For the last couple of months I’ve had this urge to go hiking in the wilderness through the snow and I find myself reading survivalist websites and mountaineering books.
I’ve never done any hiking before and I’m not exactly sure where this is coming from.
So a few weeks ago I bought some boots and on Saturday Stephanie drove me south into the Voralpen to a mountain called the Herzogstand about 45 minutes south of Munich.
It was cold and snowy but the sky was blue and I expected to see a lot of people but for the first hour of climbing I didn’t see anyone. There were only 5 or 6 people on the whole mountain.
I walked along a narrow and steep path all the way to the top, through increasing amounts of fluffy snow and incredibly beautiful landscapes. I’m skittish in the out of doors, and spent half the time worrying about mountain lions and bears, though I have no idea if they exist in the Bavarian alps.
It was much harder than I expected, which made the presence of the restaurant at the top of the mountain all the more insulting when I finally got there. At least it was closed.
On Sunday I was so sore I was limping a bit.
I spend a lot of time sitting in front of a computer, so maybe the urge to hike is some unconscious attempt to counterbalance that.
Saturday’s hike gave me a taste. The next step is to figure out how to sleep outside in the snow.
If you can suggest any good resources online or in the Munich area for the budding outdoorsman, please let me know.
Pictures are here.
Posted on 8 December 2009
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well it may sound a little odd, but the Boy Scouts of America manual is pretty good from a beginner standpoint. If you want a more experienced view, I’ve heard this one is good: http://www.amazon.com/How-Stay-Alive-Woods-Self-Preservation/dp/1579122213/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1260285772&sr=8-2 (plus, the pages are waterproof!).
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I understand this urge, and share it. I would recommend you look at books by Tom Brown, especially as you consider sleeping outside: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Brown_%28naturalist%29. Also, not sure if you’ve ever watched Man vs. Wild, but it’s filled with interesting tips (for example http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GM71kOTBHk). Same with Survivor Man: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeR3hHnEVoY. For a more philosophical take on this, Thoreau is great, e.g., Walking – http://thoreau.eserver.org/walking.html. Keep blogging about it. You might be alone while you walk, but you’re certainly not alone in your interest in this.
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Sleeping in a tent in the snow is the best. But I have not done so since I was 13 years old. Glad to hear you came back alive and were not eaten by bears.
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It is so great reading a blog from a techie that actually contains other stuff than bits of scripts and other tech-bits. Quite refreshing and very readable.
BTW there are no mountain lions in in central/western Europe. And although bears are quite common in the Czech and Slovak republic, they rarely if ever wander off into southern Germany. At times a poor fellow might stray into Austria on a rare occasion; in which case it gets shot by hysteric Austrians.
Hiking in the US is far more frightening (at least to a European). Just before heading up a mountain in Sierra Madre I learned that several people had been taken by mountain lions in the last few years. Walk. Don’t run. I thought that was in the movies.
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the last bear who wandered around was shot by hysteric germans (bavarians)
the austrians and pseudo austrians (south tyrol) tolerated JJ1 (the bear) 
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I tried winter walking when I first arrived in Munich, but I kept hitting ridiculous amounts of snow that I couldn’t wade through even if I didn’t worry about the avalanche risks. It’s not like Scotland. The AlpenVerein (DAV) can help people to do it properly though.
No, there are no bears or suchlike.
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Hi Nat,
as Murray, I would suggest you join the Deusche Alpenverein (http://www.alpenverein.de/). They are all very nice people and they know their stuff very well and can even provide you with equipment for your hikes. By supporting them you also help protecting the environment of the Alps.
Cheers,
Christian-
This sounds like a great option. I’ve just read that membership includes rescue insurance, too. Nice.
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so cool nat! jeffrey is excited to do shasta with you. i love snow hiking too and am glad you’re exploring lots of germany…
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I’m excited to do shasta with Jeffrey! I’m so glad he invited me.
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The glissade (or butt-sled ride) down Shasta remains one of my all-time favorite hiking experiences.
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Check out resources on the AMC website at http://www.outdoors.org/ and plan a New England hike next time you visit Novell HQ.
Along with many other educational resources check out this book: “AMC Guide to Winter Hiking & Camping”.
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You may be interested in trying this too: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Via_ferrata
I did it for the first time this summer and it was great fun and with spectacular views, with the only caveat that I was the sorest I’ve ever been for half a week afterwards.
Here is a listing of the ones in Bavaria: http://www.via-ferrata.de/cat-bayern-2.htm
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Wow, this Via Ferrata is one of the coolest things I’ve seen in a long time. I’ll give it a try in the spring! Thanks Christian!
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here are some pictures of a nice via ferrata (klettersteig) in south tyrol: http://picasaweb.google.de/fl3×888/KlettersteigMasareUndRotwand#
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Car-Erik: While bears are somewhat (you do not ordinarily come across them when you are hiking there though it can happen) common in the Slovak mountains, they only rarely cross the borders to the Czech Republic – if they do, they are sometimes also shot by hysteric Czechs, if I remember the news correctly. No way they would make it to Germany – maybe eastern Austria but I doubt it too.
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The last bear in bavaria after a break of 170 years was JJ1 aka Bruno – he was shot in 2006: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bear_JJ1. Cougars would be nice to have but unfortunately these are not the rockies.
For a winter bivouac you need a fine sleeping bag and a bivouac bag: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bivouac_shelter. Beside the fact, that it might get cold, the night can be quite long, so one might consider doing it in february or march, when the nights start to get shorter.
