JavaLand 2026 was finally back in the theme park after the last two year’s disaster at a car racing track. And this was good. Europa Park is different from Phantasialand, but has the same kitchy, German way of going all in being true to the theme. From the African and Chinese vibes in Phantasialand, we were now in Italy, Spain, France, and Marrakech. All mixed together in a way only possible in Germany.
1493 attendees is a very good number for a conference these days. And the German Java community is very vibrant and opinionated, so it is almost impossible to go from one end of the exhibition floor to another without stopping for a couple of conversations on the way. In my opinion, these hallway track conversations are the most important part of a conference, and JavaLand has a lot of them.
My talk, The Past, Present, and Future of Enterprise Java, was set up in the Dome, which seats 700 people. It is hard to know the number of occupied chairs, but I estimate it to be somewhere between 100 and 150 attending my talk.
In the evening on the first day, the park opened up a couple of the attractions. Unfortunately, a thunderstorm passed by at that time, so going on a rollercoaster didn’t really tempt me. Dinner at one of the restaurants was a much better option. I don’t really like rollercoasters anyway, but that is a secret 
One thing I missed year was the traditional JavaLand Jogging on Wednesday morning. Since I had arrived to the European time zone only a day before I travelled to JavaLand, I managed well without it. I did go for a short run on Thursday morning before breakfast, though.
