A text by Jojo Buddenbohm, eight years old, with additions by Johnny Buddenbohm, six years old, and photos by Maximilian Buddenbohm, much older.
We were in the mountains, in South Tyrol in Italy, at the Burgerhof. It was in Lana, a small town close to Merano.
The Burger-Hof is nice, even if it doesn't have much to offer for children. But it does have a large pool in the garden, which my brother Johnny and I used to go to a lot, I jumped in there all the time. The pool isn't heated, but the water was still okay - it's usually very warm in South Tyrol in summer.
There are often other children in the courtyard, you can play with them and if you live in a flat above them, you can send letters to each other with a string from upstairs to downstairs. We often did that because we got to know two children there.
There were no animals, this is an organic fruit farm mainly with apples and a little wine.
There was a great view of the valley from the flats. When it got dark and the lights came on everywhere, it always looked very nice, like little sparks from a fire that you could reach out and touch. You could also see the mountains on the other side of the valley and a small waterfall, and even the Dolomites further away.
You can easily reach the Gaulschlucht gorge on foot from the farm, it's a wilderness on a mountain stream, it's wonderful there. You can also walk to Lana, which is better than always travelling by car, also for the environment. Lana has a bakery and supermarkets and ice-cream shops, as well as evening events with music. In the neighbouring village of Tscherms there is the Pizzeria Helden, which was good, we already knew it from last year.
In Lana itself there is also a waterfall that you can walk to, we even stood under it. We'd never done that before in our lives.
You can get from the farm to Merano in a short time and then take the cable car to Merano 2000, where you can go on a summer toboggan run. It's really great, and from the age of nine you can also ride on your own. So next year.
On the last day, we hiked a very long path, which I didn't like because it was so long uphill and there were adders. It was a circular route and when you go back it's downhill, which was good. Anyway, we all made it, but we were really exhausted.
Additions from Johnny: There's a trampoline on the farm, which I liked, and the apples taste good there too, I picked some. The apple juice from the farm is the best juice ever, you can buy it there and take it with you.
The Vigiljoch is not far from the farm, it's the mountain next door. You can get up there with the cable car and then further up with the chairlift. Children from the age of eight can ride there on their own, like my brother. The chairlift is great, I've never done it before, but I'd like to do it again.
