Following Saint Hildegard's footprints with a couchsurfer

My couchsurfer Sara from Wisconsin USA shared an interest which was not very common for the average couchsurfer. She wished to research Hildegard of Bingen's life work and history. It didn't take much time to accept her couch request and the next day we took her on a journey through the Rhine Gorge to the Hildegard sites. My daughter Angela has taken so much energy to do research on the internet, drove us all over the place and told Sara many legends about the sites

Bingen, our first station
After a beautiful ride through the Binger Loch, the southern gateway of the gorge, we arrived at the museum in Bingen where St. Hildegard's life and works were documented in an audiovisual setting. This museum did not only depict Hildegard's heritage but it had a large department of all the surgical instruments applied in the old hospice. It was located exactly opposite the Mäuseturm or Mouse Tower , a medieval tower located on a small island in the Rhine River with a famous folk tale to tell.

Rochus Hill and the chapel
Our next path took us to the Rochusberg and the chapel. It is amazing to find such a gem at my doorstep, vast tapestry of vineyards while we were gazing down at the Rhine and its beautiful castle ruines. Walking through "Hildegard's woods" has given us a feel that we had collected positive life energy and a reborn body and soul. At the edge of the woods we could see such a natural beauty over the Rhine Gorge which could be hardly described in words

St. Hildegard Abbey
We crossed the River Rhine by car ferry and continued our journey in Rüdesheim. This is a famous place for tourists from the very kitsch until the very picturesque scenery of the Rhine Valley. We drove to the Hildegard Forum where we could eat a healthy lunch buffet and watch artworks about her visions and medical insight

The highlight and the final station was the Eibingen church where her relics and bones were kept in a shrine. I must have lost my surfer Sara and my daughter Angela, then decided to take a short cut climbing through the vineyards to St. Hildegard Abbey where the guest quarters are. We visited the Hildegard shop, enjoyed the beautiful view and finally had the chance to attend the Gregorian Chant 6 o'clock vesper.

Sometimes couchsurfers can inspire you to re-explore the beauties of your home area

A day out in nearby paradise Edenkoben and St. Martin

I started wondering what to do on the long weekend of the 3rd October which is the German Unification Day. One couchsurfer and another person spontaneously decided to plan a day trip together. We really don't need to travel too far to experience a fine day of hiking in the woods and visiting an old little town in the Palatinate wine country.

The hike in the Edenkoben Valley wasn't overly vicious but hilly enough for us to have a good sleep at night. After this we visited a small town in the Palatine wine country where we had a beautiful traditional Palatine dish in a beautiful little restaurant next to the old church. Jasmin from Couchsurfing has provided memorable photo shots she made in St. Martin.

St. Martin is a historic little town which is seldom mentioned and totally unknown for many Germans, let alone foreign visitors. The forest where we picked chestnuts last week, the vineyards, the old cosy wine taverns and historic half-timbered houses where they sell wine is definitely a target just one hour drive from Mainz

I have discovered this beautiful village surrounded by the Haardt mountain range and Palatine Forest during a weekend trip with the U.S. military. During my clerkship in Neustadt an der Weinstraße we visited this beautiful place once during our weekend trip in Edenkoben.

Those people who would like to surf in Mainz may consider this beautiful place about one hour drive from Mainz, especially if they stay for a couple of days. The French border starts about 35 km from here and could still be managed in a day trip from Mainz.

Hosting a guest while the water supply was shut down

My draining pipe gave up and as I opened it, it was fully jammed. I had cleaned most of it and the water flow was better but not perfect. Apparently there was more dirt in the back pipe behind the wall. I shut down the tap and improvised an emergency dish-washing station in the bathroom. We could still use the tap in the kitchen but I thought it was better to shut down the water supply as it was very likely that the drainage would be clogged up again.

Mateusz arrived in the afternoon dead-tired and late after sightseeing Idar Oberstein. Conversations with him were so diverse and well thought-out so that you would never think you were talking to a teenager. We watched a lot of his interesting photos. He has traveled a lot and traveling seems to be habitual in his family. His father has worked in the US, one brother is very nomadic and lives in Greece at present, the other in the U.S, one brother and one sister in the UK. He was simply lucky to be able to stay with his family or their friends on travels. Following his three brothers, he is now a very enthusiastic member of Couchsurfing, full of resources.

Mainz tour and CS meeting
Mateusz had many stories to tell about his observation on travels and laughed about an unfortunate incident regarding train ticket validation. The weather was unusually bad for a European summer, full of thunderstorms. Between two rainstorms we had a quick look at the Roman theatre excavations. It cleared up quickly and we enjoyed sitting on the Rhine riverside. The bus ran on the half hour, so we rather used the time to walk through the city of Mainz to the Nero's. This was the pub where the weekly Mainz CS-meeting took place. On our way to Nero's, I could show him the half-timbered houses in the Augustiner Straße(Mainz old town) until it ended at the courtyard behind the Mainz Dom(cathedral). This is called Leichhof or the courtyard of the dead, from where we could see the famous West Tower of the Dom. From here we walked down the main shopping street Ludwigstraße, Carnival fountain through the pebbled pedestrian area straight to Mainz central station. Mateusz had a good sense of orientation and didn't need to be babysitted all the time.

