Summer at the Zeiteninsel: Our Stone Age Gathering 2022

The European Stone Age Gathering is a recurring event for craftspeople, academics and wilderness enthusiasts, all with a shared love for the Stone Age, to come together and share knowledge and skills for outdoor and traditional living.

This year, our gathering was hosted by the Zeiteninsel open air museum near Marburg in central Germany, located beautifully in the Lahn river valley, surrounded by low forested mountains. A more idyllic setting is hard to come by.

After spending the weekend soaking up the medieval atmosphere in beautiful Marburg, my friend and I set the time machine further back to the Stone Age and joined the few other early birds at the gathering Sunday evening. Monday was the big arrivals day, and it was great to see all my friends again.

This year, the gathering was very different for me. My two best friends, one of whom got me into this environment five years ago, couldn’t attend this year, and so I felt like I had to find my own place within the gathering. It used to always be the three of us doing everything together. Sleeping next to each other, cooking together, doing crafts together, organising the annual Stone Age fashion show together, and so on. But now, I was the only one representing ‘the Danish Delegation’, as our Stone Age father so kindly calls us. It’s not like I was completely alone, though. My friend was there for the first few days, and I really enjoyed sharing this part of my life with him. I also already knew most of the other attendants, and I did eventually figure out where I fit into the whole equation. I’m not the most skilled of people (in fact, I can’t sew to save my life), but I try my best. This year, unfortunately, I wasn’t in the right headspace to focus on acquiring new skills, but it’s something I will focus on much more in the coming years. I left the gathering feeling more inspired than ever, and I feel so eager to learn.

The days at the gathering were long and hot, and I spent them mostly doing different crafts and organising the fashion show. I made a small leather purse to hide my phone, created some jewellery from amber and wooden beads and made a beautiful pattern on a wooden pendant using a flint blade.

I also tried to make a pair of shoes from scrap leather and children’s goatskin shoes that I’d picked up in a thrift store. The first try went horribly wrong, the second was a success although they’re still laughable but cute. I only managed to finish one shoe, though, but the other shouldn’t take too long to finish now that I’ve figured out the right technique.

On Friday evening, it was time for our fourth annual Stone Age fashion show! As always, it was an amazing time with nine unique and funny acts, all in creative outfits made entirely of natural materials and lots and lots of natural body paint!

We had a wonderful host also in creative dress, a band that played music customized for each act, a brilliant audience including a cute dog that reacted to all the acts (especially Werner the Werewolf!), and three judges, one of whom was yours truly. I actually came up with the idea for the fashion show along with my friend back in 2018, and it makes me so happy to see the tradition go on.

All acts were great and incredibly funny, but in the end there could only be one winner. It was our Flintqueen Elena who won the flower crown, with Monika ‘the Spirit of our Plants’ and Basti ‘the Unsuccessful Hunter’ as close runner-ups!

As much as I wanted to be fully immersed in the activities at the gathering, I just couldn’t help but explore the surrounding area a little. I had no idea the Lahn river valley would be this beautiful, but as I discovered, the area is incredibly romantic, full of old towns with cobbled streets and half-timbered houses. I really love the fact that the gathering moves to a new destination every year as it gives me the chance to explore a new part of the world that I probably wouldn’t stumble upon otherwise!

I climbed a mountain above the town of Niederweimar (Weimarscher Kopf, 305 m.) and got a little lost on the way up so I had to climb some rocks to get up to the highest point of the forest. I couldn’t locate the summit, and maps.me wasn’t very helpful, but I just went to what looked like the highest point. Trees blocked the view, but I came past two viewpoints just below the summit on the way back down, which gave me the gorgeous views over Niederweimar and the river valley that I was looking for.

One day when I was out shopping, I went for a quick walk through the streets of Niederweimar. I discovered the cutest little quarter surrounding the town’s old church, full of half-timbered houses and pretty details on the walls.

But my favourite experience was a sunset hike above Argenstein. Not least because the sun was just about to set when I reached the viewpoint, giving me a full view of the river valley in the softest, golden light. I could even see the castle in Marburg in the distance. Such a beautiful moment.

My everyday life is very busy, with excavations, weekend adventures and travels. I hardly ever allow myself to relax and leave my computer unused. But this annual week in the Stone Age is different. During this week, there’s nothing I want less than to stare at my computer screen. I want to be present in the moment. To sit by the campfire with no worries except for how my banana with chocolate will turn out. To allow myself to be creative and do fun crafts without an upcoming schedule haunting me. To forget about the outside world for a while, and just be immersed in nature and fruitful conversations with likeminded people.

I’m already super excited for next year where there will be three gatherings, and I will help organise one of them. I hope I can make it to all of them, but it’s still unknown to me where I’ll be and what I’ll be doing next summer. Either way, my life needs a dose of Stone Age and a dose of these amazing people that attend the gatherings, and I just can’t let a summer go by without attending at least one gathering.