Venue
Like every year, we were welcomed at the hotel Zur Goldenen Rose, run by Paul Grüner (just like almost everything else in Karthaus).
Entertainment
Traditionally, several musical events are organised during the summer school. Unfortunately there were no tango lessons this year, but there was a lot of piano music and two songs. Find more at the music page.
Social media
There is a Facebook group created by the summer school students.
A regular day at Karthaus
Venue
The village's community building (Haus der Dorfgemeinschaft) comfortably accommodated all the school's official activities.
Haus der Dorfgemeinschaft, where the lectures were held.
Day program
Each day lectures started at 8:30 and lasted until lunch time (13:00). The lunch sometimes took place on the terrace but mostly inside the hotel, where we could enjoy the salad bar, pasta and great desserts. The formal program then resumed with exercise classes and computer project work. Twelve groups of three students each were assigned computer projects supervised by one of the lecturers. By performing numerical experiments and playing around with different numbers, students got a taste of glaciology-related processes. The results of the projects were presented on the last day of the summer school.
The complete programme is available in PDF.
Spare time
In their spare time, the participants could enjoy the beautiful surroundings of Karthaus. The nearby Kreuzspitze (2575 m) just south of the village was a popular hiking and running destination. The 11-year old record of running up and down in 56'44" by Thomas Reerink was broken by John who did it in 53'06". Unfortunately he couldn't stay King of the Mountain for long, as Arran made it in only 52'56". Other people took it slow and walked up and down in about three hours.
View from the Kreuzspitze.
The village centre also offered a lot of interesting buildings, such as the old monastery (the Karthaus) of Carthusians that used to live here a long, long time ago.
The ambulatory of the old Carthusian monastery.
The annual event Almabtrieb took place while we were there. During this day, the cows are brought down by the farmers from the mountain pastures. The cows are decorated and the cow that gave the most milk is celebrated even more.
The decorated cows during the Almabtrieb.
Excursion
On the last Wednesday students and staff went on excursion to the Hochjochferner glacier. More details on the excursion page.
The group traversing the glacier.