When our thousand-mile Camino trek ended, Eric and I took a train east, from Santiago to Irun. The hills of Galicia and then the plains of the Meseta sped by in a blur of landscapes without details. This was the only way I’d seen the world for years, I realized, from moving metal boxes thatContinue reading “Cows of the Camino”
Category Archives: Camino Le Puy (Chemin du Puy)
The Grey Day in Condom
Happy first day of summer! Two months from today, if all goes according to plan, Laurel and I will be walking from Santo Domingo de Calzada (the chicken church!) to Belorado, where it’s 91 degrees (32 Celsius) and sunny. But here in Seattle, we’re still in the depths of “Juneuary,” and summer seems a longContinue reading “The Grey Day in Condom”
Invincible Nature (Almost Wordless Wednesday)
“Nature is always lovely, invincible, glad, whatever is done and suffered by her creatures. All scars she heals, whether in rocks or water or sky or hearts.” — John Muir, John of the Mountains Photo taken just outside Fineroyls, France, in the remote high plains of L’Aubrac. This wasContinue reading “Invincible Nature (Almost Wordless Wednesday)”
Scuba Diving the Lot River?
About a week after leaving Le Puy, it starts to feel almost routine. You follow the red and white stripes of the Chemin de Saint Jacques (the Way of Saint James) along shaded paths, crumbling castles towering above. You enter a village, another one of France’s most beautiful. In this case, you’ve come to Espalion. YouContinue reading “Scuba Diving the Lot River?”
The Morning We Became Pilgrims of Le Puy
(An excerpt from the book in progress, describing the morning of April 8, 2015.) Despite the wine and the jet lag, I slept fitfully in Le Puy, waking every hour to stare into the darkness and listen to pilgrims breathing in the cubicles around me. We were so close to beginning this thing. When myContinue reading “The Morning We Became Pilgrims of Le Puy”
The Sagging Middle
In my day job back in Seattle, I help writers revise and develop their work, which are often works of fiction. One of the things I’ve learned to look for is what we call the “sagging middle.” A good story starts off with a lot of drama and tension. Things happen. Everything is new.Continue reading “The Sagging Middle”
The Via Podiensis (Le Puy Camino) Memoirs
It’s winter, it’s raining, and the world is a complicated, messy place. Sometimes the only solution is to turn it all off and curl up with a good book. And when it comes to books about the Camino, your choices are plentiful. Amazon lists 60 memoirs with the key words Camino de Santiago, and thatContinue reading “The Via Podiensis (Le Puy Camino) Memoirs”
When It Rains…
We woke the next morning to a sound we hadn’t heard since we arrived in France: rain. Lots of rain. Our pod of pilgrims got up reluctantly and geared up for wet weather…
The Le Puy Camino in 12 Minutes
What is the Chemin du Puy — the Camino route from Le Puy to St. Jean Pied-de-Port, like? See for yourself.
The Unexpected Art of the Camino
The Camino isn’t just a walk across the countryside — it’s also a chance to see beautiful, spectacular, awe-inspiring art.But if you look carefully, not everything is majestic.
camino times two 