A walk to Grieben - April 22, 2016

A walk from Bittkau to Grieben

22 April 2016

On April 22nd, 2016 I travelled by train from Magdeburg to Tangerhütte, where Steffi Kühle very kindly picked me up and drove me to Bittkau, where I was to spend the weekend.

One of the first things I did on arriving in Bittkau was to look at the Elbe.  I do not know why but the Elbe river had held my fascination since I first found out my ancestors (Vorfahren) lived in the Altmark.  

I walked down to the riverbank and immediately turned around to look back at Bittkau, and imagined what it must have been like for my ancestors to be here beside the Elbe 150 years before.

I  then started to walk towards Grieben.
 

Along the Elbe river is a dedicated bike track that runs the length of the river. The Elbeweg is very well known bike route in Germany.             http://www.elberadweg.de/start.html

As you walk along you can see the other villages across the river. The village of Derben can be seen as you head to Grieben.

Near Grieben there is a ferry that can take you across to Ferchland, another village on the other side of the river.  On this day that I was there it happen to be the 271st anniversary of the wedding of my 5 times great grandparents Christian Bauerhortz and Anna Dorothea Gentz in Ferchland, so I cross the river.  (yes there will be another blog update on that!)

After coming back over the Elbe from Ferchland I headed in towards Grieben, where I was to meet Aileen Gruß from Bittkau.  Aileen had been incredibly helpful in helping me plan my trip to Bittkau, and on this afternoon had arranged to meet me at the Windmuhl where we were going to be given a guided tour.  My great grandfather, Louis Vetter, and own and run a windmuhl in Bittkau in the 1860s.

Grieben sits between four of the places where my vorfahren lived, Bittkau, Tangerhütte, Tangermünde and Ferchland.                                                                   

Surrounding the windmuhl and remnants of it's life as a fully functioning  windmill.

 Also beside there is the Backhaus, that has the ovens that were used to bake the bread that was made from the grounded wheat from the windmill.

With Aileen at the windmill was her partner, Thomas Lemme, and Ines Funke, also from Bittkau, and  an amazing gentleman (I feel terrible as I have forgotten his name!) from Grieben who was going to explain to us the functions of the windmuhl.

We told about life in the windmuhl, and how as long as there was a breeze you had to work, so they purposely made the bed small so you could not fall in to a deep sleep.
I was told that with my height I would never get a job in a windmuhl.

We were told how the wheat would be delivered, and how the Müller would have to constantly be there loaded it in.

There were some wasp hives in the roof of the muhl that I reckon were about the size of a large workman's boot.  No sign of the wasps!!

 

The size of the wooden cogs and beams inside of the muhl were enormous.

As you can see I am a tad too tall to work/live in a muhl.

We then went and looked at the Bakery which is set up with the old ovens, and is still used for various functions.

Ines was excellent as my personal translator!

A fabulous start to my weekend in Bittkau and a big thank you to Aileen Gruß for organising the visit to the windmuhl.