It’s a jungle…

Today I’m taking a slightly different approach than usual, because on Thursday I attended the small but exquisite opening of Thomas Below-Holzers exhibition. Like me, he captures the natural beauty around our hometown of Offenbach. The exhibition’s focus is on showing that you don’t have to travel far to have wonderful encounters, which reminded me of the motto of my cahoonah.com blog: It’s a jungle out there… and yes, we are truly fortunate that the Rhine-Main metropolis offers so many green spaces and forests.

My “Frei-tag” (Friday) is a real day off, so I cycled a short loop from the old Offenbach cemetery to Lämmerspiel, past the Grünen Seen (Green Lakes) to Gailenberg, along the Main River to Rumpenheim Palace Park (first stop for wild garlic), Schultheis-Weier, and back via the Fechenheimer Gumpen (second stop for wild garlic). Not far, and everything easily and comfortably done in 3-4 hours, but I had so many wonderful encounters, like the nuthatches at the Green Lake who wanted to take up residence in a hollow in the old apple tree, but a woodpecker came by and there was a great commotion. They both flew at it a few more times but couldn’t drive it away. Then there was the green woodpecker on the Gailenberg, who immediately tried to hide from me… these are just a few of the encounters I had on Friday. You see, you don’t have to travel far or lie in wait for hours – just go out into nature with your eyes open. So get out there and let yourselves be enchanted – spring is magical! It’s worth it!… and it’s a jungle out there…