2024-03-20 52 13

Location

Just east of the town of Halbe, Landkreis Dahme-Spreewald, Brandenburg - in a little forest just east of a lake with the weired name "Karosseriesee" (Car Body Lake).

Participants

Jens1964

Plans

Jens1964

I will take the train from and will probably arrive in Halbe at 4.38 p.m. Taking a look at the historical train station building (which is said to be an "Esperanto Station" now) and walking through this little town which has numerous little lake seems to be a great idea, but may be I will head into the forest first in order to avoid running out of time if there might be problems to access the hash (which seem to be very improbable). Finally there should be time - even on a quite early spring day - to remember all the ones who lost there live in the Battle of Halbe, one of the last big, senseless battles of World War II.

Expedition

I took the train (RE 7) from Berlin-Ostbahnhof (3.38 p.m.) to Halbe (4.38 p.m) and arrived on time. The buildings of the little station in this town look nice, but are fenced in and abandoned. No sign of an "Esperanto Station" which obviously was planned as a kind of cultural meeting point there. No station pub or coffee shop as well, just the silence of a little sleepy town.

Very soon I run into a number of information signs and memorials for the Battle of Halbe which was fought here in late April 1945. I realized that the forest I searched for was part of the big battlefield. Most of the people/soldiers who were killed in action died in the forests around Halbe. Serious and sad thoughts were mixed into the fun of getting closer to my second geohash. What a coincidence (?) that this game brought me to this place.

Getting closer to the hash was easy. Walking down a silent street and turning right at the "Karosseriesee" (still no idea why and when it got this name) I reached the small pine forest. Nobody seemed to be their, just a little track which I had to follow. 150 meter from the geohash I saw the following sign and took a photo:

"Achtung! Hier wurde schon mancher mit einem Wildschwein verwechselt! Bitte gehen Sie aufrecht und schwenken Sie einen Hut oder ein Tuch. Der Jagdpächter" (Attention! Some people were already mixed-up with wild boars here! Please walk upright and wave your hat or a scarf).

Serious? Well, written in old German Fractur font which means that it probably (In this moment I saw a woman walking with two big dogs (wolves?) directly through the forest, almost trampling on the geohash probably without knowing it. She saw me, turned around and disappeared back into the town. I am afraid that I scared her - and that was before I began to grin.

Just two minutes later I was at the geohash, just a few meters from an old abandoned hunting stand. I danced around, got it, took the obligatory photos and took a deep breath. A very silent place, peaceful in a strange way, very good air to breath, but still not the place to party or celebrate a geohash in a too enthusiastic way.

I walked back to the station (just 12 minutes) and took the RE 7 train back into Berlin. Wonderful warm early spring weather, a very special expedition, thanks to Geohashing. Photos will follow.