Not too much hiking today... just a couple of hours at the end of the afternoon... but first things first. I left Icking in the early morning, with a plan, suggested by the Deutsche Bahn, that had me taking 6 different trains on the way to Wasserauen, the end of the line in the Appenzeller Land. Due to a 10 minute delay on the second leg (an ICE from Munich to Ulm), 6 trains became 10 and 7 hours became 8... for a trip that would take at most 3 hours by car. On the one hand it is great that you can get almost anywhere in Europe with public transportation. On the other hand, >2x the time it would take in a car is a little lame. Still, I did get to spend a half an hour in Appenzell... a charming little old town... so there was some compensation.
Then came what was supposed to be a 2 hour hike up to the Hotel Aescher. I intended to go slowly, in order to avoid sweating, because Aescher has no showers... and I did go slowly, or at least I wasn't breathing too hard, but it was humid and I sweated anyway. And somehow "slow" only took an hour and 25 minutes. Not quite sure what I did wrong (other than the obvious... going too fast). I'll try to do better tomorrow... because, with between 1300 and 1700m climbing to do (depending upon the route taken), if I don't go at a reasonable pace, I'm going to bonk!
The weather today, by the way, was a little cloudy, but no rain and warm. And the forecast for the next week: aside from a possible shower or two, there is only one symbol on the weather forecast webpage: sun. Because of that, the hotel is full this evening... and I expect there will be many people on the trails over this weekend. But given the alternative (bad weather, empty trails), I'll take it.
And Hotel Aescher? As beautiful, and beautifully situated, as advertized. An old wooden building, nestled under an overhanging cliff, with wonderful views across the valley several hundred meters below to the cliffs rising to over 2000m on the other side. Stunning. Many thanks to Madeleine for sending me the photo of the hotel that led to the planning of this trip! Now, if I can only convince her at some point to come along as well :-).
Kristof and Corinna will arrive tomorrow morning ... and then the real hiking will begin!
PS No WiFi here... it may be a while before I can post this to the blog.
Sent from my iPad
