Freezing Harz

Had a magical week in the Harz from the 10th Feb, have started the job of processing the raw files.

Flickr: hughesfowler's Photostream

 

Fantastic Nigel
Henry

 

^+1. Excellent. Thanks for posting.

 

Ausgezeichnet! Must be more determined about that winter trip I keep meaning to do.

 

The Harz is a magical place at the best of times but in winter it is wunderschön as Nigel's excellent photos show.

 

Also worth pointing out that as Drei Annen Hohne is in the Valley whilst the Brocken sits ABOVE the clouds don't assume that the weather at DAH is the same as the Brocken. On my last visit DAH was snowless, dull and cloudy whilst Brocken Summit had about 12" of snow in full sun - pity I hadn't realised sooner as I lost out on some wonderful snow shots; at least it's a good excuse for going back !

For those interested the Brocken has a webcam - http://webcam.netco.de/hsb/webcams/brocken/brocken_bhf.php and according to the website the current sno depth is 124 cm (4 ft).

 

The reverse can happen too. Was out there in October and it was full sun until we were above Schierke and by the time we arrived at the summit if was cloaked in cloud. The weather on the Brocken is very fickle and a cloudless day is a rare(ish) joy.

 

Thanks for the kind comments all, I hope to upload some more tonight from day 2, not quite as the wetter frau had forecast. The brocken is indeed an amazing place as I update the week you will see some of what Fred alluded to, but trust me if you think the English forecasters are bad the Germans are worse with not one day being as forecast. Obviously its difficult to forecast for the saxony mountains but on our car journey back to Berlin heavy blizzards was the forecast.

We left Wenigerode at 0910 flew from Berlin at 1420 and not a cloud in the sky until take off !

 

A bit of information for anyone thinking of visiting the Harz I thought I would share the costs with you to show how reasonable it can be done. There were 3 of us in our party and we split all costs equally. We booked the flights in August with Easyjet for a Feb one week stay, £84.00 return from Manchester in the past we have flown from Liverpool as well. We had a hire car via Avis which we collected at Berlin. It is very advisable to book snow tyres and also take out the insurance excess waiver, cost was about £90 each.

Having a hire car meant we were able to stay outside the town and for the third time we stayed at the Pension am Zillerbache on the Elbingerode rd, about 1 mile out of town. Excellent b&b single room 29 euros per night.

We bought a 5 day rail pass, 40 euros from memory.

Food is very nice and after a good continental breakfast we would normally have a soup or Bratwurst from the stall on dah station. Now forgive my spelling but every night we ate in the Kartoffle haus in Wenigerode. Superb food, superb unfaultless service and well priced.

So having stayed 7 nights I have calculated my total spend for everything including souvenirs and copious amounts of Schirker Feurnstein at £620 including share of the fuel.

It can be done very reasonably in my opinion as you can see, for things like Bratwurst etc forget those silly christmas market prices on dah station it was 2.20 euros.

I have been three times and as said by others the weather is so so changeable. In 2007 we had very very deep snow but saw no sun all week. In 2008 very little snow but sun for 6 days solid, there is a set on my flikr site for the 2008 trip.

Hope this may be of help to anyone plannigna trip.

 

It's compulsory to have snow tyres in Germany from 1st November to 31st March now. Some of the car hire companies include them as standard, others still quote them as an "optional" extra.

Nice photos by the way Nigel! Fully agree with what you say about costings, even with the price of the euro a week out there is very good value for money.

 

I had a really enjoyable trip several years ago on a private tour with friends from Llangollen. Pictures can be seen here:


Harz Narrow Gauge Railways - a set on Flickr