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After taking two classes focusing on apes, monkeys and other primates, I was a liite bit excited to find out that there was an interactive zoo with monkeys here in the area. I heard about the so called “Affenberg” on our trip to Neuschwanstein. Affenberg literally means Monkey Mountain, which is what we called it for the rest of the trip. The Affenberg is in the town of Salem about an hour from Radolfzell.

The sanctuary has about 200 barbary macaques. Macaques are the same monkeys that chill out in hot springs in winter, by the way. Today's word means “to feed,” and the cool thing about this sanctuary is that you can feed the macaques yourself. Like the macaques come up to you and will grab popcorn out of your hand. It's wild!

Also you can get really close to them.

No, I mean like really close.

The macaques are sort of funny to watch. They act like an infant with really good coordination. But they also have moments where they strike you as surprisingly human and relatable. It will be in something like they way they sit or they way they look at you. I tried to offer one of the macaques two very small pieces of popcorn and she looked at my popcorn, looked me in the eye, blinked very sassily, and walked away. My first thought was “that bitch” and then I realized that if I had tourists feeding me all day, I could afford to be picky too.

We were warned that the macaques can get handsy and that we should remove jewelry and just be careful in general. Despite that, one of the macaques did steal Geoff's water bottle and climb a tree with it. I don't think we'll get it back.

But, I have to admit that German sort of disappoints me sometimes. And now is one of those times. In German there doesn't seem to be disctinct words for ape and monkey; they are both just “Affen.” Now this might not seem like a big deal, but the biologist in me is sort of irked by this. German has a separate verb form you use when you rephrase what someone else has said, but it can't muster distinct words for ape and monkey?!

What, you may ask, is the difference between an ape and a monkey? Well there are lots, but in the case of, say, humans and macaques, I can list some interesting points. First of all macaques, which are monkeys, have cheek pouches. Macaques also don't have the same range of hand motion humans do. You can touch your thumb to all of your other fingers; macaques can't. On the downside, you don't (shouldn't) have fangs like a macaque. But macaques can't spin their arms around like we can.

Despite the linguistic shortcomings, I was really excited to see the monkeys and to get to touch them. If you're ever near the Bodensee, check out the Affenberg.