Relations between religions

I had a little spare time in Balik Pulau after my usual market and eating day. So I decided to hike up the hills. As I saw this sign to the Santarama temple I thought of either visiting the temple or to continue the climb.

Suddenly a car drove up the hill and a nice lady asked me something in Chinese. Then she saw my puzzled face and  switched into excellent English. She asked whether I wanted to do a hike or  go to the temple. 

I was unsettled about it and she said that they were going to pay a visit to respect the monks. They also prepared some food to offer to the monks. As we arrived there, some other people brought several homemade dishes as well as bread rolls.

I had eaten a rich late breakfast in Ayer Itam and wasn't particularly hungry. The only things I could offer were some roast pork and sweet potato coconut milk fritters bought in Ayer Itam and fresh fruits from Balik Pulau market. 

We set the table and prepared the small individual tables for the monks. Meanwhile they told me that the monks were not vegetarian except of one young monk from Germany. I was looking for my fruits and he pointed to them on the table.

The monks entered the room and said a prayer, the people kneeled and prayed with them. After this they sat at the table and had their lunch. We either tidied up or sat aside because we were not supposed to walk around when they go to the huge table to bring the food to their individual small tables.

The monks still spent some time and I could ask them questions about their teachings. Their lifestyle is fairly worldly and meat allowed because Buddha was a meat eater they said.

They spoke several languages and the German monk needed to leave Malaysia every 3 months for visa purposes. He was fluent in both English and German. However I wondered why Malays were not allowed to visit whilst they had monks and visitors from the whole world coming for studies or retreat including Indonesia.

After the monks left we had lunch alltogether and washed up afterwards. The ladies told me you could easily get lost on the trails and one lady offered to go with me. I didnt have much time left until my departure and decided to do the hike alone on the weekend. 

I didn't get lost while hiking to the peak of the trail on the hill but suddenly there was a massive downpour. A middle-aged man on a motorbike stopped and invited me to his house for lunch. He told me he was a PR of New Zealand and still had a house at the foot of the hill. I stayed in his house with him and his son chatting our time away and had a tasty lunch until the rain stopped.

The experience was a quite unexpected surprise and I didn't have a phone and a camera to take photos of our memories. But who knows that the reason why people were so kind to me was because they didn't see a camera on me. Apparently I had a local appearance more than a tourist.

This experience made it clear to me that  I will always remain Roman Catholic despite the church's little flaws. However I am open-minded enough to visit other religions and have an exchange.

Hiking: Sports, nature and tourism

If you hike a beautiful area with a lot of historic cultural sites along with beautiful outlooks on nature, it is hard to maintain the athletic aspects only. Sports physicians define hiking as walking through nature with different type of tracks and at a minimum speed of 5-6 km. It can range from an easy paved road to paved forest trails, rougher track area, different types of soil up to slippery extremely steep serpentines.In most cases the distance ranges between 10 and 30 km per day.

However, there will always be the touristic side of the hike. This means that we need to count sightseeing  ancient castles and other historic cultural sites, different photo stops which shouldn't be missed or just enjoying the scenery. These non-sports activities add  some extra time to the planned hike. We always have to go for compromises because if we want to enjoy nature and culture to the fullest,  the minimum cardiovascular workout cannot be maintained throughout the whole hike. A stretch of app 20 km can easily take around 6-7 hours including all breaks.

This is another part of the Rheinsteig between Braubach and Filsen, alongside the Rhine including steep ascends and descends, partly slippery, partly in forested areas and the other stretch in the hot sunny part along the Rhine

Wispertal: A piece of heaven at the doorstep

The car ride between Mainz and Lorch, where the hike starts, is already a trip on its own. It goes through winding roads along the Rhine and through beauitful hills and architecture

I have been to Wispertal a few times to buy fresh rainbow trouts. This time it was the first time that I explored the place by hiking. If you consider hiking as a good sport to boost your  cardiovascular system, you have to keep a certain pace from beginning to end. I had difficulties to make the right decision: either I had to stop and take some time to zoom the right focus and take the picture from the right angle, or I had to keep my pace from beginning till end

The trail started at the beautiful UNESCO heritage site Lorch with its beautiful buildings, churches and scenery. The hike goes through the forest, many slate trees and shrubs, the remaining wild berries and several outlooks far beyond the Rhine to the other side, the Hunsrück mountain range.

The trail was broad enough for the relatively large group and we also had the opportunities for fruitful conversations with some very interesting people. We have also been very lucky that it hadn't rained for some time and had no problems with a slippery ground. Most of the trail was soft soil and hardly any rocks on a well-formed track.

There were some ascends and descends, the one up to the ancient castle ruine Sauerburg was one of them. From the description the trail was around 18,5 km with some fairly rough stretches and a difference in altitude of about 700 m. The last stretch was along the famous Rheinsteig trail back to Lorch, a gradually descending track. The view on the Rhine, its castles, mountain range and wineries on the other side was divine, which more than often distracts a good hiker from his purpose.

Rhineside hiking tracks are sunnier and warmer for most of the time, making the stamina a lot lesser after a good hike in forested areas. Even the road was a lot smoother and slowly descending, it was the hardest part because of the heat. From a lookout point near Kaub, we could see the small castle Pfalzgrafenstein built on the island Reichenau in the middle of the Rhine. This was formerly a venue built for custom purposes and nowadays open as a museum

Going on such a hike is challenging enough for your stamina and we can all combine it with beautiful scenery, ancient castles and churches along with great social interaction. Absolutely recommendable for visitors to Germany too!