{"id":13658,"date":"2024-11-11T23:58:21","date_gmt":"2024-11-12T03:58:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/?p=13658"},"modified":"2024-11-12T00:02:34","modified_gmt":"2024-11-12T04:02:34","slug":"my-epic-germany-trip-day-7-karlstalschlucht-spazierwanderweg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/?p=13658","title":{"rendered":"My Epic Germany Trip – Day 7 – Karlstalschlucht Spazierwanderweg"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I’m slowly but surely blogging about my 60th Birthday Trip back to Germany<\/a>. Day 7 was Monday, June 17, and I set off to hike!<\/p>\n

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I already talked about the beginning of the trip<\/a>, when I passed two castles, #171 Trippstadter Schlo\u00c3\u0178 and #172 Burg Wilenstein.<\/p>\n

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From there, it was mainly a peaceful and beautiful walk through the woods.<\/p>\n

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I did come to the Klug’sche M\u00c3\u00bchle, where I had hoped to eat for lunch, but like so many places in Germany, it was closed on Mondays. (Hey, there are lots of small family-owned restaurants, and they need rest days.) Still beautiful, though.<\/p>\n

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I think these signs mean I’d come 3.7 kilometers and had 3.4 kilometers to go. Also that it was 1 kilometer further to get to the Karlstalschlucht itself. (Schlucht<\/em> is basically “gorge” – so it means Karl’s Valley Gorge and has a stream running through it.)<\/p>\n

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Of course M\u00c3\u00bchle<\/em> means “mill,” so the closed restaurant was an old mill.<\/p>\n

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With swans being pretty.<\/p>\n

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And back into the woods, still heading down toward the Schlucht<\/em>.<\/p>\n

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And the path did start going along the stream, crossing frequently.<\/p>\n

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There were signs of a recent storm, and the owner of the hotel had said this path was closed. But I hadn’t found any such notices online, and it turned out that they had gone quickly to work to make it passable. Though maybe that’s why I had the forest to myself. (The only people I remember seeing were some backpackers at Burg Wilenstein.)<\/p>\n

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Just so incredibly peaceful! Here’s a short video clip to give you a peaceful moment.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/Karlstalschlucht12.mp4<\/a><\/video><\/div>\n

A giant rock next to the path had this plaque. It was commemorating a visit to the valley on August 9, 1862, by King Ludwig I of Bayern, Grandduke Ludwig III of Hessen, and Hildegarde of Austria – with more titles in there (She was also Princess of Austria?) that I’m not sure about translating. Anyway, some royalty enjoyed this spot.<\/p>\n

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And lots more hiking along the stream. With my heart bursting for the joy of it.<\/p>\n

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I was now fully in the gorge. This is looking back up at the sides of the gorge.<\/p>\n

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Lots of these wooden bridges, making my way up the valley. It wasn’t a wide valley, so I imagine they had to put the path on whichever side had the most room at each spot.<\/p>\n

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Then finally I got a glimpse of the pavilion whose image serves as a symbol for the trail.<\/p>\n

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Of course, I had to hang out on the pavilion for a bit. Have I mentioned what a beautiful place this was? Always with the sound of rushing water.<\/p>\n

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The path started back up out of the gorge on the other side of the pavilion.<\/p>\n

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But of course it was beautiful to look back.<\/p>\n

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Okay, by the pictures, I was still by the stream for quite some time.<\/p>\n

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(Believe it or not, I did greatly pare this down from the number of pictures I took.)<\/p>\n

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I hope this gives you a feel for walking by a stream in a thick green forest on a pleasantly cloudy day, with the temperature about 70 degrees.<\/p>\n

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The markers still told me I was on the Spazierwanderweg Karlstalschlucht, and here the path did start to go up again, to then loop me back to Trippstadt. (German trails are so well-marked!)<\/p>\n

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Here I’m looking back down at the stream. It wasn’t a strenuous climb, but it was a climb.<\/p>\n

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Most of the rest of the hike was along a ridge. I could see a road pretty far below for part of it.<\/p>\n

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And at about this point – about ten minutes away from my car at the very end of the hike – I got caught in the rain. At first I thought I could wait it out, but it became a downpour.<\/p>\n

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Fortunately, I was wearing my rain jacket. But when I did get back to my car, it was pretty drenched.<\/p>\n

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And I had to take one picture back in Trippstadt. I had parked near the B\u00c3\u00bccherei, the Library – and here’s a sign for the Summer Reading Program!<\/p>\n

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So – that was my amazing, beautiful, peaceful, and inspiring walk through the Pf\u00c3\u00a4lzerwald!<\/p>\n

And it made me remember the many, many times I’d walked in the forest in Germany when we lived there 1996 to 2006. And made me remember that walking in a German forest is something that makes my heart happy. Yes, even if I get caught in the rain. Just a beautiful time and a beautiful day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m slowly but surely blogging about my 60th Birthday Trip back to Germany. Day 7 was Monday, June 17, and I set off to hike! I already talked about the beginning of the trip, when I passed two castles, #171 Trippstadter Schlo\u00c3\u0178 and #172 Burg Wilenstein. From there, it was mainly a peaceful and beautiful […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[60],"class_list":["post-13658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-travel","tag-germany-2024"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13658","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13658"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13658\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13705,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13658\/revisions\/13705"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}