Hiking in the Sächsische Schweiz

Since we were in Dresden and had heard a lot about it, we decided to go for a hike in the Sächsische Schweiz. An easy train ride from Dresden drops us (along with quite a few other people) off at the station for Schmilka and the ferry takes us across to town. From here we follow the road out of town a bit (conveniently most everyone else heads through town to enter the park) before turning up on a trail and heading up, up, through the woods. This is a great trail through the woods with boulders and moss and roots and everything you could want. :-)

After a bit of climbing we make it to the Klein Bastei viewpoint and enjoy the views in both directions along the river. Then it's back a bit the way we came, more trail, a bit of forest road, some descending, and then along the mostly unmarked (but heavily used) use trail up into one of the canyons. We follow this, at times quite sandy (we're both wearing running shoes with mesh tops, which really aren't great for this) trail through the woods, around some great boulders, past the turn offs to a couple of climbing areas, to the end of the canyon and the beginning of the Starke Stiege. A short bit of fun scrambling (with convenient metal loops for hand grips/steps) takes us to the top. Now we're on a panorama trail that follows the edge of some cliffs and has great views.

We follow the good, at times fairly exposed, trail for a while, enjoying the views and crazy rock formations, until we reach the top of the Rotkehlchenstiege and turn left away from the edge. After a bit more trail and forest road, we head down into the next canyon and along for a bit until we hit another forest road. This is the one kind of boring stretch of the day: just a forest road without much in the way of views. Not long after the next set of rocks come into view - complete with a couple teams of climbers - we turn off to the right and climb up towards the woods towards the Häntzschel stiege. A bit of worry here as we run into a group of four just as we reach the bottom, but fortunately they stop for a lunch break before starting the ascent. This Stiege has some quite exposed sections, so it's outfitted with a cable for a klettersteig set; an option that seems to be commonly used. We're not doing that, so we don't have any prep to do and just start climbing. It doesn't take long to catch up to the group of two in front of us who are using safety gear, so we do a bit of waiting, but fortunately the first section isn't all that long and they head off to the viewpoint. We continue along until we get to the narrow crack in the rock that leads to the next bit of climbing. (We're really happy that the family that's considering this decides against it and continues along the trail!). Through the crack we get to a set of rungs that head up, up into the light:

We do a bit of waiting for the Dutch couple in front of us to manage to make it up (they're using safety gear *and* not so sure of themselves, so they are not speedy) and then head up ourselves. This really is fun: first heading up through a very constrained space and then opening up to be quite exposed. The first part is the kind of thing that would be a fun climbing challenge if it didn't have the rungs (though then we'd want to be able to place some gear too).

Once up top we take another break to enjoy the views and eat something and then head off on our way. After a diversion out to the viewpoint at the Carolafelsen (crowded!) we follow the trail a bit more before turning off and following the Heilige Stiege (very, very nice stairway down through the stone formations!) down into the canyon:

From here we just follow the trail and forest road until we're back in Schmilke. Here we stop for a refreshing beverage and some food at the bakery/brewery before taking the ferry back across the river. We've got a bit of time before the next train, so we get to clean the sand out of our shoes and cool our feet in the river before taking the train back to Dresden.

Track:

Stats: 15.2km, ~1000m up and down (from the running watch, so who knows...)