The blackforest (pics) - not so black at all!

[Midwest Ninja]

What do you mean exactly? My selection of blades or do you mean the legal status?
Well, I can carry everything I want with few exeptions. Balisongs and some automatic knives are forbitten. But my Buck 119 for example is perfectly legal and I can carry it everywhere I want.
Normally, people won't even raise a brow when you pull out a knife to cut something. The more tactical the knife looks, the more the experience might vary.
Among hikers and hunters it doesn't matter what kind of knife you carry. But you can never go wrong with traditional materials. A grip made of stag or wood is almost never wrong.
What is considered a weapon and what is not depends on the gut feeling of a judge. For example, the nicker (my Böker is a nicker), a blade that is specifically designed to kill a deer by stabbing between to vertebrae, is not considered as a weapon, but as a knife for picknicking and hiking. But this isn't a question until you bring a knife to a demonstration and get caught with it. Unless you're on a demonstration it doesn't matter if your knife is designed to be a weapon or not.

Besides that, a >4" blade is overkill in Germany. (I choose to carry it anyway, because I simply don't care what stupid people think)
Whereever you hike, you won't need to build a shelter or hunt for food. There is always some sort of restaurant/hotel around. We don't have any dangerous or venomous animals around, at all, though I wouldn't want to get between a boar and it's kids.
At the moment I use an Otter lockback with carbon steel to cut my food, even in a pub. I never get any strange looks.

I was talking about the legal status. I know England is positively draconian, so I was wondering if Germany was the same way. Thanks for the info.

 

[bruce]

Those pictures remind me of the two years (1978 to 1980) I was posted to VII Corps in Stuttgart! We used to drive to the forest for a weekend all the time. The last time, it started out in Stuttgart as a slightly rainy, overcast day. By the afternoon, we were driving in six inches of snow trying to get back from the forest to Stuttgart. My youngest son (almost 28 now) loves the photos we took of the southern Germany since he was born in the Army hospital at Bad Cannstatt. His older sister and brother asked my wife how they were going to understand him when he got old enough to talk since they didn't speak German! Still evokes a giggle.

We didn't get to die Schwarzwald after we left Stuttgart for Augsburg, but there was some beautiful country down there also. All in all, four very wonderful years for my family and I. They sure beat the two years I spent at Fort Knox!