Homecoming

After seven incredible months our time on the Iberian peninsula finally came to an end. The last weeks in Razo were super sweet, even though the weather wasn’t the best in Galicia; the beautiful green landscape made up for that though, imagine Ireland but it’s in Spain and warm from time to time – insanely peaceful up there! Not only did we manage to get a lot of administrative and promotional stuff done for peach tinted, but Emil finally finished his degree in Computer Science. Hack hack! Both of us wrote some more demos for our upcoming releases as well, which is something we’re super excited for.

The waves in Razo were among the best we had during our entire trip, the water was surprisingly warm and “soft” – not sure if that description makes sense to you. Unfortunately Emil destroyed his surfboard again, the third time during this trip already! He won’t become best friends with that board anytime soon. Lots of swear words were heard at the beach that day, much to the astonishment of local Spaniards enjoying a beer at a beachfront cafe. In comparison to Cortegaca there were way more people in the water and we barely talked to them. Interestingly, the more people there are, the more anonymous a place can make you feel, probably because you can melt into the background when surrounded by large crowds.

Gustavo got a checkup at the local mechanic’s shop – and lord, this guy knew what he was doing. He immediately fixed a rattling issue that we thought was terminal for free and also found an additional issue that needed to be fixed. An investment of €60 later and Gustavo drove like a completely different vehicle, ready for the long way home!

Louis left Razo a week early due to his mother’s 60th birthday – can’t miss that! So while Louis was chilling in the Austrian countryside, Emil was working like a machine on his bachelor’s thesis, constantly on the verge of developing carpal tunnel syndrome. Within a week he was able to finish his paper, pretty stressful times. Additionally, there was a large forest fire right next to our house so Emil had to evacuate. He was certainly thankful to have a vehicle he could sleep in. The last five days of thesis writing were done in Gustavo, which could have been cozier, especially considering that all of our equipment along with FIVE surfboards that our friends conveniently left behind as well as two bicycles were stacked to the ceiling inside of the van.

On September 5th, Emil finally hit the road after one last surf session and began his adventurous journey from the Western tip of Galicia back to Vienna. He immediately broke his phone charger and therefore got lost somewhere around A Coruña, trying to navigate via a map he had saved on his laptop. After spending a weekend without a phone in the area, he finally began travelling east, and picked up a new (used) amplifier for Louis on the way, somewhere close to Doniños/San Sebastian. The two guys who sold him the amp were super nice and acted very surprised when they found out that we are two Austrians buying second hand equipment in Spain. One final night was spent in Spain and then Emil drove up North-East into France. He found himself racing through the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, soaking up some sweet morning rays that soon turned into blistering heat, melting him to the RV’s seat – after all, Gustavo doesn’t have air conditioning lol. This didn’t stop him from driving, but rather encouraged him to get the trip over with asap, covering more than 900 Km (550 Miles) on that day alone. Emil spent a night next to the motorway in France, close to Dijon and then drove on towards Vienna. After traversing Germany at insane speeds he made it to Austria and eventually back home where Louis was expecting him. We were finally reunited after Emil had travelled over 1100 Km on the last day of his trip. [ED TRIGGER WARNING] He managed to survive his long driving shifts by sticking to a strict diet consisting of hummus, Swedish crackers and decaf diet coke, the latter being the most important component by far. When he arrived at home, he had listened to a total of 32 hours of podcasts. Lou helped Emil move all of our equipment back into Emil’s Studio/Apartment and just like that the entire Iberian experience was over for both of us.

The first thing Emil noticed after his return was the significant drop in temperature compared to Spain. It’s been quite cold and somewhat rainy here in Austria recently, which sucks but also motivates us to organize and move to a warmer place as soon as possible. We do have some destinations in mind, but we’re not gonna tell and jinx ourselves again, like we have done with our close friends. Isn’t it the worst when you tell people about plans and then they ask later and you have to tell them that they didn’t work out? Gross. One thing we will say is that we’re trying to get a tiny tour bus for the two of us, so we can get around easily within Europe and have a car that we can sleep in. Unfortunately we’re gonna have to put Gustavo up for sale, he’s just too large for us – so if you know anybody who’s trying to buy an 80s RV, let us know.