views of the taunus mountains near nauroth.
the wisper trails are a bunch of hiking trails in the region of the wispertaunus, which is a section of the hintertaunus. there are 16 trails in this very charming & cozy landscape, some only about 6 kilometers long, some around 10 to 17 & the longest about 19 kilometers. i have hiked most of them, with the exception of some of the rhine river connected ones which i want to tackle eventually, because who can resist the call of the rhine? i didn't choose those before, because i figured they are the most popular ones, which means more people on the path. that is exactly what i like about the other trails, because the wispertaunus mountains are very sparsely populated, so you only come upon other hikers occasionally. the longer ones i haven't done as well, because my pace is very slow and i stop and take pictures all the time, which prolongs the average walking time and i would need to make like a whole day trip out of it! and those are also very difficult trails with lots of climbing & scrambling. maybe if i split them into two hikes, then it might be much more doable.
the trails are absolutely magical, leading from lush & rich pastures with wide views into narrow heavily wooded valleys that have looming slate rocks overhead & bubbly little creeks flowing through them, and sometimes you come upon one of the many little villages that are dotting the landscape, giving you the opportunity to have a break & admire the fairytale setting.
for this hike we ( my parents were on a visit ) decided to hike the trail 'naurother grubengold' ( nauroth mine gold ), which is a trail of 14 kilometers near the little community of nauroth that is all about its historic profession - the mining industry. they mined slate rock of course, which is all-present in the taunus mountains. the mines that you can still find here are mostly discontinued & open to explore, the old scree slopes have grown into respectable hills on which all kinds of thermophilic little critters have found a perfect place to live. i find it wonderful that even though human beings created some of these landscapes, nature was able to turn it into an ecologically valuable landscape again after the mining was given up.
but enough of the talking, let me take you on this beautiful green may hike that left us all in great appreciation for the wispertaunus! ( seriously, it is probably my favourite taunus section! )
already a good start to our hike - the beautiful mountain views!
dad trying to capture it all, too!
the meadows & pastures around nauroth were shimmering in fresh greens!
entering the woods being greeted by the foxglove committee.
dad clearly loved the committee!
an old lorry, which was used to get the slates out of the pits. i think this former pit was called 'meier's hoffnung' ( meier's hope ), which operated from 1889 to 1964. it's the only slate pit on this path that still has some of the old mine buildings left on site.
i doubt that these silo structures were from back in the days, but i could also be wrong. finding these was a real treat, though, my abandoned buildings loving heart was beating very fast and i explored them immediately.
i loved how the trees had built a canopy overhead. to be honest, i could vividly imagine turning these structures into an actual place to live! the concrete still looked very sturdy, and if you had a good architect that specializes in creating something extraordinary out of former industrial buildings, i think it would be possible to make a modern, but still cozy home out of this! maybe some parts would have to be removed to let more light in, but imagine having a bed right underneath the openings and waking up to branches swaying in the wind, maybe even some birds nesting up there! ( i try to ignore the image of bird poop & autumnal leaf mess on those windows popping up in my mind's eye 😂 ). even if you removed some parts of the trees, a sky view would also be very welcome!
with a bit of effort, one could also dig away all the soil behind those windows & create a little space behind it, maybe milling a pathway around the building where you could store utility tools or set up plant pots. or how about even a direct approach to a tiny kitchen sill garden where all you would have to do is opening the windows & directly pick some herbs or strawberries or other vegetables?
this would be the entrance towards a little backyard, where one could recline & relax in a hammock or tend to more plants, listening to the birds of the woods & rustling of the leaves.
on the other side of the structure i am imagining a parking lot for a car with a lookout towards a small slate scree ( that's where my dad is located ).
this would be the main entrance ( next to it, there would be space for the parking lot ). it would certainly be a tiny house, but i do love those anyway! wanderers & hikers would probably walk by every once in a while, but i think that would not be detrimental for this, it was still fairly quiet around here when we visited!
these are older structures, probably from around the 1950ies. they belonged to the meier's hoffnung pit and led to...
