This post is written by Katie about her day in Garmisch-Partenkirchen on the way to her flight out of Copenhagen.

I slept in until 9am this morning, and woke up with very little hearing in my right ear.

Olympic Ski Jump

I went to LIDL to get some snacks for breakfast and hiking before setting off towards the old Olympic Ski Jump at Skistadion.  There was a bus, but it was also close enough to walk.  From the ski jump, I walked about 20 minutes to the entrance of Partnach Gorge.  The entrance fee was 4€, but it was a pretty informal process.

One of many beautiful scenes in Partnach Gorge!

Partnach Gorge was beautiful!  The water was light glacial water, and the canyon walls were tall. I think the free ‘experienced hikers only’ trail that split off right before the ticket booth might have had some pretty awesome overhead views, as I noticed a few bridges above the gorge.  But since I didn’t retrace my steps at all today, I didn’t go back and check out this trail.  I’d still recommend paying the 4€ and going on the gorge trail – it’s not expensive and it is very beautiful.  You can take as much time as you wish going through the gorge – just let speedier people zip by you.

People were relaxing near the beginning of the gorge

At the end of the gorge there is an area when you can walk down by the river before it enters the gorge.  There were many people wading and generally relaxing in this area.  I sat down to have a pretzel as a snack and just enjoy the views.

I took this picture of a posted map and referenced it frequently throughout my hike

From this point, there seem to be many choices for returning or onward travel.  I opted to walk towards the Zugspitze and the Reintal.  From the map, I decided to take the second right turn along this path to look back towards Laubhutte.  I’m glad I figured this out early on and took a picture of the map, as saw no more maps for the remainder of the hike.

Forest roads with great views

I hiked along forest roads for a long time, with my first signs of life beside a few hikers being Laubhutte.  This hut seemed to be closed, but there was a guy relaxing outside and a tap running to cool/clean empty beer bottles.

Partnach Alm and its awesome backdrop

Shortly before Partnach Alm, the forested hike suddenly opened up into farms.  I found myself walking through farm fields.  The view of the mountains as I neared Partnach Alm was the best of the day.  I probably should have stopped for a beer and snack at Partnach Alm, but I instead decided to continue onward.

At this point, I decided to head towards Kochelberg Alm instead of Olympia Skistadion, as I wanted to hike new ground and avoid retracing my steps.  This made the hike longer though, and I was getting tired.

View from a bench overlooking the Zugspitze

From Kochelberg Alm the trail was mainly along roads (some paved).  The trail dropped me into Garmisch slightly to the west of the train station.  The trail ended with some benches overlooking the Zugspitze near the ice sports arena.  I actually came back to these benches to eat dinner later in the evening.  But at this point in the hike I was very thirsty, so I stopped at LIDL on the way back and downed a liter of milk.

Dinner in the park

Once back at the hostel I worked on my laptop for a bit until the Internet mysteriously died.  I took this as a good sign to go wander the town.  During my wandering, I found a REWE, where I bought supplies for dinner.  I was happy to find fresh-cut fruit for purchase here!  I eventually made my way over to the benches overlooking the Zugspitze and settled in to eat my grocery store dinner.

After taking in enough views and finishing my dinner, I walked back to the hostel.  I grabbed my laptop and sat in the ‘lounge’ to write up both yesterday and today’s blog posts.

I throughly enjoyed my day in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and feel like I could spend at least a few more days explore the city and nearby mountains.  However, I leave tomorrow morning for Berlin, so further exploration will have to wait.  Overall, it seems to be a nice town with friendly people and beautiful mountains surrounding it.