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Apr. 7th, 2012 05:35 pmA few pictures from last weekend's hiking tours. They're nothing much (the photos, that is; the hiking tours were fantastic) since they were all taken in a bit of a rush, because right now I'm more interested in exercise than photography, and giving yourself a pretext for stopping every few minutes isn't exactly conductive to achieving a greater level of fitness, but maybe they manage to capture the mood at least a little bit. Sunday's tour was on the Hohe Wand (for personal reference: Waldegg - Waldegger Haus - Kleine Kanzel - Sky Walk - Packles - Grünbach, almost 9 hrs.) The week before temperatures had dropped again, so when I started out from Waldegg there was snow almost right down to the train-station, and if it hadn't taken me already 90 mins. to get there, I'd probably have been discouraged and turned back. As it is, I'm glad it had, and I didn't, because it was absolutely gorgeous, especially when the sun was out, although also wintery and forbidding with an icy wind and occasional snowfall when it wasn't. I was walking through snow almost constantly until I came to the sun-exposed, slightly lower south-western edge of the mountain in the afternoon, but since it was only a few centimetres of new snow on dry ground, it wasn't icy or slippery, just rather picturesque...
Monday morning I had a dentist appointment, which wasn't the best of ideas in my currently, shall we say, a bit emotionally volatile state, because even a routine check-up and the suggestion of dental hygiene in the near future was enough to almost trip me into a panic attack, but after lunch and having calmed down a bit I decided to go for a quick hike after all, took the train to Bad Vöslau and went up to the Eisernes Tor. Sunny and warm enough for nothing but a t-shirt at least on my way up, trees in gardens were already blossoming, and looking out from the train window the landscape had taken on a green hue. Further up it was still pretty brown and bare, although also dotted with primroses, Leberblümchen, pink/purple erica shrubs and other early flowers, and if you looked closer, buds were beginning to open, too. Came down to the train-station in Baden at dusk, tired and a bit sore, but more balanced than I've felt in a while, and something of that has thankfully stuck during the week...
(It was also rather gratifying to note that despite not doing very much during winter, for the first time I really noticed an effect of all that walking and hiking, with less stopping and having to catch my breath on steep climbs... Definitely looking forward to Rax and Schneeberg this summer.)
( more... )
Monday morning I had a dentist appointment, which wasn't the best of ideas in my currently, shall we say, a bit emotionally volatile state, because even a routine check-up and the suggestion of dental hygiene in the near future was enough to almost trip me into a panic attack, but after lunch and having calmed down a bit I decided to go for a quick hike after all, took the train to Bad Vöslau and went up to the Eisernes Tor. Sunny and warm enough for nothing but a t-shirt at least on my way up, trees in gardens were already blossoming, and looking out from the train window the landscape had taken on a green hue. Further up it was still pretty brown and bare, although also dotted with primroses, Leberblümchen, pink/purple erica shrubs and other early flowers, and if you looked closer, buds were beginning to open, too. Came down to the train-station in Baden at dusk, tired and a bit sore, but more balanced than I've felt in a while, and something of that has thankfully stuck during the week...
(It was also rather gratifying to note that despite not doing very much during winter, for the first time I really noticed an effect of all that walking and hiking, with less stopping and having to catch my breath on steep climbs... Definitely looking forward to Rax and Schneeberg this summer.)
( more... )