You might want to try to catch a slide show presentation of joachim burghardt – he is quite proficient in bivouacs http://www.bergfotos.de/gipfelbiwaksen.htm
I did some bivouacs this year, but I generally prefer Kaiserwetter! http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Kaiserwetter or at least a stable Inversionswetterlage: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inversion_(meteorology)
Contact me, if you need a mate for a tour.-
This story of JJ1 is pretty sad to me. I’d heard it before from friends here in Munich, but never read about it till now. I’m glad there are a few wild places left.
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Super-hyper-mega-important addition to your winter bivouac list: a closed-cell sleeping pad to insulate you from snow or the cold ground — something like a Z-Rest or Ridge Rest. You can’t warm either up by any meaningful amount, so it’d suck heat out of you all night. Two’s an even better idea.
Another requirement: WEAR A WARM HAT WHILE YOU SLEEP. Exposed head == another easy place for the air to suck heat out of. A mummy bag helps if you don’t have a hat, but it’s still not really sufficient on its own.
Also consider two sleeping bags rather than one as a way to deal with cooler temperatures if you don’t handle cold as well as you’d like. This depends on the temp of the main bag, of course; I’ve only tried this combining, say, a 20°F mummy and a 50°F summer fleece bag. It’s probably much less necessary if you’re starting with a 0°F bag. (This all depends on the outside temperature range, of course.)
Another practical tip: when you’re ready to head to sleep, switch into a set of clothes solely for sleeping. Whatever you wore during the day will have some sweat on it, and wet == cold in wintertime. (Even worse: wet + cold + cotton. Cotton is completely non-insulating when wet. Cotton kills. Get good synthetic clothes, long underwear and other stuff for day use, and use that instead.) Switch back to day clothes when you wake up.
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Buddy up with someone that goes backpacking a lot and go on a trip with them the first time. If you suggest an easy hike you might even talk them into carrying the extras like a bag of wine.
My one piece of advice would be to pack as light as possible. If you search for “light backpacking” you’ll get a lot of advice. Just take one set of really warm clothes in layers and a really good sleeping bag. (And I’d wait until summer, if I were you.)
As far as wild animals go, the one I always get confused about is brown bears versus black bears. With one you act big, with the other you act dead. One eats dead things and one doesn’t. Although when I actually ran into one, I didn’t get a choice as my dog decided she needed to defend me and started barking at it. It ran away so it must have been the kind that ate dead things.
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1. No bears, mountain lions or wolves in the Alps, and they are unlikely to come back. Too many people. If you go eastwards near the Czech Border, or further east to Slovakia, Poland, Ukraine I think you could find some.
3. The Alpenverein and its equivalents in Italia, Switzerland and Austria operate huts which offer simple accomodation. It can be rather touristy there in summer, but many of these huts have a so-called winter room even when they are closed: a sheltered place to sleep, sometimes even with a wood stove. Also, there are so called Biwakschachteln in the Alps, see http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biwakschachtel .
Unless you insist on the tent, both Biwak huts and winter rooms may be acceptable alternatives which you don’t have to lug around.
4. If you want real adventure, try the Tatra mountains in Slovakia / Czech Republik / Hungary. Or anything else in eastern Europe. The Alps are great, but there are many, many hikers there, as well as a certain amount of infrastructure for them. If you want to be on your own and alone for longer than a few hours, you might find them a little crowded.
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Oh, and I forgot: take the train and buses. There’s no need to burden the Alps with even more cars
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And the last one (feel free to moderate this away after reading): Please, please stay on the paths. You are not the endangered one there, the plants and animals around you are. We have little nature left here in Europe, and the Alps are rather fragile.
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Thanks for the tips Sonja!
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Hey Nat, check out my blog (hiking tag), there are several hikes around Munich I’d recommend. Zugspitze (Höllental route with via ferrata)is best when the weather is nice in summer. Lenggries and Wendelstein might still be possible to hike now, though soon it’ll be ski season there, when your biggest danger will be getting run over by either a grooming machine or a half-drunk wannabe racer
No worry about bears in Germany. There was one that wandered in a couple years ago… it terrorized sheep pastures until German farmers were authorized to shoot it :-/
Cheers, Dave
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If European bears are anything like US bears, they’re usually more afraid of you than you are of them. The east-coast black bears I’ve seen almost invariably bolted — not an exaggeration — when they saw me. One or two watched me lazily from a safe distance. Noise and talking would have scared them away (if I’d wanted to scare them away!). I don’t have experience with west-coast bears, but again, they still mostly leave you alone. Conventional wisdom is you fight small black bears and play dead with large brown/grizzly bears, but I don’t recall rigorous studies of the matter; it seems to me DON’T PANIC is a very solid first step, then you can evaluate from there.
Regarding mountain lions, if you see one in their habitats you’re lucky — they’re even more reclusive than bears. Non-small adults are basically safe from them. Kids, pets (should be leashed, a dog is a mountain lion’s idea of a solid meal), and smaller adults might have some reason to worry, but just Act Big (raise hands, open up jacket, etc.) and they’re going to retreat.
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…and also hike in a group if you think you have particular reason to worry about mountain lions due to size.
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You don’t need to worry about wild aminals in the Alps. Avalanches are a bigger threat. Consider the Lawinenwarndienst and take their warnings seriously before going camping in the snow.
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