JLGriffis

On June 7, on the way home from Normandy, we stopped in Cantigny, a small village in the Somme. If you know the history of the 1st Infantry Division, you know the name. The Normandy part of this trip is in Normandy: Mont-Saint-Michel and the D-Day Anniversary. The First American Attack Artillery fire destroyed Cantigny completely in May 1918, so the village around this statue is not the one the 28th Infantry fought through. The attack on Cantigny began at 6:45 a.m. on May 2

At the end of May 2022 I went to Normandy on a work trip for the anniversary of D-Day, and I took Nathaniel with me so he could see France. Most of the week was work, and that part stays off the blog. This post is about what we saw around it. The trip home, with a stop at Cantigny, gets its own post. Sainte-Mère-Église The church at Sainte-Mère-Église, our first stop before the work started. The name is literally "Holy Mother Church". In the first hours of June 6, 1944, par

Stage 6 of the Lahnwanderweg ended in Marburg, and Stage 7 starts right there. On May 15 it was just Ellie and me. This one is 15 miles (24.1 km) with about 1,646 feet of climbing, and AllTrails rates it hard. The Lahntal tourism site calls it the "queen stage" of the whole trail. If you missed the last one, it's Stage 6. Leaving Marburg Ellie heading down a quiet street in Marburg, with the spires of the Elisabethkirche behind her. The route climbs right out of the old tow

We left the treehouse on April 1 with snow still on the ground and drove north to the coast. This was supposed to be the big part of the north on this trip. If you're just joining, the trip started in The Harz, Part I and the last stop was Part IV. Bremerhaven We stayed in Bremerhaven, on the North Sea at the mouth of the Weser river. Bremen founded it in 1827 as its seaport, because the Weser upstream was silting up and big ships could no longer reach the city. It is still

On March 31 we checked out of our hotel in Wernigerode and headed southwest, with a brown wooden church along the way and a night in a treehouse at the end of it. The Stave Church at Hahnenklee This is the Gustav-Adolf-Stabkirche in Hahnenklee, a borough of Goslar, so we were back near the Rammelsberg. A Stabkirche is a "stave church", a wooden church built around upright posts (staves), and this one is a copy of the medieval Borgund stave church in Norway. The architect, Ka

The third day was the big hike. We did a trail called Zum Ottofelsen und der Grenzklippe ("To the Otto Rock and the Border Cliff"; a Klippe is a cliff and Grenze is a border), and it ended up being the most memorable day of the trip. AllTrails lists it as an 11.3 mile (18.2 km) loop with about 1,702 feet of climbing, rated hard, and I'd agree with the hard part. The Old Oak First we passed an enormous old oak with a fence around it. It looks like the Hohne-Eiche, a sessile o

Our second day in the Harz was a slow one in Wernigerode. We stayed in a cool old hotel on the hillside below the castle, and we spent the day on the castle, the town and a little bit of witch lore. The Castle Schloss Wernigerode started around 1110 to 1120 as a Romanesque fortress where German emperors could stop on hunting trips in the Harz, and it is first mentioned as a castrum ("fortified camp", the Latin word for a castle) in 1213. Almost nothing of that first building

In late March 2022 it was just Ellie, the boys and me on a six-day trip through Lower Saxony that started in the Harz, the low mountain range in the middle of Germany that is best known for its mines, its half-timbered towns and its witches. The first stop was the Rammelsberg mine at Goslar, and it was massive. A Thousand Years of Mining The Rammelsberg is a 635-meter mountain just south of Goslar, and it was mined for more than 1,000 years, almost without a break. Silver, l

Monreal is one of my favorite places we visited in Germany. It is a tiny half-timbered village tucked into a narrow valley in the Eifel, with two ruined castles on the rock spur above it and a stream running right through the middle of the lanes. On March 13, 2022 we walked the Traumpfad Monrealer Ritterschlag, and it was a perfect day for it: blue sky, a hint of early spring, and almost no leaves yet on the trees, which made for great views. The Village The houses here are

Stage 6 of the Lahnwanderweg takes us from Caldern into Marburg, and it was our first stage with a real legend attached. We started early on Sunday, February 27, 2022, which is exactly what the trail guide recommends: start early in Caldern so you can enjoy the afternoon in Marburg. The first stretch is quiet and gentle: a paved farm road across open fields, with the hills slowly getting closer. The Lahnwanderweg was built with a lot of work and pride by the people who live

