Hotel Waldkater
Encyclopedia
The Hotel Waldkater was a famous hotel in the Bode Gorge
in the Harz Mountains of Germany.
Less romantic is the story that a carter named Christoph Fessel originally built a small refreshment hut un the Bode Gorge that was soon replaced by the one-story Kleiner Waldkater. In 1852 the Großer Waldkater Hotel was added, that together with the Rosstrappe, Hexentanzplatz and Zehnpfund became one of the most famous hotels in the area.
The Großer Waldkater later became a rest home and was then converted into a youth hostel which was renovated in 1996. The Kleiner Waldkater was used after the Second World War initially as a residence for evacuees and, later, as a works holiday home for Naumburg furniture workers. After the Wende it was turned back into a hotel.
At the hote there is a relief of a wildcat above a dead bird.
visited Thale and the surrounding area several times and made the Bode Gorge an important setting for his novel, Cécile. In the twelfth chapter of this novel, the protagonists plan an afternoon excursion from Thale;
whereby the Waldkater is also mentioned: "Non not the Bode Gorge," said Gordon. "Especially that infernal Waldkater! That old country house on the roadway which reeks of cooking and stable smells. Everywhere people and butter paper, cripples and accordions. No, no, I suggest Lindenberg."
Bode Gorge
The Bode Gorge is a long, ravine that forms part of the Bode valley between Treseburg and Thale in the Harz Mountains of central Germany. The German term, Bodetal , is also used in a wider sense to refer to the valleys of the Warme and Kalte Bode rivers that feed the River Bode.At the Bode Gorge,...
in the Harz Mountains of Germany.
History
The first establishment called Waldkater ("wildcat") was built in 1845 and subsequently altered many times. The name goes back to a story, according to which a wine adulterator had been changed into a cat as a punishment. Before it was shot by a hunter the cat was supposed to have been saved by revealing a recipe for a May Day drink (Maitrank). But because this drink was also adulterated and caused the hunter to have a hangover, the adulterator had to be saved again and now showed the hunter a hidden treasure. With this capital the hunter built the hotel as well as a monument to the adulterator.Less romantic is the story that a carter named Christoph Fessel originally built a small refreshment hut un the Bode Gorge that was soon replaced by the one-story Kleiner Waldkater. In 1852 the Großer Waldkater Hotel was added, that together with the Rosstrappe, Hexentanzplatz and Zehnpfund became one of the most famous hotels in the area.
The Großer Waldkater later became a rest home and was then converted into a youth hostel which was renovated in 1996. The Kleiner Waldkater was used after the Second World War initially as a residence for evacuees and, later, as a works holiday home for Naumburg furniture workers. After the Wende it was turned back into a hotel.
At the hote there is a relief of a wildcat above a dead bird.
The Waldkater near Fontane
Theodor FontaneTheodor Fontane
Theodor Fontane was a German novelist and poet, regarded by many as the most important 19th-century German-language realist writer.-Youth:Fontane was born in Neuruppin into a Huguenot family. At the age of sixteen he was apprenticed to an apothecary, his father's profession. He became an...
visited Thale and the surrounding area several times and made the Bode Gorge an important setting for his novel, Cécile. In the twelfth chapter of this novel, the protagonists plan an afternoon excursion from Thale;
whereby the Waldkater is also mentioned: "Non not the Bode Gorge," said Gordon. "Especially that infernal Waldkater! That old country house on the roadway which reeks of cooking and stable smells. Everywhere people and butter paper, cripples and accordions. No, no, I suggest Lindenberg."