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The small town Oberstdorf at the foot of the Alps is a nice place for various outdoor activities like hiking, cycling ans skiing. But there is one more thing which most people are probably not aware off: When the nights are clear one can see lots and lots of stars - even the Milky Way is visible from here.

So while most of the outdoor activists are sleeping great things happen out there 🙂 On a clear evening we took our telescope and spent one night among the stars. Below are some photos of the Milky Way. Some more photos of this evening can be found here.

It was a quite hot afternoon. At about 3pm the weather forecast was still great for the rest of the day. So I spontaneously decided that a little movement can't hurt today 🙂 So I packed a small bag and started to hike from Oberstdorf to the Gaissalpe.

The sun was quite hot but in the forrest it was acceptable. When I arrived at the Gaissalpe I still felt quite good and so I decided to continue walking to the Gaissalpsee. One serpentine followed another but after a while I finally arrived at the lake. The sun was reflected by the turquoise surface of the lake and glinted under the blue sky. Here I made a longer break and enjoyed the landscape.

After the break I felt quite good again and so I decided to go on to the summit of the Rubihorn. The rest of the ascent was luckily in an area without sun. When I finally arrived at the summit I was the only one up there.

I had a clear look down to Oberstdorf and to the north. I just love this place 🙂 For the way down I chose the descent to the Seealpe. It is maybe a little steeper at the beginning but I just didn't want to go all the same way back. At about 10pm I safely arrived back at Oberstdorf.

My conclusion of this day: Sometimes spontaneous decisions are the best 🙂

Today we decided to do a hike that is not too difficult because our muscles were still aching from yesterday. So we walked from Oberstdorf to Gerstruben and from there we continued to the Dietersbachalp. Now the ascent to the Älpelesattel starts. It is about 1780 m high. To reach this point we had to walk through lots of grass, scrubs and trees. It was not so nice, because it was really hot today and there was almost no fresh air between all the plants. Having reached the highest point we took a long break and enjoyed the view to the famous summit of the Höfats. We also saw some people climbing up there! Because of the steep grass paths it is dangerous to go up there. From the Älpelesattel we go back down to the KĂ€seralpe. There we enjoy a drink before continuing to the Oytalhaus. From here we take the scooter back to Oberstdorf which is a lot of fun. All in all a path with beautiful views, but I would prefer to walk it in the autumn when the plants are not so big anymore.

Today was said to be a very sunny day, so I decided to take the Nebelhorn cable car up to the Edmund Probst Haus. From there a very beautiful path leads to the so called Laufbacher Eck. In the beginning there were more clouds than sunshine, but still the view is really worth walking this way. Shortly after the start you can look down to the beautiful Seealpsee. After reaching the highest point a steep decent starts before it goes up again to Himmeleck. Actually this is a really nice place to take a break but today it was really stormy! So I went quickly down to the KĂ€seralpe. From here the way continues all the way through the beautiful Oytal. Passing many cows I reach the Oytalhaus. From there you can decide to walk 90 minutes down to Oberstdorf or to take scooter - I decided for the scooter and 15 minutes later I was back in Oberstdorf.

For some time now we were waiting for the next weekend without snow, rain, storm and extreme heat. And also this weekend didn't look so good at first. For Saturday the weather forecast predicted rain and storms for almost the whole day. However Sunday was supposed to be quite good and Monday was said to be perfect.

So we decided to "move" the weekend by one day and went to Oberstdorf in the AllgÀu, again. Our plan was to go to Birgsau by bus and then climb up to the Mindelheimer Hut via the Mindeheimer Klettersteig. The next day we we wanted to climb down to Mittelberg very very early to get back to work not too late.

So in short - this basically worked out as planned! However, this was our first via ferrata this year and the way up from Birgsau to the entry point was already quite long. So when we arrived at the beginning of the via ferrata we already fell a little tired. I think next time we will sleep on a hut again before entering the Mindelheimer Klettersteig.

From the  via ferrata we had a very good view to the left and to the right. To our left we were able to see the Enzian Hut, the Rappensee Hut, the Waltenberger Haus and the Heilbronner Weg. To our right we looked down to the FiderepasshĂŒtte.

At about 7 in the evening we finally arrived at the Mindelheimer Hut. Luckily there was still a free place for sleeping and we even were able to order a dinner! 🙂 The evening on the hut was unusual warm and we had a nice look onto the mountains which were still covered with sunlight.

The next morning when we woke up on the hut we were almost not able to move due to muscle ache! 😀 Still, we made it down to Mittelberg in the end to catch the bus back to Oberstdorf. This was a very nice first tour through the Alps this year! 🙂