On my first Camino three years ago, my friend Rick and I would see people with small daypacks. These were the people who hired a service to bring their packs to their destination instead of carrying them themselves. “This walk would be a piece of cake if I wasn’t carrying a pack!” Rick would say. “Yeah, I…
Category: Thoughts
Paying It Forward
In 2011, when I first hatched my plan to walk the Camino de Santiago hardly anyone I knew had ever heard of it, let alone walked it. But I was lucky enough to get first-hand advice from people I have not, to this day, ever met. Nine months before my departure I was a host…
A Day in the Life: On the Camino de Santiago
On Friday I’ll begin my third Camino. My friend Lois and I will walk ten miles per day for fifty or so days, reaching our goal of Santiago, Spain sometime in early November. Some people’s eyes grow wide when they hear we’re walking ten miles in a day. “Well, think about it,” I explain. “If…
A Tale of Two Caminos
Huffing up into the Pyrenees on the first day of my first Camino a compact woman who looked to be in her late sixties caught up to me. “Bonjour,” she said. “Bonjour. Ça va?” I asked. After exchanging details about where we were from she asked me if this was my first Camino. “Yes,” I said,…
A Tale of Two Travelers
“Are you sure you and Michael aren’t really just good friends?” my mother has asked me–more than once. I assure her that is not the case, but I can see why she thinks this. Michael and I, unlike most couples I know, spend a lot of time apart from each other. I don’t just mean…
Winter Wonderland (Second Draft)
On my walk this morning, a blog post started forming in my head. I pulled out my phone, turned on the voice recorder, and recorded my thoughts lest I forget them. (Note to future writers: you will forget them. Every time. Unless you write them down or record them.) A few hours later, I sat…
Alone at Last
Dad has made it clear that he prefers his children never live more than a days drive from Hyde Park, NY. Three of his children live within twenty miles. The fourth? One hundred miles. And then there’s me. Asheville, a twelve hour drive door-to-door, just barely made the cut. Mom will follow Dad’s proclamation with, “It’s…
First Days: Granada, Nicaragua
It’s by now a familiar feeling–that combination of exhilaration and anticipation and fear, the near future mostly unknown, that natural high, the feeling like I’m so happy I could burst, that moment I know that this is why I travel. It hits me within the first few minutes of arrival in a new place–which is…
Last Minute Travel? Check.
I booked a flight today. To Nicaragua. I leave on Thursday. Why? Well, I’m about to start teaching at a college. In New York state. Where it’s cold. The last winter I was here I realized the best way to survive was to head south for a spell. In January. And February. And March, too, if…
RenaissanceRebecca 