KFor a moment it seemed as if German politicians had collectively seized the wanderlust: Hendrik Wüst and Boris Rhein strolled through the Sauerland forest, Markus Söder, Cem Özdemir and Hubert Aiwanger scaled Bavarian alpine pastures, and Kevin Kühnert was drawn to Lake Tegernsee. The hiking step is far from becoming the new Germany pace. Statistically speaking, it is still hardly more likely to meet two top politicians in the forest than at the outdoor pool. But some migrations in past decades have left unmistakable political footprints.
That of the most prominent hiking couple in the Bonn Republic, Franz Josef Strauss and Helmut Kohl, has made a particularly strong impression on the collective memory. In 2018, a hiking shoe belonging to the former Chancellor even made it to the exhibition at the Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremberg. However, the regular tours of the two had little in common with the media productions of their political grandchildren. Kohl and Strauss trudged through Bavarian or Austrian forests and meadows without employees, without journalists and separated from their bodyguards – and made politics at the same time.
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