... this little scree that i have mentioned before.
looking back towards those structures again & what is probably an old trafo station.
i really enjoyed this place, the may greens of the trees & ferns & the colours of the overgrown & stained concrete sort of was pleasing to the eyes!
entanglement along the way.
entering the entelsbach valley. the entelsbach is a little rivulet that supplies the wispersee with waters.
a good bench to have a break & enjoy the forest meadows around you!
there were some fish ponds in this valley, too, looking all quaint & charming.
water lilies blooming & looking like lotuses.
the entelsbach. i couldn't get enough of the saturated & lush meadows! such good, happiness creating colours!
a spiky thistle in bloom! so beautiful.
the wispersee, which is a human-made lake that dams up the wisper river. apparently it's popular with fishing people, but it's also a great place to stop and have a break during a long hike :D
my parents enjoying a drink & some snacks :D
the view was very nice, even with the occasional dead spruce thrown in. unfortunately there's a big spruce dieback currently going on, reasons of course are the continual dry summers & the increasing multiplication of bark beetles who love to feast on the weakened trees, thus sapping all their life juices. a lot of forests have been cleared off the dead trees ( who provide the beetles a welcome ground to continue growing their population, therefore endangering other trees if they are left on the forest grounds ) & there's big areas that are now devoid of tall trees, which feels strange sometimes walking through the woods. it's true, it can open up new perspectives and give you new insights on your surroundings, and also give way to new growth that might not have been possible before, because the looming spruces subdued it so far, but it's also kinda sad to see entire wooden areas suddenly bare. it feels like nature dying right in front of your eyes, and you can't help but thinking that all of this is also because of us humans and our impact on the climate. i think, that's definitely a big part, because the more our climates warm up, the more the trees get weakened, the more insects have better options to start attacks on their hosts & grow their populations massively. it's a vicious circle when you think about it more.
strained my eyes to see what floated on the lake...
...turned out to be a very pretty duck house!
on each side of the lake were some platforms where you could sit on & picknick or throw out a fishing rod to fish the lake. it was a lot more populated around here than on the rest of our hike, apparently people are attracted to its quaint waters a lot.
found some silene vulgaris aka bladder's campion aka maidenstears. it's an edible plant that is most known in southern european kitchens these days. you can put it into salads or cook it ( it's said to have a sweet licorice taste ). it was also tested to be helpful to people with diabetes!
left the woods briefly for an edge of forest meadow!
white wildflowers were dotting this delicious meadow, unfortunately i haven't focussed on what the flowers were. my guess is maybe marguerites? it feels most accurate actually.
a beautiful sea of swaying plants!
back in the woods we came upon a decrepit shelter.
basically only the roof was still standing. a home for a little troll or dwarf i'd say!
all the fresh growth along our path was so extraordinarily beautiful!
i mean, come on, who wouldn't feel delighted upon this sight? everything clearly emanates the zest of life!
the grounds got a little more rocky & primal, occasionally you could encounter the common wood serpent ;) they are fairly harmless, unless you trip over them & stumble, that might lead to various degrees of injuries 😅
mom entering the realms of the wildweibchen, which was a woman who lived out here on her own & served people living close with her knowledge on herbs & plant medicines & even as some kind of healer & doula. the legend says that she was left by her lover who went out into the world to seek wealth, but he never returned. apparently, that didn't turn her into a sad old hag, but she did everything she could to help the people in the wisper mountains, though she denied herself a common life in the compounds of traditional family values, instead she lived in a cave amongst these rocks. ever so often she returned to the villages on cold winter evenings to bring old tales, legends & stories to young girls & women. at some point, people say, monks were coming into the wisper valley & started to preach about the new religion, christianity, and the old wild woman, who was firmly attached to the old belief system of paganism, was slowly seen less & less, until nobody ever saw her again, not knowing if she just went away, or died eventually.
as you might have guessed, i am super intrigued by the story of the wild woman, for a long time i had visions & dreams of becoming something equal one day. the thought of living a reclusive life in the middle of the nowhere, nature surrounding you on all levels, it always seemed very charming to me. especially since i have always thought i would end up on my own anyway, and that my raison d'etre of life might be to accept & love myself through learning to be one with nature & how to sustain myself in it. i could vividly imagine living in a little hut, with cats & a dog & a cow & a pig & chickens & wild animals visiting me, and living off the lands that surrounded me. every once in a while i would go to villages or communities as well to try to sell products that i had created in my spare time, or produce that i couldn't utilize myself & return with a little something that i purchased around town that might even help me in my endeavours to live more comfortably. sounds dreamy & idealistic, right? i know, sometimes my romantic streak gallops away a little, with no mind for realities 😅
the area around the place where the wild woman lived was dotted with slate rocks, sometimes looming far overhead, sometimes turning into lookout points.
one of those look-out points was discovered by my dad.
peering down the abyss. i was a little afraid when i saw my father getting close to the edge, but it turned out to be not so steep & there was another plateau before it really went down.
it was fairly high, though! i loved all the crippled oaks in this spot, twisting and bending in all directions. so magical!
the sun came out again and illuminated everything marvellously!
wandering the wild woman's roaming grounds. the rocks were gorgeous and my images really don't do this enchanting area any justice!
i often wonder how people can pass by some places without being completely & utterly enthralled by the beauty around them. this place, man, seriously, it was pure magic!
just raw & unadulterated, with a splash of awakening nature!
i could never say no to mossy, craggy rocks, ever! rocks are beautiful!
formations that will always leave me in awe.
