Following graduation from Dillmann's Modern School he took a journey on foot through the Balkans to Constantinople and Troy. In 1896/7 he served a year in the 26th regiment of the ‘yellow dragoons' (gelbe Dragoner) - so called because of their yellow collars and cuffs - in Ludwigsburg. The years 1898-1902 were spent studying medicine in Tübingen, Berlin and Freiburg im Breisgau. Arriving in Tübingen in autumn 1898 he applied to join the student Corps Rhenania and was enrolled the following February. In 1903 he graduated Dr. med. In the course of his studies he travelled to Crete, Albania and Persia, made numerous excursions to the mountains, skiing on the Zugspitze and in the Bernese Oberland on his own home-made skis.