A Walk in the Woods

Hello there, folks!
I hope you enjoyed Easter (if you celebrate it.) We travelled down to the out-laws in-laws in the south of Germany, where we ate a lavish Easter breakfast before trekking off up a mountain to enjoy The Nature. As usual, I was the only person in a large vicinity that was not wearing clothing made of Gore-Tex, Teflon, Neoprene or  [insert fabric with scarily scientific name here]. I wasn't even wearing footwear with laces, just my nomal shoes. And I wasn't armed with a stick - neither a walking stick nor one of those ski-pole thingies that are especially beloved of senior citizens. In other words, I was dressed like an Irishperson on a casual, no-strings-attached Sunday afternoon stroll, and not as a German Wanderer (hiker). I was quite worried that I might be stopped at the foot of the mountain and sent back to the car to wait with a window cranked down till my in-laws and husband returned, but fortunately I was allowed meander up the hill and admire The Nature from a variety of clearly and informatively signposted viewing platforms.

It was a bit misty, so I couldn't get any nice photos, but trust me when I tell you that the Alps are there:

After that, we went back to a café, where we sat outside - first in a gale-force wind, then a rain shower and finally a thunderstorm. Like the rest of the café patrons, we shivered grimly in the inclement weather and drank our coffees as though everything were perfectly fine. Germans will not sit in a café without complaining if there is, say, the slightest draught, an uneven table, an odd smell or bad Feng Shui - but plonk them outside and this changes. Such is the love of dining al fresco in this country that they will happily perch on half-rotten log, eating charred barbecue offerings and dinking warm beer, while batting away wasps and mosquitos and plucking ticks out of the flesh above their robust hiking boots.
But let's save that grouse for a post of its own.

In the meantime, this is what the main square of a town in the region known as 'der Bayerische Wald' (the Bavarian Forest) looks like: