Taking A Walk

Hans new thing is Nordic Walking. It is a big hit here. Cris (Hans' son) thinks he is nuts. He (Cris) told him (Hans) that he won't even listen to what he has to say on the subject until he has done it for at least a year... It is quite humorous.

We were on a retreat this past weekend out in the German country side. After lunch each day we'd have a couple hours of free time and then we'd go for a walk. (We walk a lot here =) So, we went walking and Josh and I joined Hans with Nordic walking sticks (said to work 90% of your muscles). We drove to an area more outside the countryside town of Mucke (pronounced Murk-tuh) and went walking through the woods. It was a great trail and the three of us quickly took the lead. We found out later that the rest of the group stopped to play on a seesaw.

We kept walking and well, Josh and Hans, in their infinite wisdom got us lost. I take no responsibility because everyone knows I stink at directions and I was not leading...Anyway, Josh's great idea of the afternoon was to always turn left...he didn't really realize it, but that's what he did. I had a moment of relief when, over an hour and a half into the trek, we finally walked back down hill for the first time. We just kept walking and walking and by the time we emerged from the woods we were in another town 8km away from where we started. We figured we walked a good 6 miles.

The rest of the group was back at the van (as it was pretty much time to be back at the campground for dinner) and we were, well, not. (Drew and Hans had cell phones) And to make it even better, Hans had the van keys...of course! We ended up getting some help from some locals. They called a taxi for us. So we rode back to the van and then made it back to dinner an hour late. We were closer to the campground than our original starting place where we came out. We had a lot of good laughs and I wasn't deathly sore the next day. And like my dad said, "If you had to get lost, turned-around, whatever...at least you were in good company!"