Germany

Hiking in the world heritage: fall colors on the Rheinsteig in Germanys Upper Middle-Rhine Valley/ Wandern auf dem Rheinsteig

Posted by dc on October 30, 2012
Posted in: Germany, Hiking Europe. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

If you have some time to spend in the Rhein-Main area around Frankfurt, Wiesbaden or Mainz, why not go to the fabulous Rheinsteig hiking trail along the right- hand side of the romantic Rhine river? The area between Rüdesheim and Koblenz is a very unique and very wonderful UNESCO world heritage site called the Upper Middle Rhine Valley. The panoramic hiking trail along the Rhine valley is called “Rheinsteig”, which means “trail along the Rhine”. It leads through the vineyards, the small wine planting villages along the river, and the forrest on the eastern slopes of the Rhine river mountains. In other words: this is no walk in the park, you need some real good shoes! A very beautiful part of the Rheinsteig you can easily manage to get there, hike, and get back in one day, is between the towns of Lorch and Kaub. And yes, this area is top notch when it comes to hiking in Germany!

Rhine river valley and vinyards along the Rheinsteig close to Lorch

From Frankfurt, Mainz or Wiesbaden you can get very easily to the lovely village of Lorch by train. Train by the private VIAS company departs at least hourly each day, from Frankfurt and Wiesbaden central stations, and serves all towns in the Rheingau and the upper middle Rhine valley. It takes approx. 1 hour from Frankfurt to get to Lorch. Directly at the small train station of Lorch the trail leads up to the vineyards and is easily recognized by the blue and white sign depicting a white “R” on blue ground.

Signpost along the Rheinsteig

The hiking trails between Lorch and Kaub is roughly 15 Km long, and you will cross the “border” between the two federal states of Hesse and Rhineland- Palatine, which share the administration of the world heritage between the two of them. In Lorch you walk by the ruin of the castle Nollig from 12th century, it used to be a part of the medieval wall around the town of Lorch. Shortly after passing the castle, you walk through the vineyards and pass a small church, after that you enter a nature reserve with some very unique animals and plants for this region, which flower in the very special micro climate along the hills of the Rhine river mountains. The vineyards in this part are deserted, and a kind of bushy woodland is growing on these slopes, thus creating this very special piece of nature, where snakes and lizards are crawling and some rare birds are nesting.

Rheinsteig between Lorchhausen and Kaub

Between Lorch and Kaub you pass behind the small town of Lorchhausen, being up there on the hill the trail is having some real nice panoramas: The river, the sky, the fall colors, this is really great, I love it!

Small village along the western shore of Rhine river

Kaub appears on the horizon, with its mighty castle from the 14th century in the middle of the river, it gives a great view for the hiker. The castle is called “Burg Pfalzgrafenstein” and it was once built as a custom station. There is a lot of history around this tiny village, and it is worth a stay. In Kaub, General Blücher crossed the river with more than 60.000 soldiers in the New Years eve night of 1813/1814, on the pursuit of Napoleons army. Today there is a ferry going to the other side of the river, and a small boat is bringing tourists to the castle inside the river. The train station is not to be missed, as there is no ticket office, you have to pay inside the train at the trains conductor. Bring cash money, no credit cards accepted!

All photo: Canon EOS 5D MkII, Canon EF – L 17-40 IS

Rhine river close to Kaub

Wer kennt eigentlich den Rheinsteig noch nicht? Das ist ein toller Wanderweg entlang der rechten Rheinseite, und insbesondere im Rheingau sowie dem angrenzendem Oberen Mittelrheintal ab Rüdesheim – einem UNESCO Welterbe – einer der schönsten Wanderwege in Deutschland.

In diesem Artikel beschreibe ich die Wanderung zwischen den Winzerstädten Lorch und Kaub am Rhein – veritable 15 km entlang der Weinberge oberhalb des Vadder Rhein. Zu erreichen sind beide Orte – die Wanderung geht in beide Richtungen gleich gut, jeweils mit der VIAS bahn, ab Frankfurt oder Wiesbaden Hauptbahnhof. VIAS bedient die ganze Strecke entlang des Rheins bis rauf nach Neuwied, und hält ab Wiesbaden an nahezu jedem Bahnhof. Die Taktung ist mindestens stündlich, meistens halbstündlich.

Man kann also auch sein Auto z.B. in Lorch abstellen, nach Kaub wandern, und dann die Strecke mit der Bahn zurückfahren. An den kleinen Bahnhöfen findet sich immer ein Parkplatz, das ist kein Problem.

