First of all I’d like to point out how nice it is to use a normal keyboard. I discovered the hostel computer for internet access about a half hour ago, but I am not yet used to these German keyboards…they switched the z and the y and a lot of the punctuation keys. And it took me a full minute of staring at the keyboard to find the @ symbol, which I eventually found paired with the q…and then it took me another minute to figure out how to get the @ on the screen. Not cool when you’re paying for your time. I seriously hope my host family has a decent connection.
Anyways, to stave off my hunger and boredom earlier, Dan and I took a hike. Behind the youth hostel is a path that led, basically, into the forest. So we walked down it to see where it went. We’re currently guessing that it is a hybrid bike/dog/pedestrian path with offshoots that lead to logging roads. We didn’t really meet anyone on the way out, but came across a few bicycles and dogs on the way back. The trees are super tall in there, with little undergrowth. I kind of felt like I was on a movie set or something. Hopefully I’ll be able to put up the pictures I took.
Despite it being a forest, the only wildlife we ran into were a few ducks, a pair of birds (which resembled a cross between a woodpecker and a mourning dove), some bugs, and a very, very large slug crawling across the road. There was also a small lake before the forest really started, where we saw the ducks and two wading birds. Most of the forest seemed to be pine trees, though on the outskirts more near the houses and apartment buildings we also wandered through, there were more broad-leaf trees. After going through the forest, we went over by civilization…mainly a carwash “Waschstrasse” and apartment buildings with some gnomes on an awning, and houses. While the gardens here are small, they must really like their tulips. And no one seems to cut their dandelions down.
The entire walk/hike thing took about two hours. Some of this was spent watching birds we happened across, as I attempted to take pictures of them. I think I mainly succeeded, considering I don’t have a super telephoto lens and these birds were camera shy.
On the way back in, I paused at the front desk and found a mini-schedule and bracket for the World Cup. Now I know when all the games are and I can fill in the teams who win as we go. In my mind this is a better version of the whole March Madness crap everyone fills out. I placed this find in my wallet for safe keeping.
On the way up from using the internet here, I also discovered the TV room which is across the hall from my room. I’m not sure if the Germans were trying to be funny, but all it is, is a room with lots of benches and chairs and tables with a book shelf. Oh, and two skylights. But there is no TV…which of course doesn’t bother me, but it is funny. I bet a lot of kids have climbed up all those stairs in search of some visual respite only to find TV. They could look out the skylights if they were really that bored, I guess. Probably easier on the eyes.
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