2 Castles and a Tower - Friday June 27

This is the so-called Schloss Buchholz

Even in Germany, you can't kill the rooster

see the goatie movie at the end



The lookout tower seen from Hochberg





This sign reads: "So that no unlucky things happen and nobody breaks their neck, it is forbidden to climb this wall and jump off of it."



Graffiti from 1878
















First glimpse of the Ruine Hochberg


You can't kill the rooster in Emmindingen, either



Logs and cut pieces of bark for a hut roof




Hochberg seen from the lookout tower










This is picnichenge



When I got up guess who was stretched out as long as a jungle tiger on the couch? He took as much love as he could then beat 4 feet into the neighborhood. He has gotten so big, and is so handsome.

I'd had a very poor night's sleep and we hadn't gone to bed until after midnight again, so I didn't even arise until well after noon. Good thing it stays light out until 10 pm.

Once we were moving we drove up to the center of the village where there was an open air market. We saw signs about the BIG GAME set for Sunday - there will be a public viewing at the Rathaus (Town Hall) in the village square. I know because the words "Public Viewing" were in English while the rest of it was in German. Go figure.

At the market we first stopped at a fruit stand and bought a few doughnut peaches. That variety, new in the US, is so new here they don't even have a name for them. We told the proprietor what they are called in the States, which she really liked. Doughnut peaches are the size and shape of a small doughnut, and very sweet. There was a fantastic stand with spreads, olives, cheeses, meat...and she had our number. She kept offering us samples of stuff until we had spent 20 Euros. We ended up with a big round flat bread (Fladenbrot), green olive tampenade and black olive tampenade, cream-cheese stuffed olives, an olive variety including almond-stuffed, cream-cheese stuffed hot peppers, tuna stuffed peppers, goat cheese in herbs, Emmentaler cheese (I said, "we'll have Emmentaler in Emmendingen!", which made them laugh), a sweet/salty French cheese and a creamy, gooey stinky cheese. We also picked up a fresh rhubarb cheese cake for Saturday.

We stopped in the bookstore to see if we could find a book about castles, but it was no go. We have been a little lost without Brigitte, Jane's GPS system (I call her Miss Moneypenny because she has an English accent.) It's supposed to get fixed soon, but we have been wandering around aimlessly without her.

We headed toward Emmendingen, where there was reputed to be a tower. We didn't have any idea what kind of tower. When we got as close as we could, we had to hike the rest of the way in, and it was a lookout tower, the highest lookout tower in Baden-Württemberg. And man was it high! The view was fantastic. After a lot of looking, we were finally able to locate the Hochberg Ruine, a HUGE castle ruin we had visited last year when there was a fest. There were a bunch of benches and tables which we re-named "picnichenge." Look at the picture and you'll see why.

We climbed back down after enjoying the view for quite a while, and saw some people on the side of the road doing something to some felled trees. The trees were freshly cut and approximatley 1-1/2 feet in diameter. In our guise as National Geographic Travel Reporters we went over and said "what're you doing?" It turned out that they were very carefully shaving off perfectly matched bark pieces, each one approximately 2x3 feet, for shingles for a hut. It was very cool. They had special tools they were using. They said the trees have to be freshly cut so that they are still moist and the bark will come off in these perfect pieces.

We drove over to Sexau to the Hochberg Ruine, parked, and hiked with our picnic stuff up to the Ruine. When we had seen it from the tower, we noticed rows of trees in front of it. The trees were all fruit trees - apples, cherries, plums. Jane tried (as had obviously every one who every hikes up there) to get some cherries. It wasn't easy - she got 2 and I got cut by barb wire. Nearly to the top of the hike we saw a black cat in the grove. Naturally we called out to him and he came right over, flopped down and proceed to act very cute and let us pet him.

We finally got all the way up to the Ruine - we were completely alone! The castle is open only on weekends and holidays. Doesn't matter - it's a ruin (I swear it was ruint when we got there), you can just walk right into it through the many openings. We found a ruin ledge within the center of the castle and set up our picnic. We had also brought stuff from the picnics of the previous day, including raspberries, strawberries, roasted red peppers and a nice white wine. We sat and ate and enjoyed the solitude for quite a while, then walked around and took some pictures. For our National Geographic article.

We walked back down to where the car was parked. There is a bio dairy there, including a help yourself cheese fridge which works on the honor system. Unfortunately, we were so cheese overloaded it wasn't funny. We were cheese-eating castle monkeys. We got to watch a guy goat herding (I made a movie. You can see it at the bottom of this post,) Then we took off for another promising castle - we had already seen several maps and signs - in Buchholz.

Buchholz was charming village no bigger than Jamesburg. However, we dint see no Schloss! How could you miss a castle in a village that small? We stopped at a farm market and asked - they actually laughed and said, it's no castle, it's like a regular house. We went back and sure enough, we had passed it on our way through and it just looked like an old house. No sign or anything. Bummer. It should have been called Pea Pack Schloss, after the poor excuse for a ski resort in New Jersey.

Came back to Gerald's pad and decided we needed a spot to sit and read. Jane had read that there was an old cemetery in Gundelfingen, and if you know us, and you know our Mom, Cemeteries "R" Us. Grabbed our books and our chaise lounges and started walking. The cemetery was small and very very beautifully kept, but not all that old. And it was hopping. There were a number of people there watering flowers and tending graves. Setting up lawn chairs there would have been a little bit too conspicuous for me. So we walked on over to the church, set up on the lawn there, this time in our guise as National Geographic Nature Writers as we were gazing directly up at the stork's nest. We really enjoyed watching them for a while. We're going back to make a movie. I mean a documentary.

BTW - no pix and no movies on the blog so far because we can't get the pix to download to Jane's laptop, ffs. We will go to her office sometime and do that.

It got overcast and slightly chilly so we headed back to Gerald's crib to jump into our jim-jams and watch an episode of The Office, drink some port, and try to get my sorry behind into bed at a reasonable hour so that we could get up early with a plan for Sat - breakfast and Kaffee at a Frieburg Bäckerei, the pottery Markt (I call it Pottery Barn,) a walk around F'burg Marktplatz, and a climb up the Münster. Culminating, we hope, in having a meal at the restaurant we went to last year when we said "we have to get a picture of this food!" but the next time we looked at our plates all the food was gone. We had wolfed it down in about 2 seconds. We will also try to see Jess & Lynn.