Coffee Smuggling?

Last Saturday, Jim and I decided to go for a hike in the Eifel National Forest. After searching the Eifel website, Jim picked out a trail which was actually a smuggling route. After the Second World War the town of Schmidt was completely destroyed. In order to rebuild their town the Germans began smuggling coffee in from Belgium. Seeing the prosperity of the smugglers, the Church decided it wanted to get a part of the action. They began preaching that the church should be entitled to 10% of the smuggling profits and is now approapriately named St. Mokka.

As we pulled into the parking lot of the church to start the hike, we saw three car loads of senior citizens getting ready to start their hike. They were all equipped with their walking sticks and hiking boats even through the terrain on these hikes isn't particularly uneven or technical. I am always amazed to see how active older people are here. They are always out hiking and biking.


The Schmugglerweg trail was a really nice 17k loop through forest, meadows and farmland. It was the perfect day for a hike as it was probably the nicest day of the year so far. When the weather is nice in Germany, it is a really beautiful place.

Luxembourg's Little Switzerland

While I was researching Luxembourg City, I came across a website outlining the major hiking trails throughout all of Luxembourg - http://www.hiking-in-luxembourg.co.uk/. There are 5000km of trails throughout the small country of Luxembourg.

We decided to stop and hike in the Mullerthal region on our way home since it wasn’t very far out of our way and I was intrigued by the fact that they called the area “the Little Switzerland” of Luxembourg.

My biggest concern was that I didn’t have an address for any trail head on the 110 km trail. I didn’t want to repeat our cross country skiing experience, driving around for hours trying to find the trail. We were lucky enough to stumble across a trail near Berdorf after only an hour of searching.

Initially we planned to do the entire 33km loop of Trail #2, but the weather was just too cold and it was already 2:00 by the time we found the trail.

The trail was the best we have found in Europe. The landscape was really interesting. The trail started in a deep valley with rock formations on both sides and a stream running through the middle. The trail was so well marked that there was never any confusion as to the route. We will definitely be back to explore more.

At the six mile mark, we decided to go into Echternach for lunch to get one more French meal before heading home to the land of sausage, potatoes and cabbage. The waitress was so confused as to which language to speak in since we responded to her German questions but ordered in French. She kept flipping back and forth between the two. I think Luxembourgish is a combination between French and German so most people speak both as well as English.

Maria Laach

This past Saturday we thought it would be a good idea to combine our workout with a little sightseeing. We headed to Maria Laach which is a Romanesque church built in the 11th century. It is now a Benedictine abbey with 55 monks who earn a living by running the nearby hotel and selling their organic apples and houseplants along with other products produced by monks elsewhere in Europe.

The outside of the church was a gorgeous example of Romanesque architecture but the inside was surprisingly a little plain. It unfortunately had lost most of the original décor in the 1800s. However, I would expect it to have a lot less ornate decoration than a Catholic church, since it is run by monks. I think that is their thing, no bling.

The abbey is situated on a volcanic lake (Laacher See) and is nestled in the forest with hiking and horse trails all around the lake.

After we checked out the church, we decided to take a hike. Unlike most hiking areas in German, there was actually a main map that outlined 6 different trails of varying levels of length and difficulty. We, of course, went for the longest and most difficult trail – 21 kilometers.

We were hopeful that the trail would be well marked after seeing a central map. Ah, how naïve we are. Things started out well, but quickly disinigrated. We found ourselves at an intersection with three different trail options and a sign that had fallen off of the tree. Since we were unable to discern from which tree the sign had fallen, we figured we had a 1 in 3 chance of choosing the right path. Oddly a lot of the trails were marked when there wasn’t any intersecting trail but when you had a number of different options there was no sign to be found. However, it was better than any other hiking trails in the Bonn area. Although a few wrong turns and some back tracking ended up in a slightly longer hike.

During our hike, we couldn’t help notice how many hunting tree stands there were in the forest. It seems quite odd to have hunters set up along hiking trails. I’ll have to remember not to wear my antler hat and leather coat when hiking next fall.

I think these trails would be beautiful with the fall colors. We will have to go back to do some trail running in the fall or spring. Jim wants to do a marathon in the spring so we may be back soon to do some long runs there.

Winter Wonderland

On Sunday, Jim and I went to Hohe Acht, the highest mountain in the Eifel National Park, for a hike. Jim recently biked through the area and thought it would be a great place for a hike.

In Bonn, the weather wasn’t particularly good, overcast and wet so I wasn’t too excited about hiking through the mud. However, as we drove into the Eifel, the rain turned to sleet and then finally snow. By the time we arrived at Hohe Acht the ground was covered in snow.

When we first arrived in Germany, my Nordic skiing obsessed husband asked everyone he knew about the winter and whether or not there was snow. The answer was always the same – it rains most of the winter and snows a few times but doesn’t collect on the ground.

So far our experience has been quite different. I’ve seen it snow in Bonn three times already and last Sunday, while it rained in Bonn, we enjoyed a winter wonderland only an hour away.

Hiking in the Eifel

On Saturday, Jim and I went to the Eifel National Park for a hike. The Eifel covers 110 square kilometers. It is west of Bonn an extends to the Belgian border. The park contains 4 large reservoirs and countless hiking trails and biking trails. There are four different visitor centers inside the park. It looked like you could also rent canoes and kayaks.

We went to the Rurberg information center to start our hike. It was about an hours drive from Bonn. We already had a map of the area which we borrowed from some friends so the information center was only really helpful in that they had bathrooms.

The weather was absolutely perfect for a hike. It was sunny and in the high 70s. The canopy of the forest kept us reasonably cool on the hike.

A lot of the trails are actually paved so that people can bike in the park as well. We did find some unpaved roads and moved off the main trail to follow those.

The trails in Germany are not as technical as the ones in Colorado. They are generally pretty wide and obstacle free so make for easier hiking. That is probably one of the reasons that you see people of all levels out hiking and biking.

Although the trails are actually well marked in this park, we did get off trail for a little while due to Jim's no backtracking rule. We followed some mountain bikers who seemed to know where they were going - that is until they turned around and asked us if we knew where we were. Thankfully, both parties had GPS watches so we were able to head in the right direction.

Along the hiking/ biking route there was a snack stand. Of course, no German hike is complete without a gigantic beer and sausage. Our off track detour had put us a little farther out than we planned so we figured we needed nourishment to get back to the car. There was even a little pipe organ guy for entertainment. I could get used to this kind of hiking.