The Town With a Grudge
Revenge is a confession of pain. Latin proverb Only an hour train ride south from our current home in Valencia, Spain, lies the town of Xàtiva. Before arriving here, we’d never heard of the place. But it was well known by famous people through the age including General Hannibal of Carthage, General Scipio of Rome, […]
Pilgrimage to Milan
What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. Ecclesiastes 1:9 NIV Milan, Italy is known as a fashion center, financial capital, and the home of da Vinci’s painting of The Last Supper. While most people would visit the second biggest city in […]
Driving, Italian Style
“…he drove as if he were at the wheel of a Ferrari at Monza. Like all drivers, he insisted on showing off his skills.” Michele Guittari, A Florentine Death Italians drive like they’re auditioning for a race team. Streets that would be pedestrian only zones in most countries are frequented by fast moving cars, and yes—sometimes […]
City of the Saint
The deeds you do may be the only sermon some persons will hear today. Francis of Assisi The city of Saint Francis teased us. From more than two hours, away we could see the basilica, prominent at the west end of the city. But we were excited—fifteen days after hiking out of Florence the hometown […]
Walking the Italian Hill Country
In America, one must be something, but in Italy one can simply be. Pietros Maneos We’ve left behind the big city of Florence and walked into a different Italy, the Italy of small towns in the mountains connected by quiet forest paths and roads. An Italy where mushroom hunters prowl the forest paths and bring […]
Show Me The Wall
We’ve been walking Hadrian’s Wall for two days, and of the ancient Roman Wall—nothing yet. This isn’t unexpected. When the people in the north of England started to build houses of stone they had a choice of quarrying it—or scavenging from this stone wall that had been unused for centuries. Easy choice. Times were tough […]
North to Victoria
“…on the craggy southern end of Vancouver Island.” From a tour brochure It’s getting hard to stump her. Laurie and I have a tradition for our anniversary. Each year we take a trip that is planned by one of us. We alternate responsibility each year. Appropriately, I get the “odd” years. It’s supposed to be […]
More Than a Garden
Others saw an ugly industrial pit. Jennie Butchart saw a sunken garden.
The Secret Caverns
An hour east of Tucson there is a unique set of caves in Kartchner Caverns State Park. This Arizona state park was created in 1988 to preserve these caverns in as pristine state as possible. Local cavers, Gary Tenen and Randy Tufts, discovered the caverns in 1974. They kept the location secret and explored them […]
A Season at Home
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens. Ecclesiastes 3:1 Six months before we set out on our adventure living a life on the road, my father was diagnosed with incurable colon cancer. We almost delayed our hike across Spain, but my parents insisted we set off. We […]
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