“One of the greatest charms of pilgrim-life is its complete lack of monotony. In truth, for the true pilgrim the face of life is ever protean — a continuously shifting phantasmagoria of wonderment; where the seemingly impossible often occurs without discord, and the wholly unexpected jumps out of the bushes at almost every turn of […]
Thereafter I was able to walk without much difficulty under cool-while-mostly-sunny skies (graced as they were with a regular smattering of blessed cloud-cover), all the way to the lovely little town of St. Christoph sur Dolaizon with its peace-full little church and its friendly little town hall — the latter of which being the place […]
I found the landscape after Le Puy to steadily become more lush & wondrous, and yet by far the most noticeable shift that occurred at this point of my Walk was the presence of so many more pilgrims on The Road. Whereas, before Le Puy I only encountered a sporadic sprinkling of fellow travelers during […]
I exited the townhall in St. Christoph sur Dolaizon and the WIND had fully arrived ( :O ) … No matter, of course, as I simply put a smile ion my face and leaned into the same while sauntering onward under mostly sunny skies, eventually arriving at a tiny path-side chapel on the outskirts of […]
“Whenever we find ourselves stuck, whenever we find ourselves lost or confused or befuddled by the innate and ever-erupting chaos of the world, we can be sure that the only way to truly free ourselves from the same is to take bold action of some kind. Indeed, action — especially caring action; action taken solely […]
Bolstered no doubt by the amazing connections made back at the Montbonnet chapel, I caught a really good groove for several hours thereafter, flowing smoothly and powerfully along The Way up until about 3pm — when my hip started to freeze up again, which then caused me to begin to limp quite noticeably down the […]
Like life itself, sometimes the Path was steep and rocky and unstable; and other times — like today — it was smooth and soft and firm underfoot. And yet no matter what the conditions — no matter how difficult or easy or smooth or stony, I chose over & over & over again to be […]
It was pretty amusing how my normal long-gaited “Scaughdt tempo” had me flowing smoothly by dozens of fellow pilgrims for the first few hours of the day’s walk, while the afternoon’s onset of frozen hips and heavy limping had me ultimately being one of the very last pilgrims to reach the town of St. Privat […]
As was so often the case whenever I entered a town of any significant size, I headed first & foremost to the local Catholic church (for the simple reason that they were almost always open, while their Evangelical counterparts were almost always closed) to rest a bit in its sanctuary’s cool calm, to offer up […]
As mentioned previously, the people of St. Privat (including more than a few of the fellow pilgrims I encountered that day*) were less than friendly and not all accommodating as I flowed from hostel to hostel to church parish to shop owner, and was repeatedly met with either cool dismissal or outright rejection. There were […]
I offered a great & special Thank You to the wonderful Marie Laure on this day, as she easily & without hesitation allowed me to eat a hearty hostel breakfast all by myself — well before the dining hall was officially opened to the other pilgrims on hand; thereby allowing me to get a blessedly […]
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