On the E1 through Central Germany

Following the Westweg, I followed the E1 east past Heidelberg and Mannheim and went via Darmstadt to Frankfurt am Main, walking the distance between these two cities backwards, as to my great joy a friend accompanied me from Frankfurt for two days.

Not always the weather plays along

Previously, the weather had been rather changeable and rainy, but from Darmstadt on it became really sunny and on the weekends the trails filled with tourists and day hikers. After Frankfurt, the E1 initially led almost three days to the west, before it then found with a large curve through the Westerwald again in the direction of the northeast.

Spring finally arrives

In Nassau an der Lahn, I was just arriving at a campground and saw another small tent standing from a distance when I spotted the belonging hiker on a bench.

He was a Swiss guy who had started walking at home and was on the way on the E1 to the North Cape as well. When I told him that this was also my goal, he immediately said my name and I looked at him very surprised. Finally he explained to me that he had met a woman on the Westweg in the Black Forest who had told him about me. We later once reconstructed how we had managed to miss each other for so long, although he had overtaken me in between.

Since we hit it off right away, we continued hiking together from Nassau for about 10 days before I took a longer break for vacation with friends.

Hiking together was a welcome change, we often stopped for lunch at a restaurant or snack bar and the otherwise somewhat unspectacular sections went by much faster because we were constantly talking. I think we had our inside jokes after the first day at the latest and were delightfully amused about this and that.

And suddenly there were two

We went through the Westerwald via Siegen to Detmold, where we parted ways again for the time being. But who knows when we will meet again on the long stretch that still awaits us.