but this is not the Black Forest, and the hills in the distance are not France - we are too far East to see our neighbouring country from here.
A "geological window" with information boards tells the visitor about the various layers of rock this area is formed of. It is not a former quarry but a landslide that happened naturally, a long time ago:
This small structure is called "Altertum". It was built of natural field stones, deliberately made to look rustic, in the early 1800s when the then King of Württemberg came to this area in the summer for hunting. He would sit inside this shelter, gun ready, while his servants would chase deer and other game in his direction - all he had to do was shoot. What a great sport hunting is, especially when it is done that way... :-(
Can you spot the church on the hill? This is Michaelsberg (Michael's Mount), the main attraction of the tour from the book:
A little closer:
Steep steps leading up to it - I had to catch my breath at the top before we could walk the rest of the way to the church:
Views from Michaelsberg across the town of Cleebronn and the area called Zabergäu:
St. Michael's:
There were peregrine falcons in the tower window to the left; I couldn't get a decent picture of them, but we observed them for a while.
Back home, the view from my kitchen window (note the branches of the cherry tree!) was rather spectacular with the evening light against the grey backdrop:
The description in the book was a little unclear at times, and the signposts not always where we would have needed them. After two wrong turns - eventually ending up on the originally intended path - we clocked up 22 km instead of the 15 described in the book! Not that the extra kilometers mattered; we always roughly knew where we were and how to get back to the car, but it certainly was more adventurous than expected :-)
Such similar scenery to here - such different architecture. Fascinating.
ReplyDeleteNo drystone walls here, though, and no vineyards in Yorkshire (as far as I know). But the gently rolling hills are similar, that's true.
DeleteDespite how much I love a good vista, those stairs up to the church would have defeated me. Good that you are intrepid (and about 20 years younger than moi). :)
ReplyDeleteWhile we were there, several other walkers, some of them quite a bit older than us, tackled those stairs - they had my respect! I suppose as long as you take your time and stop to catch your breath every now and then, it is doable. The alternative is a much longer path winding up the hill.
DeleteWhat a dramatic sky in that last photo! This Altertum rings a faint bell....Poor King. He must have needed the meat. He could not have been doing it for the pleasures of the chase. That was a lovely present your sister gave to O.K.
ReplyDeletePoor King indeed! He had to feed a large household of servants plus all those guests (and their servants!) staying with him over the summer.
DeleteYes, the book is a lovely present, and I have already chosen our next tour from it :-)
The vast open relatively flat vistas are just so different to anything I ever see here that they really make me stare at them for a long time. I liked the vista from the church with its one solitary poppy. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteIt is unusual to have just one solitary poppy, usually they come in patches. The view there is towards the small town/village of Haslach, which looks picturesque enough to make for a pleasant stroll. The problem with Sunday trips is that we always have to keep in mind that one of us has to get back home the same evening, cutting short the time we can spend on detours.
DeleteThose stairs!! Well done! You two are in great shape with all of this wonderful hiking. Such a pleasure to see the beauty that you explore! Thanks!
ReplyDeleteThank you, Ellen - I wish I WAS in great shape and not puffing and panting away at every uphill bit!
DeleteI certainly would not be able to walk up those steep steps. When the elevator in our building is out of order it's a problem for me...we are on the fourth floor so it's a lot for me, I have to go up one ramp of stairs at a time, sit down on the stairs after each ramp, imagine how long it takes me to get home. 20 good minutes. I would not have spotted the church, but luckily you took a "close-up" picture. Beautiful scenere, so nice to go for a walk. The only walk I took today was to the supermarket, 3 minutes walk from our house. I am so eager to go take a walk near the beach, but we need to take the bus and I am still afraid to take them, even though I have seen them running quite empty. We're all wearing masks and gloves still, and staying at a distance of at least a meter from each other.
ReplyDeletePoor you, all those steps just to get back to your flat. I hope the elevator in your building is not out of order too often, and that you can go to the beach for a walk soon. Gloves have become a rare sight here, after everyone seemed to be using them at the start of the pandemic. Now there are dispensers of hand sanitizer at the entrance of many shops and places such as hairdressers.
DeleteSuch interesting pictures! I like the patchwork fields in the first two pictures and the Altertum is a piece of history. The skies are amazing in all the photos especially from your window. I had to go back and look for the solitary poppy that Graham mentioned and I found it. There is something special about a single flower in a vast space.
ReplyDeleteI agree, Bonnie, and like I said in my reply to Graham's comment, it is unusual to see a solitary poppy when they usually grow in patches. I wonder how that single one ended up there!
DeleteBeautiful views! I hope there is a driveway up to that church as well, or else the congregation visiting it regularly must be a hardy lot!
ReplyDeleteThere is a driveway, Monica; next door is a community centre / guest house / youth hostel (closed at the moment), and a kiosk/restaurant thing, so normally it would be a really busy place on a sunny day.
DeleteYou have captured big wide-open skies, I feel I can gulp in all that fresh air.
ReplyDeleteCleebronn sounds half-English, maybe a town in the Yorkshire dales, but Zabergau is so German, like somewhere in a John Le Carre novel.