Idstein and Taunus area
The next day we had a lovely day eating brunch at my friend Marianne's place in Taunusstein in the middle of the Taunus mountain range. I brought a pot of home-grown basil to prepare a delicious tomato-mozarella-basil plate and Marianne baked a delicious fresh pear cake. The thunderstorm has severely hit their pear and plum trees, fruit falling off and she had to make around 30 pots of jam. The conversations were stimulating and the food excellent, time passed by very quickly. Marianne offered to show us Idstein before she headed to an appointment with one of her students.

Mateusz and me continued our visit to Idstein which was in fact spontaneous and unplanned. One of Idstein's landmarks was the Hextenturm or Witch Tower. Its history had nothing to do with witches but the ordinary watchtower looked like those towers in one of Grimm's fairy tales. We climbed up the watch tower called Hexenturm or witch tower as all of a sudden Idstein was struck by a heavy hurricane-like thunderstorm. We felt safe and protected in the tower and watched the storm from a window-like opening. Afterwards people told us that umbrellas, coffee cups and cakes were just flying around the place. Normally we only see this type of storm in Australia or Asia, in Europe it must be more spectacular than a 3D movie. Marianne rang me up to make sure whether we were safe because her car was hit by a heavy hailstorm and the creeks were flooding into the streets, very dangerous for driving.

We came home hungry and fortunately I have cooked a good Spaghetti Bolognaise the day before. Mateusz coped very well with my emergency dish-washing station in the bathroom. He is exceptionally gentleman-like for that age, carrying bags for ladies was simply natural for him. In the evening we took another walk through Mainz, I showed him more ornaments and historical buildings in Mainz. Afterwards we enjoyed a glass of wine in the traditional wine tavern "the Kanzel". I really enjoyed Mateusz's visit because he was curious, interested, a good conversationalist and very empathic. He did not only talk about his own culture but also about the Greek and Canadian one. His stories and photos really felt like traveling without leaving the comfort of your own home. Needless to say that house rules were totally unnecessary for him

Hans-Jürgen, Enrico's father.

Sometimes I thought that Couchsurfing was the wrong place for me because the majority of the members were under 30. Simply too young for me to come closer in real life friendships. Enrico, a nice couchsurfer from Germany wrote me a somewhat strange request. At that time I was not even aware of Couchsurfing safety precautions and that every person should have a separate profile to make the host or guest feel safe. In case of problems it is also easier to report a separate profile to the MDST(Member Dispute and Safety Team), a team I just learnt about later.

Enrice wrote me a strange request for his 48 y/o father who was not good with computers and didn't speak English very well. Enrico's request was elaborate and showed very clearly that he bothered to read my whole profile. I decided to host Enrico's father because he was older........

I expected a worn-out silly old man who couldn't speak a word of English and possibly could not even leave the house without being run over by a car. The doorbell rang exactly at the time as I expected him. "Well, German punctuality." I thought. Surprise...surprise...I saw a fairly young-looking and athletic man with a beard and interested lively eyes. He entered and gasped a bit as he saw the breathtaking 180 degree view of the Sydney Harbour.

We spoke German for most of the time and he quickly lost his initial reserved behaviour. He...a married man with me, a woman living alone in a small flat. But we soon found some topics about his travels in Queensland and the European background of Kirribilli. We spent a warm Sydney evening enjoying the Sydney Harbour and drinking red wine. He had so many interesting stories to tell about the time as East Germany's wall was still reality. As a customs officer he told me exactly the same stories that my neighbour and friend from East Germany told me. Touching stories and the opinion from the other side: How arrogant they found the Westies and how they have been looked down at.

His son Enrico told me that I could possibly change his life by showing him more than the usual triad: working, shopping and watching TV. Hans-Jürgen wasn't lucky with the weather because it rained nearly all day and I had to work. So we spent quite a lot of time watching TV and the German DVDs that I brought from the university library. I cooked him an Australian Bratwurst made of lamb and rosemary and he could enjoy a sweet breakfast with mango ginger jam. He was more independent than Enrico described him. During the day he walked the Harbour Bridge to the centre of Sydney, visited Aldi in North Sydney and Luna Park just on his own and took a few pictures of Kirribilli. A seemingly less spectacular experience with just a common man who started to see the world and learn at a very moderate pace.....Oh, he was an excellent guest where house rules were totally redundant. I could see that his wife had taught him everything a good guest on Couchsurfing should know:-))))) He was not a particularly rich man but he was generous. I appreciated the bottle of red wine and the yodeling mole he brought from Germany.....