Had I known about all the wonderful sporty things to do in the town of Malschwitz, I’d have never have gone and worked out this morning. Whew, it was a double whammy — and might explain why I’m so gosh darn tired on a quiet Sunday evening.
You’ll find Malschwitz in the Upper Lusatian Heath, just six kilometers from Bautzen. And it’s here at the Bautzen Reservoir that I managed to get in a double workout.
There’s a pleasant little beach, but also miniature golfing, rowing, and windsurfing. You can camp out around the reservoir, a nice place to spend the night. The Olbsee has two camp sites, and it’s a great lake for swimming and sailing.
It took a while to rest up, as I wanted to venture around the rest of (OK, parts of) Malschwitz’s twenty-three districts. Lieske, once belonging to Prussia, had some Bronze Age grave found. I wanted to see if I could find anymore.
Sadly I didn’t, but I found quiet streets and what used to be an old castle in the village of Baruth. And it was dairy cows and a castle in the village of Kleinbautzen.
Niedergurig was the real treat, that’s for sure. This was a strategic place during the Battle of Bautzen in 1813, and it’s where you can see the ruins of the Old French Bridge.
It’s also got some fish ponds, and an 800 year old tree — known as the Rieseneiche von Niedergurig. This tree is massive, with a trunk measuring 8.87m in circumference and standing 22-meters tall. There’s even a ringwall from the town’s old Slavic settlement days.
Just thinking about all that sightseeing and swimming makes me hungry — and thankfully Malschwitz has a variety of restaurants to choose from. Hmm, was I going to go with traditional German cuisine? Spanish? Pizza? Ahh, let’s go with a little of everything.
Maybe it was a good idea to get that double workout in then, huh? ;-)