I can imagine the peregrine falcons in St. Michael's. Look for a classic book, The Peregrine by J.A. Baker. Hetty Saunders published a biography of the reclusive Baker, This House of Sky.
John Haggerty
The air was extra fresh that day because it had been raining for most of the day before, very welcome after a very dry spring in this area.
DeleteThank you for the book recommendations. If only my to-be-read pile was not already so high, and my eyes better suited for long reading.
Books unread? *The end of all our exploring is to arrive at the place where we started and know it for the first time.*
DeleteTwo biographies of J.S. Bach, *Evening in the Palace of Reason* and *Music in the Castle of Heaven*, have been waiting patiently on my book table like lions asleep. In the latest copy of The New Yorker I read a review by James Wood of a book titled, *Dostoyevsky Reads Hegel in Siberia and Bursts Into Tears*. The long review was as good as reading it.
Dry eyes are a problem for me too, but it's television that makes them feel gritty, not reading. My optician said to avoid a certain brand of (dry) eye drops which causes many people trouble. Fresh air and unbroken sleep are the thing.
Keep well!
John Haggerty
Thank you, John; if it only were dry eyes, I wouldn't have reason to complain. I am extremely short-sighted and on top of that had an operation on my left eye two years ago, for gliosis. There is only so much strain these poor little eyes can take in one day. In my childhood and youth, I would sometimes read an entire book in one day (on a rainy weekend), but those times are gone forever.
DeleteI am sorry to hear about the astrogliosis. The SOUND of words means more to me now than the written page. I doubt I would read much of Melville's Moby Dick, but I keep going back to the online-audio of the book (Open Culture) with the voices of Tilda Swinton, Fiona Shaw, and Damian Cumberbatch. I had a friend who had difficulty reading and I brought her the CD of Jack Kerouac speaking his *October in the Railroad Earth*, now on YouTube. I'll have a friend read to me a sonnet, because I need to hear a voice other than my own. *Remember me when I am gone away, Gone far away into the silent land* sounds like I am hearing it for the first time, when a friend reads aloud.
DeleteEven more than good prose, poetry IS the breath. *I made it out of a mouthful of air,* Yeats said. Peter Davison (author of The Breathing Room) believes poetry began as a mnemonic when workers had to remember goods stored in Babylonian warehouses; from this developed rhyme and metre. Raymond Carver said the most valuable thing he got from Iowa Writers Workshop was being able to read his stories to an author he admired - just speaking aloud would show up the false notes or weak passages.
In music I don't even need to know the language. Who is that great German baritone who sings Schubert so magnificently? He has a double-barrel name and makes me think I speak German! The great Dietrich sang Lilli Marlene in her own tongue. I listened to her German songs all last year while reading Heinrich Gerlach's novel *Breakout At Stalingrad*.
John Haggerty
The lieder genius was Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (1925-2012) - I have a DVD box of his filmed recitals, just his voice and piano. I had an uncle blessed with a lyric tenor voice who entertained us with his Puccini arias. He rated the German tenor Fritz Wunderlich (1930-66) as highly as any of the great Italian singers. Wunderlich sang Don Giovanni (Kierkegaard's favourite opera) at the Edinburgh Festival, and died shortly after in an accident in the Maulbronn region. My uncle had vinyl records of the German marching songs and I heard them often in my childhood. I listen to them now on YouTube.
DeleteJohn
While I am familiar with the names (Fischer-Dieskau and Wunderlich), I'm afraid neither of them are my musical heroes; theirs is simply not my world when it comes to music.
DeleteLike you, I don't necessarily need to know the language to appreciate a song, but it certainly helps :-)
As a kid, I didn't understand a word of what the bands I grew up with (the Beatles first and later ABBA) were singing, but loved their music and still do. Only much later did I "get" their lyrics, what a revelation that was!
I still have all the early Beatles' singles; Lennon said he wrote Do You Want To Know A Secret? for George Harrison: *It had only three chords,* John said in his laconic way, *and George wasn't the best singer in the world!* I can remember where I was when Abba hits like Fernando came out. Songs are time machines.
DeleteMy sisters played the piano so I would hear them play Beatles' songs like Yesterday and Michelle followed by Beethoven's Fur Elise (a melody that will haunt me to the grave) and with autumn they played Christmas carols. The great composers wrote great tunes. John Barry did a beautiful score for Out of Africa, but he included Mozart's Clarinet Concerto (the second movement) after Karen Blixen learns that her lover is dead. Kubrick scored his spaceship scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey with the Blue Danube Waltz.
I remember seeing West Side Story when it came out and being captivated by Bernstein's witty song, America. - I'm going back to San Juan! - I know a boat you can get awwnn! (Yes, at times you need to understand the lyrics.)
John
A great outing and not far from home either. Great photos to illustrate. You should try some other local walks with your friendly chauffeur - taking you to paths you have not trodden before.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Neil! This was the second time we based a walk on my sister's book. It contains 40 suggestions for tours - still 38 to go!
DeleteLovely scenery-have come over from Weaver of Grass blog. Thank you For the comment you left for me. My husband was a bit of a collector although I do have some things I plan to give to his brothers and a close friend
ReplyDeleteHello Anna, thank you for popping over, reading and commenting!
DeleteYou are very welcome.