Der Rheinsteig bietet zwischen Lorch und Kaub einige wunderbare Ausblicke, viele Weinberge, aber auch naturbelassene Stellen und Schutzgebiete, die ein besonderes Mikroklima und entsprechend einzigartige Flora und Fauna aufweisen.

In Lorch oder Kaub gibt es Kaffees, Hotels, jeweils eine schöne kleine Altstadt, und abseits des Sommers auch gar nicht so viele Touristen. Der Rheinsteig bietet im gesamten Rheingau einige sehr schöne Routen, und die Wege sind immer gut ausgeschildert, aber nicht ganz einfach zu gehen – meist geht es steil bergauf oder bergab, und gutes Schuhwerk ist absolut notwendig.

Rheinsteig with view to Kaub

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Hiking in the world heritage: fall colors on the Rheinsteig in Germanys Upper Middle-Rhine Valley

Posted by dc on October 28, 2012
Posted in: Germany. Tagged: , , . 6 comments

here comes a first picture of todays hiking on the Rheinsteig. The Rheinsteig is a great way to hike along the right-hand bank of the romantic Rhine river: vineyards, small vine planting villages along the river, castles and churches – this area really deserves it to be a world heritage site, and I love hiking there! More to come, including travel tips and how to get there…

Along the Rheinsteig close to Kaub

Some thoughts about bird photography

Posted by dc on October 8, 2012
Posted in: Germany, Safari photography. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . 7 comments

Some weeks ago I went to photograph the White Storks we have around here, migrating each year between their summer homes along the Rhine river and Africa. There is a colony along the Rhine river valley, and there are, including young ones which hatch each year, around thirty White Storks in the area. 15 of these even stay for the winter, and they even survived the very cold weather we had here last winter. So your chances of getting some nice pictures are quite high, but the challenges of getting a good picture are huge, either.

The storks are either in their nests, which gives mostly a boring picture. Or they walk around. There is one nest which might gives you some promising chances for a good image, especially when you have a nice color  background, like in the picture below.

White Stork on the watch

But this year, this nest was empty, which is sad, because it is very easy easily accessible, but this might be the reason for it being void of any bird – there might be too many people around. The colony is growing, but this nest was empty this year. I discovered this after the first storks came back from Africa. So the other chance of getting some good images is to encounter the storks when they alk around in the meadows. They accept you getting close around 80 meters, and than they fly away. But it is this flying away which gives – sometimes – a great photo. So you sneak towards them, they notice you, because it is an open meadow with nothing to hide, and than the storks fly away. They tend to stay very low over the ground for some time before they gain some altitude, they are heavy birds and can only climb to higher altitude very slowly. This is the moment where you have make the picture, with a clear background. But anyway, you and your autofocus have to be very quick! Otherwise pictures will look like this:

White Stork out of focus

With the focus set on one single point (camera settings!), pictures will have one sharp spot, which should be around the eye of the bird, the storks wings and body can be out of focus, just like the following example. In this pictures I also adjusted the images color settings to have a greater contrast, but I am still not sure if I like this or not….

After a while the storks are flying higher and they always flay back to their nest. I like more when they are flying almost in eye sight, these images I like most. After they gained some altitude, pictures look like the one following – which ist still not perfect in sharpness. In a few words, what do you need to prepare for bird photography:

  • ISO setting should be adapated to local light situation, and you should remember that you need a fast autofocus.
  • Autofocus should be a single spot
  • When it comes to photographing storks, I would not use a tripod – maybe a monopod would be the better solution.
  • Lens aperture should be not under 300mm
  • Lens should be a zoom lens, because the situation can change so quickly.
  • If you want to know exactly, where you can encounter the storks at the Rhine river, send me an email. Storks are there all year, best time is when the young ones are flying  – around July. Most storks leave for Africa in September, some stay during the European winter, but they are hardly to be seen in this time of the year.
  • More of the better shots of white storks you find here in my gallery

White Stork

And well, there might be only a view bird photography spots in the world, where you can encounter white storks and little green parakeets at the same time. But here in the Rine river valley, this is possible. Parrots in Germany, you might say, come on. But yes, they are breeding birds to the region between Speyer and Cologne along the Rhine river, and they are a lot! The only thing is, that you can only very barely see them, because they use to stay all the time in the trees leaves. So, only in spring and winter, when there are no leaves, you might have the chance to make a succesful picture of  parakeets, but you have to be lucky and very patient, because this birds are shy, and smart…

In April, when they are nesting and feeding their young ones, I made the following shot, which is quite acceptable. The tips above can be used for all kinds of birds, and I hope they give you some hints how to achieve better photos of birds and other fast moving animals in the great outdoors.

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Parakeet (Psittacula krameri) in Germany