Plan B

Our spur of the moment plan made sitting in the beer garden the day before didn't sound so good anymore, staring at the weather forecast.  Showers all day long, highs in the mid teens.  Who wants to spend 3 hours on a train, just to go see some mountains in the rain?

But, it was already 6:15 and we were meeting at 7:20.  If I didn't come up with another plan quickly, I'd be hiking in the rain (or more likely, huddling in a cafe) like it or not.

15 tabs in my finder later, I had a basic plan. It sounded good: take a shorter train ride to a place with a good weather forecast, pick up the Frankenweg trail there, follow it to the next town, and ride the train back.  There were just a few minor details missing, you know, things like, where to pick up the trail when we left the train station, how close the trail passed to the next town, and the actual distance we would be hiking.  Oh, and the fact that I couldn't actually print the map.

However, little details like that weren't enough to stop our adventurous crew (that and the fact that I may not have *ahem* disclosed that I didn't know the actual distance.  Google maps claimed 8.5 km.  Of course, that was following the road).  Our train stopped at Deining, and we stepped out onto the platform.  We looked around us, a bit bewildered.  We'd assumed if there was a train station, there would at least be a large enough town to find a cafe and drink a coffee while we waited for a friend who had over slept to catch up with us.  But all we could see was the platform, a road, and a sign.  Deining was apparently not a thriving metropolis.

We sleepily looked at the sign and tried to figure out which direction the hiking trail was, until Mikko made the brilliant deduction that we'd better continue the direction the train was going since our final destination was that way.  Our decision was pretty quickly confirmed as we spotted the first of the red and white stickers that were our lifeline for the rest of the day.

Turns out people do live in Deining, because we passed some backyards before the trail veered off into the forest.  Birds were singing, flowers were blooming, and trees were budding.  Our enthusiasm lasted for a couple of hours, as we moved in and out of forests and pastures, and through farmsteads.  A little village nestled in the distance, it's church steeple sticking up above the roofs. Giant wind turbines dotted the landscape, their modernity and sleek lines strikingly out of place.

After a couple of hours hiking, we came to a cross road.  The path continued one way.  A major road with a sign pointing to Neumarkt (our final destination) pointed the other.

Morale immediately sank to zero.  When you don't have a trail map and road signs are telling you the opposite of the trail blazes, it's hard to trust a sticker over a road sign, especially when only one person in the group has even seen the trail map and can confirm that it heads to the destination.  After a lengthy discussion, we decided to risk the hiking trail, but then realized we'd temporarily lost it.  At our most lost, our missing group member called us.  We told him to get off at the next town and walk back and meet us.  "Take the Frankenweg trail" I told him.  "It has red and white stickers.  Don't take any other trail, or you won't find us.  We're a bit lost now, but we'll let you know if we stop following the trail."

We crossed the road, looking to see if we could pick up the trail again, but there weren't any stickers to be seen.  We flagged down a young guy and practiced our German, but he could only tell us that yes, the road lead into town, and no, he didn't know any hiking paths.  We regrouped, confused again.  Should we follow the main road?  Or look for the hiking path?  Just then an older gentlemen came by on his bike.  "Entschuldigung!" (excuse me!) one of our group members called out.  The man stopped and the guy who stopped him suddenly realized he didn't have all the German skills necessary to ask what he wanted. "Kerlys!" he called, and our best German speaker went over to help him out.  She only got a few words out before she was calling me over, "what's the name of the hiking path we're looking for?"  Despite the poor man being overwhelmed by a succession of people all trying to ask the same question with varying degrees of German fluency, he finally understood us and answered.  "Straight ahead, just follow this path.  Yes it will take you to Neumarkt"  Feeling slightly more confident, we did as he said.

It wasn't the last of our confusion though. The path twisted and turned, stubbornly avoiding the direction that we were sure the city was.  Signs we passed neglected to mention Neumarkt as a destination.  We started to second guess ourselves again.  Our missing friend Hugo wasn't having any luck either.  I got a text message from him, "I'm on trail 5, with a yellow and white blaze".  Wait, what?  How were we ever going to find each other if we weren't on the same trail?  I called him back and explained once again what trail we were on.  "Make sure you find the same trail, or we'll never find each other"

The next trail sign we passed was stamped by the city of Neumarkt, so we started to feel more confident.  Even so, we'd passed 8.5 km long ago, and the city was nowhere to be seen.  Would we ever get there?  And would we ever find Hugo?  The last we'd heard from him, he'd found an orange church and was waiting there, sure we'd find him eventually.

Despite some dire predictions of death in the woods, starvation, meeting roaming bands of cannibals, or alien kidnapping, we eventually made it to civilization.  A sign post kindly informed us that we were 13.2 km from where we had started and that Neumarkt was only 3.7 km away.  (Whatever happened to 8.5 total?!  Thanks Google maps!) There was also a church only .8 km away, and a quick phone call to Hugo confirmed that it was the same one he was at.

We broke out into cheers when we reached the church and saw Hugo sitting in front of it, the city spread out in the valley below.  We'd been intrepid explorers, and finally were within sight of our destination.  The view made us all decide it was worth the extra kilometers of walking.

From the church, we headed down the mountainside into the city where we decided lunch was a must. After all, you work up quite an appetite walking 17 kilometers.  Sausages, potato salad and beer took the edge off our hunger, and then we wandered the town for a bit before catching our train back.

Five minutes before our train left, as we were speed walking to the station, a fire truck pulled up and the firefighters jumped out and rushed towards the platforms.  An ambulance with it's lights flashing was already parked there.  "That doesn't look good" one of us commented, as we rushed towards our platform.  Out of breath from dashing up the stairs, we checked the schedule as we wondered why the train wasn't there yet.  An announcement soon had everyone changing tracks, and we followed, a bit confused.  "Our train was canceled, we have to take the other" someone explained.  That train didn't seem to be going anywhere either, even though it should have left 2 minutes prior.  The conductor explained to someone through the window that all the trains were delayed, followed by something I couldn't understand.  Nina asked in English if the train went to Regensburg, and he assured us that it did, but then followed it up with, "But somebody has died.  We're not going anywhere until the track's cleared"  The ambulance and firetruck took on a whole new meaning.


We boarded the train, alternating between morbid curiosity and the feeling that our curiosity probably wasn't very respectful of whomever had died.  Uniformed officers went back and forth outside the windows, caution tape was put up, and then removed only minutes later, someone thought they saw the body being removed, and then realized they were mistaken.  Minutes ticked by and curiosity dulled to boredom and tiredness.  "Maybe we should walk back to Deining and take the train from there.  It might be faster" someone joked.  Just thinking about it made me exhausted.  As we were beginning to wonder if we'd be stuck spending the night in a town none of us had even ever heard of before, they made an announcement and everyone got off the train.  Good thing everyone in our group speaks more German than me- I would have been lost. They sent us to board a bus, which, we thought, would take us directly to Regensburg.  Ten minutes into our trip, as we were drifting off to sleep, the driver came on and made an announcement.  "Wait, what was that?"  No one really understood that time.  We arrived at another train station, and the driver said something else.  All that I understood was the time- 5:20.  The bus clock said 4:07.  It finally dawned on us.  We had to get off the bus and board another train. It would be there at 5:20.  The thought of spending over an hour on a platform made me want to cry.  But as we walked to the platform and checked out watches, we realized the bus clock was an hour slow- the train would be there in only 12 minutes.

Finally on the train to Regensburg, we closed our eyes.  If nothing unexpected happened, we should be home soon.  Fortunately for us, this time around, all went as planned.