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The German hiking club Pfälzerwaldverein will sponsor the annual burning of winter in the village of Olsbrücken. Each year, the community observes this special tradition the Saturday after Fasching.
Hikers interested in joining the “Fire for Spring” should meet at 7 p.m. at the Dorfplatz (village square) in Olsbrücken.
The mayor will hold an opening speech and village officials will sell torches for a small fee. The torchlight procession will then wander through the village up to the old sports field on Oberberg hill. It is about a 3-kilometer walk.
About two weeks prior to the event, members of the hiking group started putting up a 4.5-meter-high pile of wood to be burned near the sports field. Even old Christmas trees have been added to the pile.
When all walkers have arrived at the pile, children will throw their torches into the pile under the supervision of the local fire department. When the fire starts, winter will be “burned.”
The PWV hiking group runs a hut on Oberberg hill, where it will serve food and something to drink.
In other places in the Pfalz, the burning of winter will take place at later dates.
On April 3, the wine-growing villages of Neuleiningen and Forst, as well as Speyer and Landau, will say goodbye to winter with so-called summer day parades that lead through the town, ending with the burning of piles or burning of figures made of straw and wood. In Speyer, a snowman will be burned.
