First Volkmarch!

Ok. Yesterday was definitely full of surprises.

Yesterday, J and I went to our first Volksmarch.  Just getting there was an adventure.

We left our house only to realize that there was a major detour right outside our village only for that day.  During the detour, which took us through a lot of side roads and small towns, we called ahead and were given the address to the Volksmarch location, since we were unable to meet up with the caravan on time.  While on detour, we kept having to double back because our Garmin kept redirecting us toward the only major road...which was under construction.  Forced to improvise, we went to a town we knew would get us to the autobahn away from the construction.  Enroute, we also got stalled by...among all things...a cattle crossing!  We never see cows around here, so we don't know where they came from.  Even the locals in the town were in the street watching.

We finally got there on time, amazingly.  The Volksmarch seems to be assembled by the locals of the town with a few "representatives" of the "IVV."  It stands for Internationaler Volksportverband.  As part of the whole spiel, one can get a card that the hosts can then stamp as evidence that you walked around one of the routes.  Interestingly, the man who gave us our cards was American, but insisted that Volksmarching is a sport and droned at us for 10 minutes about how it is a serious sport.

Personally, I was irked by that notion.  One, there is no competition to Volksmarching as there is no possible winner and there is no judge or referee.  Two, the only recognition you get is a badge after x amount of kilometers marched.  I effectively consider Volkmarching equivalent to people camping.  People do it because they like to.  They don't compete against people so much as it's just to say that you did it.  And beyond that, people ultimately do it because it's fun, not because they want to say that it's a sport.  Others may disagree with me on this one, but until they do, I consider my generalization on the money :)

The Volkmarch itself was nice.  It was effectively a hike around the hosting village and through the surrounding farmland.   Very pretty.  Gorgeous day too.  At stops along the way, locals offered drinks for very low charge (1 euro for a bottle of beer, free iced tea, 1 euro for a sandwich, etc.) and free water for dogs.  We did indeed bring Etsy along, but unlike our friends' dogs, we kept her on a leash.  We also saw a couple of remote controlled airplanes take off and fly around along the way.  The hosting town also had a house someone built with a lowering drawbridge and moat with large fish in it!  It was pretty impressive.

Of the presented distance options of 5km, 10km, and 20km, we walked 11km (the 10km route), which was a breeze for all of us.  We chatted with the friends of J's co-worker who invited us along.  We also had beef in horseradish sauce and a HUGE brat with fries in curry sauce once we arrived back at the town house.  J and I also shared a cake.  Again, all of this was made by the locals and was inexpensive.

We are invited to the next Volksmarch J's co-worker is coordinating.  We may go, depending upon what other craziness may pop up in our schedule.  It was worth going to for certain.

Once we got back, through the detour again, we took a wrong turn and tried to go through our village's "downtown" area only to be blocked by a "Baumarkt."  Likewise, this was only going on this day.  We had to actually leave the village in order to get around it to get home.  We decided to check out the Baumarkt anyway.  They were selling cheeses, herbs, belts, hats, wallets, bread, jewelry, watches, baskets, and a few other knick-knacky things.  There was also food and drink in the town hall.  We saw a band leaving, of which we were sad to see that we had missed the music.  We decided to buy some cheese, and ended up buying 1.5 kg on accident (3.5 pounds).  We didn't realize we were going to be buying that much, but we had some samples so we know that we already like it.  We then made dinner, ate dinner, and crashed for the night :)

Today, among other things, we made Sweet and Spicy Chicken and Mushrooms Florentine.  Good stuff!  We're presently figuring out where we will travel on our next four day weekend.  Our new couch is coming in tomorrow, which is good because we have to return the bulk of the loaner furniture the Army provided.  This loaner couch can leave you in aches after sitting in it for a while.  No complaints though.  Can't argue with free.  We also have an invitation for a Fourth of July Fireworks display.  This will truly be interesting considering we are in Germany.