I think we all walked the Camino for a certain reason and with a certain idea of how it might turn out. But non of us would have even imagined what happened in the end. Today – two weeks after officially finishing the Camino and going home – we said goodbye to Mitch and Ben. After spending 3 days with Tom in the black forest, against their plan to go home directly from there, Mitch and Ben came back to Saarland with us once again on Saturday. Trying to enjoy our last days together as intensely as possible, non of us got very much sleep after we had gotten out…

Tired from yesterday’s late dinner and long day, we didn’t make any plans for this morning and slept in. Our new plan was to just relax all day and the fact that Tom’s dad offered to cook a paella for us played along very well with that plan. The others watched a few episodes of Game of Thrones in the living room while I spent my morning-noon drawing and listening to the sounds of dying and growning people from next door. At 4, the paella was ready and we all sat down outside where Tom’s family has built a nice little place with a cooker and fridge and pizza oven…

It hadn’t been very hard to discard our original plan to get up at 5 and drive to the Swiss Alps today. The weather forecast for that region had predicted rain so we decided to stay in the sunny black forest which would also grant us 3.5 more hours of sleep. We started breakfast at 8:30 and took off pretty late around 11 towards the Zauberwald (“magic forest”) in Bernau. There, we did a beautiful little loop path through the magic forest with lots of wooden figures, huts and signs and the most amazing landscape with tall trees and a small river. It was already very hot when we got…

Today was the big train day. We were at the train station at 9 and purchased the Germany group ticket, knowing that we would have to change from regional train to regional train for a total of six times until we would reach Tom’s village in the black forest. Knowing Deutsche Bahn, we were prepared for the worst and very surprised when everything worked perfectly for the first 4 trains. We had between 2 and 9 minutes of time to switch between trains at each station and all of them were perfectly on time until Offenburg, where we had a 10 minute delay. We played a funny word game during…

We couldn’t help it but – after a week and a half of eating 6000 calories a day without moving – go for a hike today. Due to our carlessness, the choice was easy and we started the “Lookintothecountrypath” (Schauinslandweg) around 9:30. The scenic loop itself was only 11 km long, but we had to walk 7 km to get there and to come back, which left us with an average-high Camino day of 25 km. It was really hot and it felt weird to walk without hiking poles and weight on our backs. The path itself was pretty, but on the way there and back we had to hike…

I made it. The threatening 28 have been reached yesterday. Time for a little update in my diary. I always felt like 28 would be an important turning point in my life. My original plan had been to have a plan about my life by the age of 28. What happened is that I have never before had less of a plan than now. Any plan is limited to the next 24 hours, long term plans concerning vacations reach up to August at the moment. But that’s okay. For one thing, this planlessness has created the possibilities to Schwenk 3 days in a row and that had not happened in…

Why not keep maintaining the blog even though I’m at home? (Which I actually haven’t even been). After finishing the Camino, all the farewell and emotions and coming home on Thursday evening, I had dinner with my parents and slept for 2.5 hours before we drove to a small village in northern Germany to the family reunion. My aunt had invited her brothers and sisters and their children to this reunion one year ago and this would be the first time for me to see my cousins again after 9 years. One of them even has a small child of her own now. I must admit that going to a…

Our 33rd and last day of this journey started rainy and quiet. We could sleep in but only Johanna really slept peacefully until we had to leave our beds. I stood up at 9 and joined Mitch and Tom for breakfast. Despite the “goodbye-quality” of the day, I felt happy and we had lots of fun together. We had breakfast for over an hour in the living room and even Johanna came down eventually. As it was raining a lot outside, we just stayed there playing Contact on the sofas, trying to absorbe and enjoy every minute we had left to spend with Tom, Mitch and Ben. At 1, we…