Bayerwaldloipe Cross-country skiing in the southeast of Germany

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Here is a report of a cross-country skiing trip I made in Bayern in 1999, the winter everyone remembers because of the abundant snowfall in the Alps. To the Trail Database

The 'Bayerischer Wald' is the wooded and remote area in the far southeast corner of Germany. In the East the hills rise to 1600 meter and constitute the border with the Czech Republic. In the South, the hills flatten towards the Danube ('Donau') and the Austrian border.

Although accessible when walking in summer, the loipe stays far out of these re-mote areas, a pity, but understandable because the Bayerwaldloipe is in essence a series of interconnected circular skiing trails that lie around the villages. When cross-country skiing, a trail is indispensable and a trail needs regular maintenance. The municipals keep the trails well prepared so that it will attract tourists in winter. Therefore, the Bayerwaldloipe stays in the middle parts of the Bayerischer Wald, passes both open and wooded areas and frequently touches the outskirts of the villages, some of whom are quit large.

The length of the Bayerwaldloipe is about 155 kilometres and we did about 100 kilometres of it. Technically speaking, the route is very easy. It can be pretty crowded, especially if you go there during a national holiday, as we did. The tourists typically make day trips and choose the circular loipes. We didn't meet any other backpacking skiers like us.

We went from village to village and when tired, looked for a hotel or guesthouse. Typically, it will cost you something between 40 and 50 DM for a single with breakfast. Excellent service of course, people are very hospitable, and the food is good. Alternatively, you can stay in youth hostels. I guess it is possible to go from one YH to the other the whole stretch. Have a look on a youth hostel site (http://www…….)

Cross-country skiing ('langlaufen' in German) is very easy. Although I will mention you some sites further on where you will find information on technique and equipment, I never did any preparation or practise myself. The best advice to the beginner is to jump on the machine-groomed trail, into the two grooved channels, and go. If you slip backwards, maybe you should put your skis crosswise on the track and wait for another skier to ask advice. Alpine experience is not necessarily an advantage. The only alpine technique that comes in handy in my opinion is the snowplough wedge, used to slow down when going downhill. Be sure to put your weight on the outer ski when going down fast in a turn, use the inner ski as a brake, and you will stay upright.

Another thing is to make a choice between waxable and waxless skis. A waxable ski needs kick wax, applied to the middle third of the bottom, to grab into the snow. A waxless ski has a pattern (could be fine hair) permanently imbedded in the ski base that serves the same purpose. Well, I was kind of an exception in Bayern for using waxable skis. Actually, my skis are optimal for ski touring outside trails, as is the case in Scandinavia. In Central and Western Europe, people use waxless skis as a rule.

Waxing is not as difficult as you might think. Apply the stick wax cold, like writing on a blackboard with a piece of chalk. For different snow conditions and tempera-tures, different waxes exist. If the temperature is well below zero and the snow is not too old or frozen, the type of wax to apply is far from critical. When, how-ever, the snow is frozen or the temperatures are around zero, waxing becomes difficult. I experienced this myself during our tour. The first four days, my skis glided very well and I had a very good grip on the snow when 'kicking', better then the waxless skiers around me had, I think. The last day however, the tem-perature raised to about one degree above zero, and whatever I tried, the ski would either glide back or the snow would freeze to the ski base. The "waxless skiers" passed me one by one. Of course, there are many more wax types like klister, glide wax, hot wax etc., but I never used any of it.

If you need waxable skis, you get into problems buying them if you are Dutch. The shop in my hometown, when asked for cross-country skis, pointed me to the 'senior citizens department'. They only had waxless skis in stock and evidently didn't understand anything of skiing since they tried to sell me glide wax for kick wax.

Regen and Grafenau are part of the national railway system. From Grafenau you can continue to Zwiesel with a local train which goes through the hills ten times a day. Another hourly connection runs between Zwiesel and the border village of Bayerisch Eisenstein where the Bayerwaldloipe runs. Zwiesel is accessible from Regen, a frequent connection. Visit the site of the Deutsche Bahn for timetables Also, local busses connect the villages, not as frequently as the railway connec-tions, but at least several times a day.

We parked our car in Bodenmais, took the ski-bus to Brennes, skied to Finsterau in five days and then returned by bus to Grafenau and by train to Bodenmais with a change in Zwiesel.

Below are some excellent starting pages for cross-country skiing. The best site, also for beginners, is Cross-Country Ski World. The best pages on technique, equipment, waxing etc can be found on this site, and I will refer to them again in a second.

