Growing up in the Bavarian Forest

Hey, I’m a fifteen-year-old teen living in the Bavarian Forest and growing up here has always been a great adventure for me. I decided that I wanted to share for example some stories from my childhood here, so people who grew up in cities can imagine what it’s like growing up in a small village near the forest.

Advantages of growing up in the Bavarian Forest

As you can imagine, my friends and I spend a lot of time in the forest and you would be surprised by how many things you can do there. On warm summer days we often go to a stream with a small waterfall and we just stand under it, fully dressed. That’s always really funny. And don’t worry about getting ill, if it’s warm enough our clothes dry most of the time before we’re even out of the forest.

Besides that, if you’re interested in photography, you can find some really interesting sceneries or even some wild animals if you’re lucky.

As it has been pointed out, I really love to spend time with my friends in the woods, but sometimes, when I just need some time alone I just grab my headphones, turn on some music and walk to my favorite places in the woods.

Another cool thing about growing up in a small village is that everyone knows nearly everyone, so for instance if you want to cook something and you need for example some flour and you don’t wanna go to the supermarket, you can just go and ask your neighbours. But this can sometimes also be a disadvantage. Imagine that you just had some kind of a family drama going on but you’ve already worked everything out and you have a good relationship again, but people will talk and make nasty remarks about it a long time after and ask questions about it even though it’s none of their business. Of course not everyone’s like this, but there will always be people like this.

Disadvantages of growing up in the Bavarian Forest

Of course not everything’s always as good as everyone says and obviously there are also negative aspects. In my village for example we don’t have any opportunities to buy food or something, we don’t have a bakery, nothing. But the next city is only three kilometers away, so it isn’t that far. Another downside is also that our bus line only runs every two hours or something instead of every hour like in the big cities like Munich for instance.

Here’s an example of what you could experience

One time, my friend and I, we went to one of our favorite places, everything was fine and we had a great time, but as we were on our ride home (we had our bicycles with us) I noticed a bird at the border of the street. I expected it to fly away because of the sound our bicycles made gravel path, but it didn’t. Of course we slowed down and I went to look after the bird. It turned out that the bird had an issue with his wing, so it couldn’t fly anymore. We felt really sorry so we decided to take it with us and call some people who could take care of the little bird. They later explained, that the bird was a red crossbill (Fichtenkreuzschnabel in German). These bird experts took it with them and I’m pretty sure that the crossbill is flying around happily by now.

All in one I’m really happy to live here and I wouldn’t wanna miss my childhood here in the Bavarian Forest.