Eckenhagen-Blockhaus-Eckenhagen 10 km

Walk from Eckenhagen to the ski area Blockhaus and back, largely through forests. You can find something to eat and drink in Eckenhagen and at Blockhaus, although the ‘Panoramahütte’ in Blockhaus was temporarily closed during our trip by the order of the mayor and has limited opening times anyway. The hike is predominantly easy, on larger forest or field roads, but has a steep descent on grass from Blockhaus.
The hike starts at a parking lot ‘Wickenbach’, just outside Eckenhagen. You walk into the forest, but then ascend quite steeply to the village of Eckenhagen. You walk to the center with the Evangelische Barockkirche and some timber-framed houses (‘Vakwerk’). You walk around the church and then ascend via the asphalt Landwehrstrasse to the edge of the forest. Shortly after reaching the edge of the forest you take a path into the forest. Here a lot of logging had taken place and tree trunks were lined up in places, one of these tree trunk collections blocking the path at the end. I expect the trunks will have been removed shortly after the walk, and we could pass the collection quite simply actually. There was a lot of this logging going on in the forest. You continue on broader forest roads taking you up past a viewpoint above Branscheid and then further up to a neat Nature Reserve protecting juniper trees (‘Wacholderschutzgebiet Branscheid’). Another forest road takes you to the top of the hill where you arrive at a gravel road amidst pasture and corn fields. You follow this gravel road towards Blockhaus, which was quite deserted during our trip. The Panoramahütte was closed, and the fog was so dense that we did not have the good views you would normally have here. At the Panoramhütte you could walk a little along the asphalt road to get a view of the ski area. However, we descended steeply on grass next to the Hütte. Below you enter the forest again, first along a track along a forest stream, and then on forest roads along another stream. One of these forest roads takes you down along a slope to the Hexentanzplatz, a crossing of forest roads where witches dance… Here we took a smaller forest track in a west north west direction to the top of the Breselberg, but this forest track disappeared at the end due to logging activities. So I replaced that part of the walk with the track continuing straight on to the hamlet Wolfseifen. Shortly after, you arrive back to the starting point.