Yesterday I was walking in the forests of northern Alsace, and I came upon the ruin of a medieval fortress. That's nothing unusual. In Les Vosges, you stumble over plenty of ruins all the time. In the late medieval ages it seems to have been a common pastime to build castles. The small child of an Alsatian knight would cry to his mother and say:
"I have nothing to doooo!"
and the mother would say:
"Why don't you go out and build a fortress this afternoon? Just get out of the kitchen, 'cause I'm preparing some delicious turnips for daddy, when he comes back from the crusade tonight."
Of course even the people of that time would get tired of building castles all the time, so sometimes they pulled down the castles of their neighbours instead or rebuilt their own ones, when the neighbours had been over for a cup of tea and a quick pillage.
Anyhow I approached this fortress, and as I got closer I could hear music playing. It was a soft voice singing accompanied by a guitar. Along the wall was a mountaineer's rope hanging. Apparently someone had given up using the worn out medieval steps, and found an easier way to get up. Personally I chose to carefully follow the worn out steps, holding tight to the bannister with one hand and to my umbrella with the other.
The music became clearer as I came to the inner side of a wall, which was standing a couple of yards from the main fortress. I passed a cave, where there were four sleeping bags and some backpacks. As I climbed the last steps to the top, I saw four young men sitting around a fire, which they had made in the ruin. Two of them were singing, one was reading a book and the fourth one was cooking. There was a glass with a toothbrush standing in a loophole.
Apparently these four men had decided to live a life in a castle for a couple of days, welcoming strangers with music and the smell of burnt food.
I looked around, but saw no mobile phones or portable computers, so they are not likely to have internet access, and can therefore not read this text. I can therefore safely accuse them:
The rope hanging along the wall was in a disgusting purple colour. If you ever want to climb a castle wall, make sure your rope matches the colour scheme of the environment. I'd recommend a light grey colour, in the same shade as the bark of a beech tree.
by Magnus Lewan