Blomberg ("Easy", Not so Easy) Hike & Mountain Slide

[So first, a few disclaimers and fair warnings:

1. any typos in this post, any recent post, or likely any post to come are not at all intended and my grammar and spelling has not simply gotten worse since I've been here (hopefully!). I type this on a german Keyboard (which has a different layout and different keys altogether), on a german Computer (meaning spell check naturally underlines all english in red - making it difficult to see the words and spot any mistakes), and since all nouns are capitalized in German, spell check also likes to capitalize random words as I type. Don't worry, I think my grammar is as good as ever. ;)

2. The photos in this post are not edited, many of them are not my own (but photos that others on the hike took), as I did not take my camera along for this hike, and it was an overcast day, making for less than ideal lighting. My phone stayed in my backpack for most of the day and it was a day to simply enjoy the journey. So. Sorry for the lack of decent photos. :) ]

Second, a little background on my Sunday hike: a while ago, I joined a Munich hiking Facebook group which has thousands of members and supposedly more experienced hikers who organize and lead hikes on the weekends and holidays. Each scheduled hike has a sign up online and it's basically first come first serve for reserving a spot. Then the group meets at the train station and splits the cost of a group train ticket and goes hiking somewhere for the day. All strangers, but pretty cool concept!

For a while I considered going hiking on my own, though common sense talked me out of that pretty early on. ;)

So on one of my lunch breaks last week I ventured out and bought a pair of sale hiking shoes (which worked very well!) - because on most of the hikes, they don't let you come unless you're properly dressed (i.e. shoes!). I signed up for a hike that was advertised as "very easy" and "for beginners." Ha, yeah right! More on that later....

Sorry for this...I hate pictures of myself, but I always appreciate the occasional one when looking back on a memory. Featuring my new hiking shoes ;)

Where to next?

Hiking with a group of strangers honestly quickly turned into hiking with a group that felt more or less like a family. It must be that I often go a full week without actually really talking to anyone here - besides the occasional "hey, how was your day?" on the off-chance that I actually see one of my roommates at home, to the inevitable "good morning" and work related questions at work.

But yesterday hiking - I had conversations with nearly everyone on the hike. And though I introduced myself about twenty times to different people, I also had a bunch of really good conversations and learned about a bunch of different people and their stories. Not the small talk. The real stuff. Hikers, man, they're a different type of person. Way more authentic than anyone else I've met here so far. 

It was a steep hike. Most of my fellow "beginner" hikers agreed that it was not quite the trail for the beginner. It was nice to have company on the way up, anyway!

No rush, made it to the top and took time to take in the view. So opposite of city life. 

Yep, that's me with the pink jacket around my waist. Enjoying the goodness. 

What a view. What a world.

The number of families who were also hiking this trail - with young kids too - was too many to count! Such a beautiful thing!

From the silent, slightly mysterious leader of the hike who obviously thought we were all a bunch of slow-pokes yet led us still calmly to the completion of the hike, to the married german couple and their golden sense of humor, to the girl from China with her Cannon camera and fabric thin fashion shoes, to the physics major current engineer from Italy, to the low-carb wannabe cook from France, to the unemployed man from Lebanon who misses his family becuase in his home country, family is everything, to the experienced older hiker who didn't hesitate in correcting my german, to the long-haired sunhatted student who prefers karate to hiking, to the girl with the Harvard hat who was in fact not from America but came prepared, offering snacks to everyone, to the few hikers whose names I'll never know as they were about a million times quieter than I, and a few others as well. 

Prost!

"Yes, you can still do "cheers" with water!", they told me. :)

Also, I spy Mother Mary! How incredibly awesome. 

View from where we sat at the hut at the peak. Some ordered plates of food, others enjoyed a beer (or plain water ;))

Aaannnddd: the long awaited slide down the mountainside. I can't lie, I was a bit nervous but simply did not give it much thought at all, so as to not freak myself out.

And though I felt like I was going to fly off the edge at many points (which is very very possible and probable - this is very much a self controlled and good judgement based thrill), it was a blast. 

And, what would you expect - one of the other hikers got photographic proof that it was in fact me holding everyone up because I was going too slow. All in good fun. 

Hope that makes you laugh as much as it did me.