Things to See in Germany Stumbling Upon the Ronald McDonald Gehry House of Oeynhausen Bad Oeynhausen has many things for easy hikers to enjoy – a river, a canal and lakes for a waterside walk, a forest with a deer enclosure and a park that is stuffed with classicist monuments. And what’s more, to complement and…
Easy Hikes in Germany Just What the Doctor Ordered Easy hiking, it turns out, is good for you. (I have always suspected that.) No, seriously: good not only in the way that it helps you to discover new things and broaden your horizon, not even good for your health in the sense that it is…
What to See in Germany The Most Famous Operation Chastise Target What was the greatest military feat of WWII? If you are from North America, you might say: the D-Day landings, while Russians would probably go for the defence of Stalingrad. But I suspect that, if you are English, you will be thinking of a less…
Where to Go in Germany Altena – Where the Youth Hostel was Born Looking back on our hiking weekend in the Sauerland, I have just one regret: that we had neither the time nor the energy to explore the town of Altena, our last destination. I don’t know whether Altena deserves a daytrip in its…
Easy Hikes in Germany The Erzbahn – A Railtrack Hiking Trail Some hiking trails have always been hiking trails, and there is nothing wrong with that. Others, however, have a history behind them: itinerant tradesmen may have been using them for centuries to carry their wares from village to village, or the trail gives you…
Where to Go in Germany Daytrip Destination: Syburg I had seen the Syburg (not knowing at the time what it was called) many times from the train and on various hikes in the area, always wondering how its disparate elements – the monument with the equestrian statue, the medieval ruins – were connected. It simply…
Day Hikes in Germany Hiking Past a Nazi Monument Considering the big shadow the Third Reich was once (and, up to a point, still is) casting over Germany, there are relatively few places in the country with a Nazi Monument that can still give you a whiff of that old Nazi sulphur. There are, specifically,…
Forst, a Town We were not Meant to See On one stretch of our hike along the Deutsche Weinstrasse, the “German Wine Trail”, we turned left where we should have turned right (or was it the other way round?), stepped out of the forest, fully aware that we had lost our way. It happens…
Where to Go in Germany Bacharach in Half a Day Rick Steves, in one of his “Europe in the blink of an eye” itineraries that Europeans feel so smug about, suggests to his readers to spend two nights in the Rhineland town of Bacharach, as much time as you are allowed to dedicate to Venice…
Where to Go in Germany Neustadt If you hike anywhere in southwest Germany, you are bound to come across Neustadt sooner or later – most likely to change trains or to take a bus, because it is the main hub of the local public transport network. The temptation is to leave it at that, possibly…