On January 22, 2022 we spent a day in Trier, a city that is considered Germany's oldest. Ethan's grandparents were visiting, and we only had a few hours, which is not nearly enough for a place this old. Augusta Treverorum The Romans subdued the local tribe, the Treveri, and founded the city in the late first century BC as Augusta Treverorum, "the City of Augustus among the Treveri." In the late 3rd century it became one of four Roman capitals, and from 293 to 395 it was a re

2021 was the year we moved to Germany. Before the castles, the cathedrals and the hiking trails, there was our last spring in Maryland, and then the day we arrived in Wiesbaden. This post is a look back at the whole year. Fort Meade, Maryland We spent our last spring in the States at Fort Meade, Maryland, and the kids made the most of it. Tadpoles, Snakes and a Buffet The stream and the woods near the house were the kids' territory, and our last spring there was a good one

On December 4, 2021 we spent a day in Strasbourg, the largest city in Alsace, sitting on the French bank of the Rhine just across from Germany. It was a wet, gray day, but the city was dressed for Christmas and we walked until after dark. Where We Walked The old center of Strasbourg is an island. The river Ill splits around it, and the island is called the Grande Île, literally "Big Island." The whole historic center, including the cathedral, was listed as a UNESCO World Her

On November 7, 2021 we hiked a loop in the Taunus, the wooded hills north of Frankfurt, starting and ending in Kronberg and taking in three castles along the way: Kronberg, Falkenstein and Königstein. It came to 8.18 miles with 1,407 feet of climbing, and here is our AllTrails recording. The day was foggy. So foggy that the lookouts, which are the whole point of a hike like this, gave us a view of white. We saw more of the forest and the ruins than the valley, and the fog ma

On October 24, 2021 we hiked Stage 5 of the Lahnwanderweg, from Buchenau to Caldern. It is 13.5 km (about 8.4 miles) with roughly 435 meters (1,430 feet) of climbing. Here is the AllTrails link for Stage 5. It was cold and it was foggy. Nebel is the German word for fog, and we had plenty of it. Everybody complained at the start, even Ellie, who never complains. But once we got going, everyone loved it. The fog gave the whole hike a sense of mystery and adventure. Buchenau B

On October 23, 2021 we took a detour from the Lahn for a different hike, this time in the Rheingau, the hills above the Rhein near Rüdesheim in Hessen. We walked a loop through the forest and vineyards past two monasteries, Kloster Marienthal and Kloster Nothgottes. Kloster means monastery or cloister. The loop is about 11 km (6.8 miles) according to this trail description. We did not track ours, so that is the published figure. Marienthal and the Blind Hunter The walk start

On October 17, 2021 we hiked Stage 3 of the Lahnwanderweg, from Bad Laasphe to Biedenkopf. The Lahnwanderweg follows the river from its source to the Rhine, and we had decided to walk all of it. This stage is 17.6 km (about 11 miles) with roughly 530 meters (1,740 feet) of climbing, and the official site rates it a "top recommended route." Here is the AllTrails link for Stage 3. The official Lahnwanderweg site also has the Stage 3 page. I will be honest: the early stages of

On October 11, 2021 we took a day trip to Köln (Cologne). The plan was simple: chocolate first, then the Dom (cathedral), and using the family motto, Possum et ego, a climb to the top of the tower. We got there just in time, with only minutes to spare, to be able to go inside and make the climb. Cologne is one of the oldest cities in Germany. The Romans founded a settlement here in 38 BC, and in 50 AD it was given city rights as Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium, which is w

In September 2021 we met up with friends in Würzburg, a city on the Main river in Franken (Franconia), the northern part of Bavaria. We were stationed in Wiesbaden, and they were stationed down near Stuttgart. We had known each other since our Fort Riley years, so we picked Würzburg as a halfway point and made a day of it. Festung Marienberg We started at the Festung (fortress) Marienberg, which watches over the city from a hill above the Main. People have fortified this hil

Stage 4 of the Lahnwanderweg runs from Biedenkopf to Buchenau, and we hiked it on September 25, 2021. Biedenkopf is a town with a long history. Its Schloss (castle) goes back to the late 12th century, and around 1231 it passed to Landgrave Konrad of Thuringia, who used it to secure the western border and had the town built at the foot of the castle hill. The town is also known for the Grenzgang, a festival of boundary walking held every seven years that began in 1839, with ro