Montag, 9. Juni 2008

Schwäbische Alb XVII - round-singing session

Schwäbische Alb XVI - wicked witches in hell

Schwäbische Alb XV - natures water playground

We could have easily spent the whole day at the natural pool & the waterfalls, but unfortunately, we had to get down the mountain because our little 4-day-hike was over today. But it was definitely the coolest finish of our trip that we could have wished for! Water to abound!

Schwäbische Alb XIV - mossy bathtub

Yeay, we found water!!!! It was aaawesome to swim in this natural basin in the morning sun.

Schwäbische Alb XIII - my hiking companions

It´s really relaxing to hike with Julia and Betty. They´re so much fun and totally easy-going. Well, unless you try to take pictures of them:) Unfortunately, they live really far away from Berlin, somewhere in southern Germany. All the more it´s so great that we managed to meet for this hiking tour!

Schwäbische Alb XI - nightfall in the mountains

The sun flooded the sky with golden light, we sang songs at the fire, had a gorgeous meal and sat on the rocks until nightfall, watched the birds circle around the mountain tops and then crawled into our cozy warm sleeping bags.

Schwäbische Alb X - beauty lies in the smallest things

Freitag, 6. Juni 2008

Schwäbische Alb IX - and another beautiful morning!

There is nothing in the world that can substitute a morning in the forest. You hear the birds awaking, slowly the sun rises and nature prepares for a new day. So I stick to Eleanor Farleons lyrics for a Cat Stevens song: "Praise with elation, praise every morning, god´s recreation of the new day"...

Schwäbische Alb VIII - a little bit of caving

We found a cave! It was completely dark in there, quite cold and a little bit creepy, too. But really exciting!

Schwäbische Alb VII - orange ladybird

Schwäbische Alb VI - morning has broken!

As soon as dawn came up and within seconds, Julia was as fit as a fiddle and set out to pull us out of our sleeping bags. Nooo! It was so cozy in there and I wasn´t ready to get up at all! But finally, we surrendered. Betty held her morning meditation on a ledge while I was busy taking pictures and Julia started to re-light yeasterday´s fire, so that we all could prepare breakfast. Hmmm, organic granola with fresh fruit, what a luxury!

Schwäbische Alb V - carterpillar graveyard

What´s this???! Some weird carterpillar graveyard? The structure measured approximately 25cm in diameter and was rife with dead carterpillars. Straaange!

Schwäbische Alb IV - springs and witches

Oh how I love to disguise myself as moss, mud, stones and foliage. But this time I seem to resemble some kind of forest bank robber rather than a tree...

Schwäbische Alb III - here comes the sun...

We´re soooo happy that the weather gods are with us!

Schwäbische Alb II - flower power

Schwäbische Alb hiking tour I

Yeah!!! We´re out in the forest again!!!! This time, Julia, Bettina and I chose a beautiful mountain range in southern Germany for our 4-day-trip in May - the Schwäbische Alb. Usually, the weather turns bad the minute we put on our hiking shoes, but this time we were lucky: the sun shone as bright as it could and we found gorgeous sleeping places, cool waterfalls and magnificent viewpoints. But see for yourself...

Donnerstag, 5. Juni 2008

our forest living room

Julia brought it to the point: this forest has become our living room over the years. That´s why it´s so hard to leave it behind!
Before we all separated to travel to our civilized homes again, we met the other groups to share our experiences of the last days. This was when my lunatic friend Seppel told us how a bug got stuck in his nose while he attempted to smell if the bug possessed scent glands in order to test it for its palatability...

Farewell from our second home

Unfortunately, every weekend outside has its end, so we said goodby to the forest and thought of everything that was important to us in these 3 days - housing, food and company. So maybe we´ll come back to Malte´s idea one day: to release ourselves back in the wild, as a new protected species, somewhere near nowhere...

wildlife encounter

The next morning, Andrea was awakened by a squeeking noise that came from under her sleeping bag. She first considered it to be a mouse, but soon after a displeased toad climbed out of the leaves. I guess it got squeezed a bit by Andrea, but still seemed to be fine...
Then I got really excited cause I found fresh badger droppings near our camp! As you can see, they´re pretty big!

dinner naturale

Preparing food on the fire without a pot seems challenging, but it´s easier and tastier than you might think! We wrapped our carrots, squash, eggs, potatoes and apples in mud and placed it in the blaze. When the mud is firm and dry, we broke the food packages open and had a wonderfol meal. Bannock (indian bread) can either be prepared in the embers or in a pan.

Life in the forest camp

Since a good fire is essential for a comfortable life in the forest, Julia and I also tought the group environmentaly friendly fire techniques that even work in bad weather. There´s always one person who´s responsible for the fire - in this case, it was Jens. Malte is heating natural glue for the repair of his wooden spoon, Andrea is using embers to burn out a cup and the rest of us is busy grinding grains and collecting fire wood. And Jana tried to cook an egg in an orange peel. Unfortunately, the peel contains a lot of oils, so it burnt. But hey, this is the time to experimentalize!

Jana´s brandnew dish

We try to substitute as many articles of daily use as possible - here you can see Jana constructing a dish from spruce cambium.