If you are not sure whether cross-country skiing is your sport, have a quick glance at the ski faq. Then, if your interest is awakened, improve your instant knowledge with this beginner's guide to basic terms. Be sure you are in good company: so, take a look at your fellow skiers. You will ask yourself the same questions as I did: what is the difference between cross-country skiing, Nordic skiing, ski touring, Telemark skiing etc. Well, it is explained on the pages from the CCSAA.

If you still follow me at this point, there is a change you are serious. Now, to check if the money for the equipment is not the problem, have a look at the Two Minute Beginner Reference: The Essentials. Of course, you want to know where you can buy the equipment. The best list of manufacturers I found on the CCSAA site. The advanced skier can satisfy his knowledge on the complete equipment guide.

I told you already that cross-country skiing is easy. I did not even check out these excellent instruction pages myself. Many pictures on this page help you understand the basic techniques. Waxing might put you off. Don't worry though, in normal snow conditions the wax choice and application is not very critical. To get confident about it, address this excellent introduction on waxing.

Finally, find more information following these two link pages: the linklist of SkiCentral and Kuz's Repository of Cross-Country Ski Links.

The Bayerisches Landesvermessungsamt in München publishes a series of hiking and cycling maps of 1 to 50.000. The problem is that the winter routes and the Bayerwaldloipe are not marked on these maps. Locally, sketch maps of the Bayer-waldloipe are available and you might be lucky to find some winter maps. We eventually found two reasonably useful maps. One map covers the area around Zwiesel and is published by the Werbegemeinschaft Zwieseler Wald. The scale is 1 to 35.000 but the effective accurateness is poor. The second map covers the whoe area and is called Wintersportkarte Bayerischer Wald, publish by Morsak Karte in Grafenau (nr. 175C). The scale is 1 to 80.000 and the map is not accurate enough to find your way in the area without any marked trails. Also, the marked trails do not correspond too well with the actual situation. The way to find the way is asking people and carefully watching the marks.

First day: from Brennes to Rabenstein

We took the ski bus from Bodenmais to the Gross Arber, one of the high peaks (1456 meters) near the Czech border and a busy ski area. A little further on, the mounting road hits the road to Bayerisch Eisenstein. This junction is called Bren-nes. It is not exactly the start of the Bayerwaldloipe, but it is not far from it.

Rien and I took notice of the waymarking (see the map), fastened our skis and jumped into the prepared track. In no time, the feeling of control over skis and movement was there again. The "kick and glide" rhythm is quit pleasant, believe me. The last time I had been skiing was ten years ago but it felt like I had been skiing the day before.

It took us an hour or so to descend to Bayerisch Eisenstein. Through the open spaces in the large pine forest the broad wooded hills were visible and the village below. Snow was abundant. Above the village we crossed an alpine ski piste and with a prudent speed and some carefully curved turns we managed to reach the village.

Bayerisch Eisenstein is a border village with some traffic to the Czech Republic. After crossing the road and walking a few yards, the track ('loipe') continued, passed a Nordic racing circuit and then dived into a wood. At one point a clear-ance in the forest gave us a pretty view on the Gross Arber, partly in clouds. The photograph, I'm sorry, fails to show this.

After passing a high point with some fields, a farm and nice views over the area and Bayerisch Eisenstein in the bottom of the valley, the trail continued a little above the valley. We passed a few houses and later on Regenhütte. The sun stood low now and the temperature dropped. We went on to Rabenstein over a long climbing stretch through the forests with a steep descent in the end.

It was quite busy on the trail today; many skiers everywhere. Basically, two types of cross-country skiers exist in these areas: the sportive type of skier, who is mak-ing his rounds like a jogger, and the senior citizen type of skier, who more or less walks on skis. No backpackers except us.

Café-bäckerei-pension Petrich, in the centre of the little village had rooms and served food. But first we had to wait till the tumultuous carnival celebrating crowd left.

Second day: from Rabenstein to Spiegelau

The town of Zwiesel was not far from our village of Rabenstein. Since the trail from here to Zwiesel is only a few kilometres, we took the bus. The Bayerwald-loipe ends in the northern part of Zwiesel and continues in the southern part. No sun today, and some snow. First the Bayerwaldloipe followed some village trails through the open fields on gentle slopes. Then the trail took a quiet forest route, with large pines on either side. The snow kept falling and upset the balance on the tree branches heavy with snow. Occasionally, a load of snow fell down. This trail continued for many, many kilometres, till we arrived in Spiegelau.

