2015-12-14 50 7

Location

After the slightly disappointing geohash 2015-12-11_50_7 last Friday, I saw the chance for more adventure when the geohash of the day appeared in my vincinity, afar only 33 km by car, in the woods. It is a graticule of many woods and therefore a promise to solid adventure halfway.

Participants

Burgman

Plans

The plan was driving to the K17 overland road, finding a parking lot in the surroundings of the wood path and marching on.

Expedition

On the map it looked like a short detour from a nearby wood path. Unfortunately, I do not have much time to do the journeys so I calculated 90 min. for it - 30 min driving, 15 to reach the place, 15 to get back to the car, 30 to get home. Yes, a tight calculation.
For it was already dark when I started I had three torches with me; one with accumulators, two with dynamos. In the wood between Schreckenberg (meaning "Scare-Mountain"!) and Stockum it would be pitch black at the time I arrived. Again I had my Android device and, this time, another (smaller) camera to make the required photos. I felt good equipped with this, also I was in warm clothing and outdoor shoes. The temperature was about 9C while the weather was cloudy but had no rain.

The ride was pretty much standard while I followed the navigation system. When I reached the K17 road, I passed through fog, a sure sign of adventure! The road itself was rather empty, and even with Highbeam it stretched into a tree-accompanied darkness.
The nearest real parking place (for wanderers) was nearly 2.5 km away from the place I was looking for, and there was no path beside the street where I could have walked. But I found the small street leading into the woods which I had discovered on the map earlier. It was the only place here where one could pass over the Derenbach brook without getting wet. I parked aside and went on.

But on the whole length of the the narrow bridge, from side to side, stood a gigantic woodcutter's truck, fully loaded with tree trunks. Nobody was there. I circumvented the truck, partly walking under it for the bridge had no railing. Only a half step more on the right side and I would have fallen into the brook. But finally I bypassed the long vehicle and was alone in the wood. My first torchlight was not very bright but it was sufficient. So I started the Radar application of the Geohash Droid and followed the compass.
As I found out, this way was heavily imprinted by tracks of the lorry so the wet ground was very uneven and slippery. Yes, this was becoming a better adventure than last time...

It was so dark now that I nearly missed the branching of the way. A smaller path forked to the right side, going more upward. The path changed from rather muddy to definitive muddy. To get into the right direction, I had to leave it though for the last 96 m. I had to climb up a slope to enter the real forest. The compass pointed towards high Christmas trees what was very fitting to the season. But most were already taken out here so the way was steep but mostly unhindered by trees. Then, about 10 m before the wall of trees, I had reached the spot. As seen last week at 2015-12-11_50_7, it wandered all over the place so I followed the coordinates to get some decent photos of proof again. After a while running around in the dark between the undergrowth, I placed the device on a tree stump and let the spot find me. That gave me time to make some pictures of me standing there.

I had used more time than I had thought. Especially the search for the perfect last 5 metres walking on the hillside had cost me nearly a quarter of an hour. On the way back I ran at first but then decided that it was simply too risky to run downwards a slippery, bumpy trail in - more or less - sheer darkness. So I slowed, passed by truck again, took two photos of it and got back to my car.
Conclusion: this was more the geohashing adventure I was looking for.