grown-ups like to get lost

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This post is about a 21km walk from Leimersheim to Lingenfeld. We learn about corn mazes and find a place that serves burgers.

Swole Stefan had been right: Fritz, the owner of the farm with the corn maze, was a kind man. He let us pitch the tent under an overhanging roof on his premises, and in the morning he and his buddy Fabian gave us coffee and hot water.

Then they showed us the corn maze.

the maze

Or actually it wasn’t much of a maze anymore. The season usually went from June to September, and by now the plants had dried up and lost a lot of their original height. It was still impressive, though.

Fritz had been creating his annual corn maze since the year 2000. They would plant the field in late spring, trying to make sure the plants interspersed, not in neat rows that people would be able to peak through. Then, when the plants had reached about a foot or so in height, they would draw up a plan for the maze on paper, and they would go to work with a lawnmower.

There were six boxes with stamps at different locations in the maze, and visitors were supposed to find them all and collect the stamps on the back of a postcard.

Lots of people came with their kids, and Fritz had set up a playground and a pedal car track for them. But the maze wasn’t just for children.

“Grown-ups like to get lost, too” Fritz said.

burgers and rain

When we continued on our way north along the Rhine, we had learned that the mosquito problem we had been dealing with was mainly due to a recent flooding: the government had tried to spray the mosquito-infested areas in order to prevent them from hatching larvae, but a minor flooding of the river had washed the pesticides away. Good for the mosquitoes, bad for us.

We walked until we reached the commercial zone of Germersheim. It wasn’t a particularly pretty place to walk around in, but we found a place that served greasy, plant-based burgers and chili cheese fries. It was glorious.

Then we spent the next hour or so huddling under the roof of a gas station, while a short but heavy rain was coming down around us.

pictures

the walk from Leimersheim to Lingenfeld:

Fabian and Fritz in their corn maze

in the corn maze

you’re supposed to collect stamps in order to complete the maze

local villagers walking for a cause

the bicycle path along the Rhine near Leimersheim

the fields next to the Rhine

found some food

I sit in front of a gas station, waiting out the rain.

where we got lost

train crossing

camp near Lingenfeld