Place & Arrival
This year the undjetzt?! conference will be hosted again by the Gemeinschaft Freien Feldlage. undjetzt?! oldies will be familiar with this place, because we are allowed to pitch our tents there for the third time this year. We are looking forward to welcoming you in the summer in the beautiful Harz mountains!
You can get a first impression of winter in the undjetzt?! Trailer from 2017 below (german).
Community Freie Feldlage Harzgerode
The community “Freie Feldlage” is still in the pioneer and start-up phase. On a cooperative basis, communal living, life and work are to be combined.
Our vision for the Freie Feldlage: People of different ages live, learn, work and live together in shared apartments and yet in a large community. They meet peacefully, supportively and in solidarity and respect each other in the diversity of their life plans and lifestyles. They treat the earth as a living space with care and responsibility, protecting and caring for it. New and innovative ideas are thought, tested and lived in the common need to act in a meaningful and sustainable way.
Arrival
Harzgerode is located in the eastern Harz Mountains in Saxony-Anhalt and is easily accessible via the A36 in the north. Quedlinburg is a reference city and is located about 20km north of Harzgerode. In addition, the A38 runs along in the south between Göttingen and Leipzig and passes Sangerhausen, Berga and Nordhausen. From these places you can also easily get the ~40km uphill to Harzgerode. The conference will be held in the former Children’s Lung Clinic about 2km outside of town.
A precise description of the location of the clinic can be found on the website of our venue: http://freiefeldlage.de/anreise.
Unfortunately, Harzgerode is not well connected to the long-distance public transportation network. Therefore, it is a good idea to reach the surrounding towns and change there to the public bus or the narrow-gauge railroad. When you arrive in Hargerode at the train station you just have to follow the “undjetzt?!” signs.
Cities where you can change to local transport are Quedlinburg, Aschersleben, Sangerhausen, Berga and Nordhausen. You can reach all these places by train. With meinfernbus.de and flixbus.de you can also get to all the cities mentioned, except for Berga.
From Quedlinburg, and more rarely from Aschersleben, buses go directly to Harzgerode. Both cities are located north of Harzgerode. If you come from the south, you can take a bus from Sangerhausen (via Wippra) or also Berga (via Stolberg or Schwenda). You can get reliable information about connections at insa.de. With common country tickets (Schönes-Wochenende, Quer-durchs-Land, Sachsen-Anhalt/Thüringen/Sachsen, etc.) you can also take buses.
The Harz narrow-gauge railroad is a tourist experience. The picturesque steam locomotive crawls slowly from Quedlinburg or Nordhausen to Harzgerode. Here you can buy the route ticket. The ticket must be purchased separately and is rather expensive.
The Selke Valley Cycle Path, which avoids the hilly landscape, is highly recommended. Following the Selke, this leads almost directly past the sanatorium. Near Mägdesprung you should be able to follow the “undjetzt?!” signs(, which lead you the last 2km up the hill).
In Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia, it is also possible to take bicycles on the train without any problems, so you can also get there easily by public transport (e.g. Aschersleben, Falkenstein, Meisdorf) before you can enjoy the Harz at your own pace.
To undjetzt?! you can also walk comfortably! Trains and long-distance buses stop only ~20km north and ~40km south of Harzgerode, respectively. This corresponds to a day trip or even a two-day trip to the conference location. Or you can hike from Meisdorf along the above mentioned Selketalradweg, about 15km. Of course, the most fun is to do it together. We are happy to help you with networking.
Hitchhiking you can get to the conference from all points of the compass quite easily. Some things have proven useful so far:
* Start early enough in the day or plan an overnight stay for longer distances, as there are fewer cars on the country roads in the Harz at night.
* coming from the south you will get along well via several highways:
– A71 to Sangerhausen
– A7 to the junction of the A7 and A38 before Göttingen, from where you can take the A38 to Berga or Sangerhausen.
– A9 to the junction with the A38 and then on the A38 to Berga or Sangerhausen.
– When you are let out at Sangerhausen Süd (Nr 16) you will find an Araltankstelle or a McDonalds where you can be let out. From Sangerhausen you drive over the country roads in the direction of Wippra and from there in the direction of Harzhochstraße B242 & Harzgerode (! could still be closed…).
– If you get off at the exit Berga: Immediately after the exit there is a gas station where people can drop you off well and easily find new cars coming from Berga via the country roads towards Schwenda and then Harzgerode.
* from the north:
– Coming from the A7, shortly after Bockenem, the Autohof Rhüden is very convenient to get from there to the B82 direction Goslar and from there the A36 to Quedlinburg is a good reference point.
– Coming from the A2 you can take exit 63 and 64 to the Landstraße 245 in the direction of Halberstadt.
– Coming from the A14 it is possible to walk from the parking lot at Beesen-Laublingen (between exit 11 and 12) to Beesen-Laublingen and from there hitchhike to Alsleben and take the 242 to Harzgerode. Or stay on the A14 until Bernburg and then change to the A36 until Quedlinburg.
– from Aschersleben you come from the 185 to Harzgerode
– from Quedlinburg it is not far…
* most people who are traveling in the Harz mountains know their way around and can help you. Some of them will surely drive a little loop so that you arrive at a good point or even directly at the site. The closer you get to Harzgerode, you can ask people to take you to the “Ehemalige Kinder-Lungenklinik”, where the conference will take place. For the description to the clinic, look again under the heading “Arrival by car”.
* Here you will find an overview of the German highway network and rest stops: http://www.autobahnatlasonline.de/AutobahnkarteMitAS.pdf
* Trust your gut feeling
* Even more info about hitchhiking and where you can best start: http://hitchwiki.org/de/Hauptseite
We wish you a lucky thumb and many exciting encounters and conversations!
If hitchhiking is all still pretty new to you, here’s first so very basic why hitchhiking is absolutely awesome:
It’s ultra sustainable (the cars drive anyway, and the extra fuel consumption is barely measurable).
It’s fun because it’s a new adventure every time and something special always happens.
You get to know nice people (quote hitchwiki.org: “The good thing about hitchhiking is that the assholes drive right on by”).
It is free of charge
It is completely flexible in time
It’s faster than some other means of transportation (e.g. long distance bus) and it’s even possible to hitchhike with ships, trains and planes!
Even if you have never hitchhiked before, that is no reason not to participate in the undjetzt? hitchhiking party. Because hitchhiking is easy as pie! If you still need some inspiration, here are a few tips from the “pros”:
To find good starting points for hitchhiking out of cities (gas stations near the highway, or places on the on-ramp where you can easily stand and cars can stop), search hitchwiki.org. Just type in the name of the city you want to start in at the top right, and the wiki will tell you the best place to start.
Here is a summary of a few tips for beginners: http://hitchwiki.org/de/Der_erste_Trip.
Since hitchhiking in a team is of course much more fun than hitchhiking alone, you can network with other participants beforehand and hitchhike to the conference together. We will send out a list with contact details soon.