My Second Autofreies Lauteral Bike Ride

Bike riders on the B270. Photo by J.

Sunday was a great day! Some friends and I grabbed our bikes (or, more accurately, 2 of the 3 bikes were mine ;) and headed out for the car-free day on the B270 road from Kaiserslautern to Lauterecken.

I did this ride last year with some friends (read about it here) and loved it. It's a day to enjoy the two-lane highway without the threat of motorized vehicles. Most people ride bicycles but we also saw rollerbladers, skateboarders, and even some unicyclists! It's a great day for all ages; we saw everything from grandparents to children along the route.

Along the way, there are food stands, oompa music dance parties, rock music parties, plenty of town fests, sausage and meat stands (lots of them!), booths with community information, and even bike repair stations. It's basically a 20 mile-long party. That's right up my alley!

We began at the Gartenschau in Kaiserslautern, the first stop, and rode along the river to join the B270. In Otterbach, we had the friendly Technisches Hilfswerk people adjust the bike seat on my old bike that J was riding and add air to my bike's tires.

Our next stop was at the hippie corner. Okay, it wasn't called that, but it certainly appealed to my inner hippie with an organic snack stand and a drum circle. We enjoyed some Holunder schorles (elderberry-fizzy water mixes) from the friendly ladies at the Bund Freunde der Erde stand, then proceeded to play drums with the welcoming drum instructor. Everyone was jamming!

My friends were hungry after all that jamming so we made a meat-packed stop. M had saumagen, which is a very typical regional meat for the Pfalz (more info here). J. gleefully announced that Helmut Kohl, a former German chancellor who was from this area, always proudly offered it to guests. We snickered as it is not something that everyone would like; M's serving of it looked like a huge hunk of meat, but she did like it. I could imagine a few international guests choking it down and trying to appear to enjoy it.

Meat fest! From left, clockwise: steak, Rotewurst, and Saumagen. Photo by J.

The next stop was my favorite: we visited with a herd of Haflinger horses on the side of the road. I fed them some delectable grass that was just out of their reach and J played horse paparazzi.

A horse enjoying some of the grass I gave it. Photo by J.

We finished the ride in Wolfstein, stopping to eat some ice cream. Originally, we had planned to bike all the way to the end, Lauterecken, but a sudden downpour of rain divested us of that idea. We loaded our bikes onto the train (which became more and more cramped with bikers) and returned home. It was a great ride! Had the rain held off, we probably would have biked back for a total of 30 miles, but the 15 mile ride was also good. Even better yet was that I was barely sore afterward, a welcome change from last year.

Roadside Candy Machines: Wolfstein

Another machine with bars on the front of it. There are "stink bombs" inside, so maybe that's a good thing? See in Wolfstein.

Wolfstein Kulinarische Wanderung

Today my friend and I took the train to Wolfstein, which is north of Kaiserslautern, for the Kulinarische Wanderung. It was a culinary hike through the town, up the hills with lined with farm pastures, and back down again with stops along the way to sample regional wine and cuisine. Shops in town were also open for Sunday shopping (not that the town had a lot of shops, but a few were open as part of the festivities).

It was a wonderful way to enjoy the countryside, get some exercise on the 6K walk, and work up an appetite for the delicious offerings along the way. At the beginning of the hike in downtown Wolfstein, I bought a small wine glass on a lanyard for 5 euros. With that, I could sample wines at the stations for 1 euro per serving and get a little booklet stamped at each place. I won't lie; I felt rather dorky wearing a lanyard, but I feel that way wearing any lanyard. I guess it was slightly cooler because it at least held a wine glass!

There were six stops along the way. As we were walking along, I realized that the town was familiar. We had biked to it during the Autofreies Lauteral Bike Ride last August (read more here). On the route, we stopped at the second stand at the bridge and each enjoyed a bratwurst filled with chestnuts from Metzgerei Frölich. Yes, I normally don't eat meat, but once in a while I'll eat wurst. Don't judge. Anyway, it was amazing and very rich!
 
Our next stop was for flammkuchen at Flammkuchen Serr, next to the horse pastures. It was tasty and I washed it down with a very sweet German white wine from Weingut Wolf. I love sweet whites and it hit the spot!

The line for Flammkuchen.

Seating adjacent to the horse pasture.

From there, we powered up the hill to the Panoramaweg, or the panorama path. It was a beautiful view of the town with several more stops. I had another small glass of white wine at one booth and then pickled mirabelles in Armagnac, a type of liqueur.

Isn't this a lovely view?

Cooking Lachs (salmon) on the wood-fired stove.

 On the way back down to town, we saw these double trampolines (the red one is tiny and hard to see, but it's under the blue one). I had to stifle the urge to yell, "double trampolines! What does it mean? Sooo intense!!" Don't worry; I didn't actually do it.

We finished our culinary hike with a Kalkbergwerk tour of the mines and then rode the train back to Kaiserslautern. It was a lovely day spent drinking wine, eating delicious food, and taking a hike to enjoy the scenery. I heartily recommend it!

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I read that there will be another culinary hike in Rodenbach coming up on 20-21 September. It would be worth a visit, if only to reuse the dorky wine cup on a lanyard thing ;) (at least I think it's possible to do so, as it looks to be put on by the same organization)  More information is here.

Oh, and don't make the mistake that I did and lose the card that gets stamped at each stop. Apparently one can turn it in at the end with all the stations marked and get a small gift. I missed out on a free bottle of water.