A person moving to a destination. So goes my bare minimum way of understanding a common human activity, a pilgrimage. As I mentioned in previous posts from walking the Via Francigena, I’m struck by how much I longed for my nightly destination. No matter that my eventual destination was Rome, that destination was too distant …
Author: sabbatical2017blog
623. Pilgrims’ Movement: Following a Backpack
German walker As I mentioned previously, I’m enjoying my efforts of making sense of this long-distance walking in general, and of this South West Coat Path in general. I’m afflicting you with more of my early thoughts here, especially as this walk relates to pilgrimages. For simplicity’s sake, a pilgrim is a person moving toward …
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622. Benches
The standard image of a pilgrim is a walking figure. I enjoy the figure on the Mount of Forgiveness only a few miles outside Pamplona. The pilgrims are walking or riding. I thoroughly enjoy the lone pilgrim outside O Cebreiro who holds his hat as he strides into the Atlantic wind. Pilgrims moving! Yet pilgrims …
621. Pilgrims’ Persisting while Visited by Serendipitous Joy
Tintsgel Methodist church Jenny and friends completed SWCP in eleven years! Mary has arrived in London! Yeah! So, my walking days have ended. As I mentioned in one of my earliest posts, I had a hunch that this walk would be different. It has been. As I try to put words to that difference, I’ll …
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620. Pilgrimage: “Guests in the World”
St. Columbanus was a Celtic saint and a peregrini. A pilgrim for the last 15 years of his life, he died in 615. Esther de Waal quotes him: “Therefore let this principle abide with us, that on the road we live as travelers, as pilgrims, as guests of the world…” What a wonderful expression, “guests …
619. Odds and Ends: Humor, Political Statements, and Art
Because I try to write and include relevant photos centered around a theme, I don’t include all sorts of interesting photos, at least photos that I find interesting. I know the English have a sense of humor; however, that humor makes rare public displays. There are occasions though. Sometimes the humor depends upon the observer …
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618. Clouds
Early Light Porthleven Bude Rain coming Does anyone see me, I don’t care. I’ve got places to go, shapes to take, though I know not where. Like an actor in a play, I change. Sometimes in the first peeking light of morning, I let you see a bit of me, but only a bit. Sometimes …
617. The Wonder of Rocks and Stones
I feel them under my feet. I reach out to them next to me in order to steady my balance as I descend a slope. I see them above providing convenient handholds as I climb a steep incline. Slow-travel allows me literally to come into contact with primeval features of earth. As I slowly walk …
616. Apprehension and Expectation
I’m awake at 5AM. I’m apprehensive and expectant. I’m apprehensive because of the 100% chance of rain with wind gusts of 25 mph. In similar weather conditions, my 6 mile walk two days ago took 5 1/2 hours. I had to walk slower than normal with the driving rain, the obscure path, and the scrambling …
615. Adjusting to the Sea
Ilfracombe Interesting Fact: every part of Cornwall is never more than 17 miles from the sea. Porthleven As humans, we have always interacted with the sea. Here along the Cornish coastline, there are dozens of Neolithic sites. It is no accident that these very distant ancestors lived by the coast. Besides the fields and woods …
Journeys: Explorations in Body, Mind, and Spirit 