My morning started out like most: with a late breakfast and a walk around my neighborhood. I didn’t expect the day to amount to much, so when some friends invited me to Bebenhausen, a small village just outside of Tubingen known for their monastery dating back to the 1100s, I was excited to accept. However, when two Filipinos, an American and one Taiwanese person with the collective knowledge of the German language as that of a toddler get onto bus out of town, it can only be expected that at some point, they will get lost. As soon as we stepped off of the bus, it was easy to see that we were not at our destination. With not a single monastery in sight, we made our way back to the bus stop. Thanks to smartphones and GPS tracking, we learned that our final destination was two stops away. An hour later when the next bus finally arrived, we got on confident that we would soon be at the monastery. When our bus still had not reached Bebenhausen after another hour and some Deutsche Bahn employees did a ticket sweep, we knew that we had once again made a mistake. Eventually, we were able to find an English-speaking passenger who explained to us that we were just minutes from the Stuttgart airport. The monastery had been two stops in the opposite direction. We immediately got off the bus and took the next one back toward Tubingen and we finally arrived at Bebenhausen. 

We ran through the ancient stairs and hallways, taking pictures of and with everything as if we could ever forget the beauty that the monastery held: tall walls, clock towers and flowers were everywhere. 

As the employees started closing up, we realized that there would be another long wait for a bus. 

“I know a way back to Tubingen if we walk through the forest,” one of my friends said. And for some reason, we trusted him. 

Because of that, my day ended like few: with a blind trek through the forest, up hills and past farms. At points we could see whole villages far below us and at others, there was nothing surrounding us but what felt like miles of red, orange and yellow trees. 

We started off the afternoon by getting lost, but that only made the day better. When you’re living just hours from the birthplace of fairy tales, it’s easy to see how something as simple and usually frustrating as getting lost can turn into an adventure with sights and experiences. 

— Shannon Rabotski is a 2016 graduate of Monroe High School and attends Drake University. She is studying abroad in Germany.