Hiking around Finnentrop

End of July, beginning of August seems to be the high season for vacation. Every year we see a lot less people, until they come back in something like September again. As well as the number of visitors on my website, I could see a clear decline in the number of participants this time, which was somewhat reassuring as the second corona wave is apparently arriving.

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And the great thing is, we haven’t had the yearly heat wave at least so far this year. Today was also a perfect day for hiking, with a bit of clouds everywhere, but we could see a blue sky quite regularly.

Finnentrop is a very small place, just like every city inside Sauerland. For some reason, it took quite some time to enter nature. Fortunately, there was nearly no car passing by, so it was not that stressful to go through that area. Also since the sun was not shining, we hardly felt heat there. I guess in the heatwave of last year, we would have been dead in the first 30 min.

But then as soon as we entered the forest, it looked like it would never end. And just like everywhere in Sauerland, there were hills everywhere. For the small number of new people today, it must have been quite tough.

I might have said that I’m not a big fan of Sauerland before. Indeed, compared to the Eifel, which is just as famous, Sauerland has never really impressed me. Today I got a somewhat similar impression, but still the hills offer a great view over the mountain ranges. It’s a pity that the photos don’t allow you to see the spatial variety of different places.

Just like every time, some people were far in front of us, some others were staggering behind. I was in the last group, consisting of maybe 10 people. Zaman’s group was so far ahead that it took us around 10 min more to reach the place for break.

I chose the place because there was one restaurant, but there were also random public benches there, so that we could all sit somewhere comfortably. The restaurant was supposed to be open until 2pm, but we essentially forced them to stay open longer, which may or may not have been a good surprise in this small place, where there was absolutely no one else to see.

When we finished the break, we followed a huge slope shooting up to the highest place in the area, but still the town extended to that place. I was wondering what the life is like for the kids who go to school from that place.

Regarding the altitude, it was quite nice after the break, but then we bumped into one path towards the end. This was one path where I wasn’t sure if it existed or not, a kind of common problem in Sauerland. We simply forced ourselves through and reached the river (that goes through Finnentrop) and went back to the original point.

As we reached the train station right after one train was gone, meaning we had to wait for the next one for nearly an hour, we bought ice creams and went to the river. As I was not quite expecting to spend much time there and the temperature was not really high, I didn’t bring my swimming stuff today, which turned out to be a stupid idea, especially regarding the fact that it was legal in this river. Well, maybe next time.