😍
not sure anymore if this was the washed out creek bed of the wisper, or one of the many little creeks flowing into it. my intuition says it's a different creek, i think we encountered it after coming down the wildweibchenslei & entered a little valley that some of the field name cards i used for research called seyen valley. i wasn't able to find out much more about the seyen, but maybe that is the name of the little creek. in any case, i loved how the schist was all leached & eroded due to the creek water flow.
another closer look at the schist rock formations.
the seyer wiesen. juicy, delicious-looking meadows!
after all the wooded areas of the first half of the tour, it was a welcome diversion to change into this lush landscape!
if you looked closer at the meadows, you could make out cornflowers. their cyan blossoms are a real looker!
every once in a while you were granted sweet vistas over the wisper taunus mountains and its meadows.
someone repurposed this hut into a beehive building! loving that idea!
bees can fly into their respective homes via openings in the wood. somehow this principle reminds me of apartment complexes 😅
we were getting closer to the woods again, but before we entered them, we came upon hundreds of these little sunny flowers!
they're horseshoe vetches, a perennial flowering plant that is very loved by sheep ( if they encounter them ).
re-entering the woods for the final part of our hike. the blue sign was our clue to search for, as it is the symbol of this particular route of the wisper trails.
i loved how green this forest floor was! the fir trees were not as healthy, though, but that probably paved the way for all the ferns and other plants to come up and spread better.
foxgloves again! we also call them fingerhut ( finger hat ), as they look like thimbles. i always like to imagine that foxes love to dip their paws into them for fun :D
the hole was pretty small, and i wondered about how tedious it must have been to crawl in there and get slates out. most probably it was even life-endangering.
strolling along the herzbach valley, passing by fish ponds. the sceneries were so pleasant & idyllic!
i'd love to spend an afternoon here, having a picnic, reading, frolicking, watching nature around me!
the last highlight of the hike was another discontinued slate rock mine called ROSIT. it was the biggest mine pit around here and in the state of hesse ( mine tunnels reaching up to 10 kilometers, giving work to about 300 miners in its peak period ), and with its tall mining scree dumps, it is also the most impressive. they mined 'hunsrück-schiefer' here, which is slate rock of very excellent quality. the mine was open and operated from 1741 to 1964, with reports that it might have existed even earlier than that. a lot of local buildings and houses were roofed with this particular slate, for example the mainz cathedral or the colonnades in front of the kurhaus in wiesbaden.
after 1964 efforts were made to give the mine back to nature, as it was discovered that lots of little thermophilic creatures & special flora & fauna loved the premises. pine & birch trees are slowly growing on the slate hills, showing that nature, if given time, can restore itself on any kind of underground.
various mosses & lichen liked the warm slate rocks as well.
loved the ratio of humans versus slate rock hills. it shows how tall these mining dumps are!
to me it proves incredible time & time again, how resilient nature is and manages to find ways to claim back landscapes that are man-made.
another interesting tidbit about the slate rocks: it is comprised mainly of mica, chlorite, quartz & small amounts of ferrous sulfides. it's very brittle & fracturable, but not in a way that it crumbles under your touch, and if milled the right way it proves to be perfect for roofing endeavours, as it is highly water-repellant. it also saves warmth very well, and because of that, little critters like the viviparous lizard have started quite a little population on these hills! we saw at least 10 specimens during the time we spent there!
yes, we did climb the slate hills, they provided a nice view into the herzbach valley :D
along these many slates the lizards flitted around from left to right & right to left, some even being undisturbed by our approach and enjoying a nice sun bath...
... like this little fella over here!
a big smile for the photographer.
viviparous lizards are special in the lizard world, they are fully carnivorous ( eating flies, spiders & all kinds of insects, even cicadas and of course larvae & maggots ) & as their name suggests, bring their babies into the world without laying eggs - viviparously! i was pretty flashed by this revelation, knowing that these tiny reptiles are capable of doing such a rather mammal kind of thing!
great lizard habitat, don't you think? i'd love it here if i was one!
it's quite a stunner actually, and dazzles a lot in the right light!
a cute little wooden shed we found soon after.
it blended well into its surroundings.
the final stretch led us along agricultural fields again, back to the starting point near nauroth.
this wisper trail was a really gorgeous one, with many nice sights along the way, showing the best aspects of the wisper taunus mountains! 14 kilometers that made 3 hikers really happy & looking forward to return again to this region. a true treasure trove of gold for sure!
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