Many years ago, a friend of mine went backpacking around the world, and I gave her a torch as a leaving present. When it became my turn to leave the UK earlier this year, she gave me a torch of my own, a headlamp that amply demonstrated how the technology has changed in the intervening …
Author: johnelsewhere1968
Thoughtful wanderer in search of virtual meaning
You Never Walk Alone
To walk long distances on a daily basis is thought-provoking and often quite an interior process. As the miles pass by underfoot, the mind occupies itself in any number of ways and has time to consider rare topics. As an example, I'd been thinking a bit about Aretha Franklin and the incredible impact that she'd …
Naturally Left-Leaning
I've always thought of myself as being a naturally left-leaning person, politically speaking and in other ways too. As an example, I'll always take the path on the left-hand side, whenever given a choice. But today I think I've finally realised that I'm actually a left-leaning person. On today's stomp from Puente la Reina to …
The Girl Who Saved The King of Sweden (is actually called Edwin)
Some of you might have read the book of nearly that name, an excellent follow-up to "The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared", which tells the story of a young South African girl who just happens to be a mathematical genius, and who somehow gets involved in a nuclear incident involving Sweden, …
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One Up On Martin Sheen
Continuing the theme of finding certain things that have fictionally occurred to Martin Sheen's family, a moment on the stage from Zubiri to Pamplona presented me with another opportunity to stake a claim to brief superiority. In an attempt to inject a flash of actual drama into the otherwise pedestrian story of a man walking …
Roncesvalles to Zubiri
Somewhat surprisingly, I woke up this morning to discover that I was still alive and even more incredibly, not one part of my body had gone on strike overnight either. An excellent pilgrim dinner and a couple of glasses of red had combined with all that exertion to good effect - I felt well-rested and …
One Up On Emilio Estevez
As I’m currently both alive and in Roncesvalles, that means I'm technically one up on Emilio Estevez, almost certainly for the first time in our lives. By that, I mean that Daniel Avery, the fictional character he plays in "The Way", attempts to do what I have just done - cross the Pyrenees from St-Jean-Pied-de-Port …
Bayonne and St-Jean-Pied-de-Port
Another day of flurried transferring from one place to another, but one that sees me finally in St-Jean-Pied-de-Port, a pretty little town nestling in the shadow of the Pyrenees, and the starting gate for the Camino Francés, the French Way to Santiago. Despite an unfortunate contretemps this morning with a shower door at my Airbnb …
Biarritz
After a week of zooming around the UK visiting family and friends, I find myself on a Biarritz balcony, sipping a coffee and contemplating the days ahead. I've had one last night in a bedroom with only one bed in it - it's going to be a much more communal experience from now on. I've …
Wherever I Lay My Hat…
For the first time in more than 40 years, I don’t have a house key in my pocket and I’m likely to be sleeping in a different bed every night for about the next six weeks. Much as I loved Paul Young's cover of Marvin Gaye's "Wherever I Lay My Hat” back in the 80’s, …
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