Aug 22: Rommerskirchen - Horrem

I made this trip to check out what kind of edible plants grew around me, and I was already off to a good start. Not sure what these are though to be honest.

The red ones are rose hips of the dog-rose (Hagebutten der Hundsrose) and are edible, pretty high in vitamin C too, more than 20 times as high as oranges actually. The blue ones I'm not sure. Generally it's not a good a idea to eat fruits that look similar to those unless you really know what you're doing, because a bunch of them are poisonous.

I didn't only take pictures of plants though.

I took pictures of art too! #WürthTang

That in the background is one of Europe's dirtiest coal power plants.

Some more plants. I ate a few of the yellow flowers thinking they were chamomile (Kamille). They weren't.

These were all growing together on a patch next to a highway crossing.

Another pretty weird one. Probably not blossoming yet.

Entering the wind park.

Yup. Looks like a wind turbine.

And another one.

That long hill in the background was my goal for the day.

I wonder if I could have charged my phone here.

I'm sure they wouldn't notice if I took some of their electricity. Seems like they have enough.

These things look cool too.

One last pic of the station.

Wasting no space.

I think this was about the closest I got to the power plant during this trip.

This is also where I took my first longer break after about two hours of walking. Should have taken more of those longer breaks though because by the end of the trip my feet and legs were on fire again.

I reached Büsdorf and took another short break.

A chapel in Büsdorf.

Leaving Büsdorf, looking back at the power plant.

Getting closer to the forest on the hill.

I think these might sloes (Schlehen), which are edible, but I wasn't sure, so I didn't try any.

This should be sea-buckthorn, also called sandthorn (Sanddorn), and as poisonous as it might look, it's actually edible. Despite its English name, it's in a different family than actual buckthorn, which is poisonous. I only looked it up after the trip though, so I didn't try it either.

Getting even closer to the forest.

Finally something I was sure I could eat.

There were hundreds if not thousands of ripe blackberries, then another few hundred that were already withered and another few hundred that weren't ripe yet. I think I spent almost half an hour picking and eating the ripe ones and there were still more than half of them left at the end.

If my camera was better, you'd be able to see the skyline of Cologne in the background. You can still really faintly see the TV tower in this pic though, at about 40% of the width of the image, right behind the green triangle.

This was at the foot of the hill.

Time for another break.

And up we go.

Some more random plants.

And some more.

At first I thought this path would lead somewhere cool, but I only found a few freshly planted baby trees.

No idea what this is for.

At this point I was already pretty close to the top of the hill and took another short break.

Ran into some deer here, but you can't make them out in the pic. When I got closer, they jumped into the bushes. When I got even closer, one of them was dumb enough to jump back out on the path again and just looked at me for a few seconds before running away again. That's not how you survive, my deer.

Now this was kind of weird. To see the moon that high up when it was also still relatively bright outside. What was even weirder was that from then on the moon actually started sinking again. Once the sun was gone, the moon had sunk to about eye level, and another few hours later, the moon was gone too. Is that how it's supposed to work?

"At the Stairway to Heaven". Also noteworthy: the mark of a campfire on the ground right under the "no fires" sign above the name sign.

This seems to be the Stairway to Heaven, seen from "Heaven", but I was going to go further up.

Looks like someone already signed this bench for me.

After another half hour of walking I reached the top of the hill.

Right as the sun was setting.

Now these actually are chamomile. I'd found some more before along the way and depending on its intensity their taste ranged from chamomile tea to chamomile hand soap.

It was starting to get dark and at this point I had still planned to sleep in the forest. But that was going to change a bit later.

I think this is supposed to be some kind of outdoor office.

Plowing your field on a Saturday night. That's the farm life.

Back at the Stairway to Heaven as you might even recognize if you compare it to this picture from earlier. Getting back there wasn't actually my intention though. Taking the wrong way down from the top of the hill wasted me about half an hour.

This spooky light was a lamp at the feet of a Jesus cross, but because it was so dark, you could only make out the cross when you were standing right in front of it, while the light was already spooking you out from afar. After a short break at the cross, I decided I wouldn't sleep in the forest and just head back home, even though I originally had another forest on another hill planned as my goal for the second day. I wasn't tired enough to sleep, but I kind of had enough of walking too.

So I spent the night walking through the forest to the nearest train station instead. This was on a bridge crossing the tracks that are used to bring the coal from one of the near mining pits to the power plant. That blue light in the distance is the power plant. No idea where those weird diagonal lines in the image come from though.

Three hours of walking later I reached the nearest town, and my feet and legs had started to really hurt at this point, but I still walked to the next town to take the train to Cologne at 4 a.m.

I reached Cologne at about 4:30 but still had to wait another two hours for the first train of the day back home. The first hour I hung out at the main station (not the one in this picture). I kind of expected it to be swarmed with homeless people at this time of day (or night rather), but they probably all slept outside because of how warm it was. Instead, the main station was full of people waiting for the first train of the day back home like me. No wanderers though, mostly young adults heading back from the club. It was a pretty weird picture compared to what the station usually looks like.