Grammar question about na

Hi,

Please could anyone explain to me why there is a 'な' after 'したい' in the following sentence?
気ままに旅行したいなと思っています

Many thanks

https://jlptsensei.com/learn-japanese-grammar/なあ-naa-sentence-ending-particle-meaning/

Thank you LIZ.
But I am a bit confused because in the sentence I mentionned above な is not the end of the sentence. ?.

気ままに旅行したいな is one sentence.
I am thinking that 気ままに旅行したいな.

気ままに旅行したいと思う。 is plain .
you can get variations
for 気ままに旅行したい as 気ままに旅行したいな（あ）to show strong desire.
for 思う as 思います　or 思っています, etc.

I believe it is used as wishful thinking, like you are talking to yourself

Thank you
@ ken
Yes I understand what you say and being like that i would understand it.

But the sentence I mentionned above is one sentence at least as I read it, the 'と思っています' is not separate. That's exactly my problem. It's here:
https://hirogaru-nihongo.jp/en/outdoor/watashi-en/outdoor_012/

@ Ric. Yes, it would make sense but it's not the end of the sentence. Is it common to use it like that?

The と思っていますis the main clause and the other part of the sentence is the subordinate clause. I.e the subordinate clause (=sentence part) finishes with したいな　

An English example would be

“It is going to rain tomorrow, he said. “

The “he said “ part is the main clause with the acting subject and verb. And what he says is in the subordinate clause.

Actually both sentence parts could be independent so I think grammatically it is a compound sentence rather than a compound complex sentence.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentence_clause_structure

Anyway, to your question, one of the sentence parts ends after the したいな　therefore the grammatical explanation about 〜な　applies.

〜したいと思う　is a common phrase in conversation. it is same to 〜したい。
in the website you cited, the Japanese sentence is not word-to-word direct translation of the English one. you only can compare the meanings of the two sentences.

what she said is "I(or we) think that I (or we) would like to ......"

Thank you LIZ.
But I am a bit confused because in the sentence I mentionned above な is not the end of the sentence. ?.

Think of it as a sentence within a sentence.

気ままに旅行したいな
This is the sentence

と
This is a particle which indicates that the preceding sentence is being quoted

思っています
And this means that the quote is being thought by the speaker

旅行したいな / と思っています
I want to travel / I'm thinking

First, let's make sure we're on the same page about what na is, when used in this way. It's an emphasizer, used to make a feeling sound stronger. More or less the same as ne, another Japanese emphasizer.

Often you'll find na at the end of a sentence. Person A says "I'm taking a vacation to Okinawa!" and Person B responds with "Ii na," to say "[That sounds] so nice!"

But na doesn't have to come at the end of the sentence. It's position is more determined by what it's emphasizing (it generally comes after whatever it is that the speaker wants to emphasize).

So now let's take look at your sentence
「気ままに旅行したいなと思っています」

This is one sentence, but it really contains two ideas:
1. 気ままに旅行したい
2. と思っています

Putting na in the middle lets the speaker emphasize the first idea "I really want to travel freely."

On the other hand, putting na at the end and making it
「気ままに旅行したいと思っていますな」
wouldn't be grammatically wrong, but it would be kind of strange. For starters, it makes the emotion of wanting to travel softer, and puts the emphasis on "think." So instead of getting "I really want to travel freely," you'd get something like "I'm really thinking I want to travel freely."

Also, because na is a bit stronger/rougher of an emphasizer than ne, it sounds sort of unnatural to pair na with a -masu form verb, so 思っていますな is something a Japanese speaker would be less likely to say.

The whole thing is extra tricky because in English, we generally don't separate the emotion of wanting to do something with the action of thinking about that desire. In the Japanese language, though, that separation is often made.

Hi,

I know it's confusing since there are no brackets「」 around the 気ままに旅行したいな, but that's just the way people casually write in Japanese. Here is the difference in its nuances.

気ままに旅行したいと思っています
I wish to travel freely.

気ままに旅行したいなと思っています
I'm like, "Gosh, I wish I can travel freely."
or
I kinda wish I could travel freely, you know?

Something like that.

to all :)
Many thanks to you all for these comprehensive explanations! I see now that "なあ" mustn't necessarily be the end of the sentence but mainly be attached to what  "なあ" refers to. Meanwhile I found some other examples using  "なあ" the same way on the website I mentioned above.

Thanks Uco for the - well - slight distinctions made.

Again many thanks, it helped really a lot :)