Prälaten hike

Description:
The "Prälatensteig" leads from the market town office up the stairs to the market church, which can be visited during the day. Over the cemetery to the street and further uphill until just before the end of the town. The path turns left between the houses and leads along garden fences to the Mühlbach. At the level of Engelszell Abbey, it turns right into the monastery forest and further to the "Haselmaus" hut, which somehow resembles the fairy tale of "Hansel" and "Gretel". The path continues through the forest to the "Sausenden Bach". Here it goes down to the "former" hammer mill. At the federal road, turn left along the edge of the forest to Engelszell Abbey and back to the market town office.Directions:

THE HASELMAUS STORY

In 1955, a violent storm tore a wide path here in this romantically situated part of the monastery forest near Engelszell Abbey.

While processing the wood, the hunter and hobby carpenter Friedrich Bernhofer (born 1920) had the idea, together with his son Friedi (born 1951), to build a small hut here for resting, snacking, and as shelter in bad weather. With much love and skill, a small hut was created from the wood of hazel shrubs.

By chance, during the "construction work," hazel dormice kept appearing. The cute, brownish animals with a long, bushy tail, reminiscent of a miniature squirrel, proved to be very tame. Since they showed no fear of humans, Friedi later took a hazel dormouse home and also to elementary school, where it was enthusiastically admired by his classmates. After a "short vacation" of the hazel dormouse with the Bernhofers, the small forest resident was brought back to its original environment in the Trappist monks' forest.

THE NEWLY ERECTED HUT WAS NAMED AFTER THIS SMALL RODENT AND HAS SINCE CARRIED THE NAME "HASELMAUS". IT THEN BECAME A POPULAR HIKING DESTINATION FOR THE PEOPLE OF ENGELHARTSZELL AND THE MANY SO-CALLED SUMMER GUESTS.

Not only next to the hut, but also inside the small hut itself, hikers found a table with two benches for snacking and resting. Sometimes the monk from Engelszell Abbey probably took a break here, as he regularly had to travel the path day and night to the monastery's power plant at the nearby stream in the village of Saag to manually perform various switchings, which have long since been done automatically.

The fact that the "Haselmaus" was frequently visited was proven by a guestbook with many entries. Opposite the hut on a tree right next to the hiking trail, there was a picture of Mary by the academic painter Käthe Herrmann-Bernhofer, showing the Mother of God surrounded by the animals of the forest. This original picture, the hut, and the resting benches were one day completely destroyed by unknown persons and thrown into the adjacent spruce forest.

Later, a new hut was rebuilt on this site by the forest owner, Engelszell Abbey, which had become very dilapidated over the years. Only on the initiative of private individuals and the association "Culture & Tourism on the Danube" was a renovation phase of the "Haselmaus" and the hiking trail completed in 2021 in agreement with the abbey under the leadership of the very committed trail sponsor Gertrud Schneider.

Tip:
The "Prälat" is an ecclesiastical dignitary in the Christian church. The Trappists of Engelszell Abbey, Austria's only Trappist monastery, gave the hiking trail its name. In the monastery shop, Trappist beers and monastery liqueurs are available for purchase!Equipment:
normal hiking equipmentAdditional information:
www.stift-engelszell.at