A hike with CUTIE;-)

 When I was in Marburg, the magic troll and I set out to do some hike to our favourite place... it has become sort of a tradition to have a look if things are all in place... and those Marburgian hills are simply beautiful.

 In case you wondered how she gets all her gear around, the 4 - people tent is in her bag as well as a car, a railway station, a chainsaw, an entire goldsmithy, a carpenter´s shop, and some other things to be treated discreetly, including a worm hole and another universe. She told me the secret, but I have sworn to keep silent. That much I can say that she once had a friend called Aoífe...

She loves chicken...*ggg*

 The light was radiant and warming our hearts... we do not want any gems of treelight...

 ...for it´s there all the time.

 This is the view towards the Marburgian castle. It is nice to dream that artists and writers like Clemens Brentano, the REAL Grimm brothers, Goethe, Schiller, Hermann Hesse and many more went for a stroll into the same hills. I find Marburg breathes this atmosphere still. The fairy tales are alive and well there.

Take for instance this horse head. Okay, so you all know it from other posts, but I am just fascinated by the idea that someone just gets out into the woods with his chainsaw and does some fun carving and then leaves it there. In my hometown few even consider doing this (most are not even capable of spelling their own name correctly, let alone doing something with their hands not ordered by the long-time-unemployed-integration program), and most certainly would not do it for free. If they would, the authorities would hunt them down as easy prey, for they are just artists without being licensed and could be jailed much easier than the professional criminals (bankers, head citizens, pimps, drug dealers).

Over here, someone just gets out and does it, and does it lovingly. Of course there was a tiny badge advertising you could buy stuff like this, but hey, that´s a small price to pay for a bit of enchantment in the woods near the city. And everywhere around people keep telling tales and legends, doing it naturally and consciously, telling and listening. Talk about culture and cultural diversity without sacrificing the soul to Mammon. paying tribute, maybe, but doing no shortcuts. This is beautiful.

 As is this;-).

 We took to the deeper woods, and who might be living here?

 Found some spruce sprouts for syrup and tea.

 Hello, ancient, how do?

 There was a birdhouse in the stem of that old tree and a stand for watching and servicing it.

 Beside the trail a spring waited with blossoms of Iris...

 Over hill and yonder dale we went....

 It is traditional to ahve a cuppa tea, and here´s one of those shots...

And beside the trail I found some Jasper for applications in knife handles or summat...

 And home again we went, through those green, green meadows....

A beautiful stroll. Thanks, my wonderful magic troll, for those wonderful outings...

Marburg - a lovely weekend with the loveliest person in my life

Ah, yes. I have not written for quite a long time. Fact is, I have too much to do, and some logistical problems...

But in no way there has nothing happened.For instance, I went for a lovely visit to Marburg to meet with my lovely magic troll. And, while not everything we did is for the public;-), we also went on a nice little foraging troll stroll.

The path led into the foothills that offer a beautiful view of Marburg castle. It is funny, many of Germany´s greatest poets, such as Rainer Maria Rilke, Clemens Brentano, Johann Wolfgang Goethe, Friedrich Schiller and many, many more have lived or visited this city. And, visiting a pub concert on Friday at Molly Malone´s Irish pub, I got the impression that at least folk music and romanticism is alive and well still. More so, I have the feeling that every inch of city, university, and, even more so, the woods, breathes the spirit of poetry.

This is a photo by the magic troll that shows a bit of the atmosphere. There is poetry in the autumn, too.

And as we came up the hill, the little one whining, complaining and on the verge of tears (because I was going too slow;-)), we saw this chainsaw carving sculpture standing in the middle of nowhere, which someone obviously had made just for the fun of it.

Into the woods we ventured, to the site of an old market garden.

Recently it had burnt down, and it lies in ruins. There is a very strange air about the place, with car wrecks silently rotting there (and, of course, polluting the ground in the process), with the plants growing wildly. It is strange that we are only accustomed of our pet plants growing tiny... and suddenly you are faced with a giant Thuya tree and flower "trees". It is as if nature would strike back there, and violently. The place will rot, and the plants, once enslaved, will destroy the ruins, unto they will lie submerged in wreckage, beyond recognition. I would wish this fate will befall some big-term crop seed corporations selling former ABC weapons as herbicides, too, if I was allowed a wish, but I am not.

The woods, made from alien plants, lay utterly peaceful.

 Then it was off into the deeper woods, foraging for bay boletus and other ´shrooms,sloe berries, quince and rowan berries. At a hunting stand in the middle of nowhere, we rested, and had a cuppa tea. Note the deranged portion of our little camp belongs to me;-).

 I simply love this picture. Funny, how it´s always the weird things I love, like the tip of her nose bending into the kuksa, and her look following, and then the pupils of her eyes go up, and then she smiles. I am right grateful for every hour we are able to spend together. We also did a bit of Ömpf-troll watching, and she made a sketch of the little fellow we observed, and I gues it´s already onlineon her facebook account. Just search Triona ni Erc on facebook;-). I know she will hate me for this...;-).

And this was the outcome of the day:

We made a great dinner, with a topinambur cream soup I will remember for years to come, it was that tasty, and it was not me who made it;-), and some deer stew with quince and parsnip, with a delicious chutney of rowan berry and quince. NOMMMM!!!!!