Spiegelau is slightly larger compared to Rabenstein where we stayed yesterday. We found a rather new hotel with the zodiac painted on the ceiling of the break-fast room, mirrors all around and baking odours in the corridors. There were some restaurants down in the village. The snow continued and the wind increased.

Third day: From Spiegelau to Sankt Oswald

The snowfall had not ceased. The snow already piled high in the village squares and along the road. Once we found the track it became clear that it was not pre-pared and the grooved channels were more or less absent. The problem was not skiing in fresh unprepared snow, but finding our way while the trail was not clear. Neither the maps, nor the marking were clear enough to find our way over the open fields. We had no problems in the forest, but when we came out and had to cross an open space, we were lost. Whenever possible, we asked people. Now, a second problem presented itself: the wind had driven the snow high up on some places and we sank knee deep into it. Nevertheless, we went on, stubbornly.

Then, in a forest (happily), the snow and wind increased enormously and thunder sounded. There was no way of continuing while the snow drove over the fields. We went to a village, found a place to have a drink, and waited for hours till the weather turned for better. In the afternoon, the sun returned, we tried to retrace our steps which was very difficult since every trace of the trail had disappeared. We had a few lucky stretches in the forest and lost our way many times in the open field. Looking back to the pictures however, it was not too bad today.

In the village of Sankt Oswald we found, with the help of some locals, a pension on the top of a hill. Fernblick was its name and the views over the surrounding hills were nice. Only a handful of guests stayed in this hotel, since the owners were old and had virtually stopped running the place. Pictures on the walls re-minded of forgotten years when the owner was a fervent mountain climber. He was still a very good humoured and witty man.

Fourth day: from Sankt Oswald to Schönbrunn

Although the weather had improved, we could not start skiing before the trails were prepared again. We phoned to the tourist office and they told us the shovel was underway. When we arrived at the start of the trail above the village, however, there was no sign of it. We heared that the amount of snow was seriously hampering the snow shovel. We got a lift to Rosenau where the trail was open again. Crowds of skiers gath-ered here, in contrast with the silence of yesterday. It all went well, apart from an evasive manoeuvre of Rien because of some people behind a turn. In a little vil-lage the trail ended and again we had to plough through deep snow and look for signs that would bring us to the Bayerwaldloipe.

Once back on track, the trail passed through many villages and over farmland. We had great views, and towards the end of the day, the sun peeped through the clouds and turned the snow yellow while high up in the hills dark clouds promised more snow to come. Mind you, don't trust the 'Bayerwaldloipe' signs. We fol-lowed them, only to find out an hour later that we made a perfect loop. Well, it was one of the better stretches anyway, and we had a charming conversation with a local farmer who was very hard to understand in his melodious accent.

For the first time this journey, we didn't find a hotel in the village where we ended, Schönbrunn, and since we had no energy left to go any further, we took a bus to the town of Freyung. Many towns here resemble the Austrian towns, and their formal but colourful architecture from the 18th and 19th centuries add to the charms of Bayern. So did Freyung.

Fifth day: from Schönbrunn to Finsterau

Rien stayed in Freyung while I returned by bus to Schönbrunn to make the best of the last day of skiing. From the point we stepped out of the grooves yesterday, I continued. It snowed a little when I skied down over the fields. Once over the little river, I had to climb steeply over a forest road with no prepared trail. After ten minutes of duck-walk, another forest road with a perfect track took me flat to Mauth. I did not enter the village but went on along a quite busy trail along a river and bordering fields.

Later, the trail started to climb, and it continued to climb for the next hour and a half. What bothered me more, was the rising tem-perature. As a result, the wax on my skies failed to have grip on the snow, which means that the skis constantly slide backwards. Of course, this is wearying very much. I had the wax scraped of half a dozen times, to apply another type of wax, but to no avail. One type of wax froze to the snow, the next type failed to have grip.

Nevertheless, I climbed to 1100 metres and skied down to reach Finsterau. The village disappeared into the mist. The streets were messy wet with melting snow and most houses were more or less buried in the snow that had been shovelled off the roads. In a smoke-filled public place I got a coffee and waited for the bus to bring me back to Freyung.

If you are interested in cross-country skiing in Central Europe: Schwarzwald in Germany is probably one of the best places together with the Jura in France. Long trails cross these regions from north to south. But in many other middle-high mountain areas in central Europe, from Poland to Bulgaria, long distance trails are marked during winter. Have a look at a Dutch report of a tour in the Giant Mountains

But of course, Scandinavia is the place to go to for cross-country skiing and ski touring. Have a look at the page on Sweden.