spring Archives - Nadine Walks

No Room at the Inn! Small Shoes!

May 15, 2018

Minutes ago, in a flurry of excitement and anticipation, I dug through my drawers and cabinets, assembled clothing and toiletries and trinkets, and put it all together in my old Camino pack.

“Off on an adventure!” you might be thinking. “Where is she headed to?” you might be asking.

These are fine observations and questions but the answer is: Nowhere. Not yet.

But then why am I loading up my Camino pack? All I can really tell you is that I feel as though my summer trip is right around the corner. Today was just a Tuesday in the middle of May but it felt like one of those days that immediately precedes a big adventure. The air was heavy and humid and hot, the trees were bursting with green, I had off from work and so it felt like the normal pace of the last 9 months was pulling to a close. School’s out, summer’s here.

Not yet, not yet, I still have a month to go. One month! But just one month, and maybe that’s why I can practically taste my next journey. I’m in those final weeks where it feels like time just slips away so quickly, when there is still so much left to do, when every day I need to look at the great big list I’ve made for myself and try to manage to check at least one thing off.

And today, I let the excitement wash over me. My first stop on my summer trip will be the Pennine Way, a 268-mile route through the mountains and hillsides that are said to make up the backbone of England. I paged through my guidebook and began to re-read the blogs that had been part of my research months ago.

Along with the excitement was a sudden burst of nerves, the kind that always hit me, but this time they feel early. There’s still so much I need to do, but I have nearly 5 weeks and haven’t I already done this sort of thing before? Many times before?

Yes, but that doesn’t stop me from worrying. This route will be challenging, and the first days start off with a bang and I just haven’t been hiking like I normally do at this time of year. And this isn’t Spain, this is England- northern England- and what if it rains every day? What if the June days are unseasonably cool? What if I get turned around and stuck in a bog?

The blogs warn of stream crossings that can swell if there’s been rain, and now I think to myself, “I need to pack my Crocs, too.” The blogs also warn of the heavy mist that can obscure the way, and I worry at this as well. When I’m walking, I tend to have a good sense of direction and have really never gotten lost, or strayed far from the path. But what if the Pennine Way is different than the West Highland Way, or Hadrian’s Wall Path? What if I am, actually, vastly underprepared?

Now is probably the time when one of you should write in and tell me to stop over-thinking this, and you’d be right to do so. This walk may indeed be my most challenging yet, but I’ve also read many accounts that say the way-marking is better than ever, and that big stone slabs have been laid down over the boggiest portions of the trail. These things assure me.

Usually by now I’ve checked in with some updates on my planning, so here we go…

The planning has been intense!!

On a Camino, you really don’t need to do much planning, outside of your flight, your train/bus/taxi to the start of the walk, and maybe the first night’s accommodation. But walks in the UK are a little different, at least for a non-camper like me. Since I’ll be staying in a mix of B&B’s, hostels and bunkhouses, I need to make sure they I have my beds reserved. Because I’m not going to carry a tent, it would be a little risky to just show up and expect to find a place to sleep. And on the Pennine Way, there are sometimes great distances between towns or villages, so if one place is all booked up, I might be unable to walk the distance to the next.

I pre-booked my lodgings for both the West Highland Way and Hadrian’s Wall Path, but each of those walks were only 5 days long. I’ll walk the Pennine Way in 15 days, and including a night before my start and an extra night in Scotland at the end, I’ve had to research and book 17 different places! I knew this going in, but the organization and communication and details were another thing altogether once I’d started.

I’ve run into a little trouble here, and I’m not out of the woods yet. There are a couple places along the route where accommodation seems- already- to be all booked up. I’m not sure how this is possible; my guidebook talks of all the lodging options in one particular town along the route, and says, “Unless the Rolling Stones decide to play in Middleton Village Hall, there is always going to be plenty of choice.” Well, I looked into every single option in my guidebook, then scoured other options online, and everything is booked. I literally checked to see if the Rolling Stones were going to be in town (had to do it!), and I can’t find any reason that there is no accommodation available. And this has happened at multiple different towns or villages along the route, where I’d been planning to stay. So far I think I’ve figured out most of my nights, and have had to alter my route a bit, but it isn’t all bad. One of the changes I’ve had to make now has me stopping in Haworth, home to the Brontës, a stop that I thought I would have to miss. It does mean that the day out of Haworth will come in at a whopping 26-miles, but, well, I’ll deal with that when I get there.

But there are still a couple nights’ lodging that I need to figure out, and and another curveball has been how to figure out the best way to make a quick phone call over to England from the States. I won’t go into the details here, but it took me far too long to come up with a good solution (but I think I have the solution- Viber Out. I got through to one of the hostels this morning, so something must have worked?).

The other snafu to my summer adventuring has been the shoes. Oh, the shoes! Something I thought I had figured out 4 years ago, when I bought that first pair of Keen Voyageurs and have been singing their praises ever since. Well, maybe I have spoken too soon, or maybe I have jinxed myself, or maybe this is just what companies do: they constantly change things up because they think they need to be bigger or better. But when it comes to shoes that fit wide feet, oh please, leave good enough alone!

I bought my new pair of Keens and giddily took a photo of all the old pairs and this new one and thought to myself, “How lucky I am to have a shoe that fits.” But then I wore them for a few walks around my neighborhood, and then on a 6-mile hike, and I don’t think there’s any way that I can take them to England for the Pennine Way. The shoes have changed; I’d heard rumors of this a few months ago, but this new pair I bought confirmed it for me. I’m not sure what it is, exactly, but the shoe feels a little shorter and my toes feel crowded. I think the width is still there, so maybe it’s the length? But my toes hurt in a way that they never have before, and that was just after a 6-mile hike.

In any case, I’m at a loss for what to do. I’m running out of time so I need to figure out something quickly: either buy a half size larger and hope they work, or maybe try a different model altogether. I stopped by REI last weekend to see if I could try the Voyageurs on, but they are no longer being sold in the store. Someone working there said they thought that a new model of the Targhee is actually the same thing as the Voyageur, just with a different look (does this make any sense??). I tried them on but I wasn’t ready to make a decision- I’m still mourning the loss of my good ol’ Keen Voyageurs.

No room at the Inn and shoes that don’t fit… not exactly good omens for this adventure, huh?

But it’s all part of the fun, isn’t it? This is what travel is: it throws us out of our comfort zones, it makes us need to think on our feet, we need to make adjustments and accept change and sometimes just face the unknown with openness, and trust.

And in the end, I’m going to have shoes on my feet and a bed to sleep in, one way or another. I’m sure my walk through England is going to have some difficult moments, maybe entire days that are challenging, but it’s going to be beautiful and amazing too. History (my own, over these last four summers) has certainly proven that.

(photos from my springtime walks)

Making our choices

April 12, 2018

When I haven’t written in awhile, I like to begin a post with where I am, and what I’m doing. It centers me, it gives me a place to start. It sets the scene.

And while I wish I could be reporting in from some exotic place (or, Europe, which is still quite exotic in my mind), I’m where I usually am at this time of the year. Sitting at my kitchen table, the one that’s covered with a bright yellow table cloth. There’s a dill plant on the table that my mom gave me this past weekend (so if any of you have recipes you love that feature dill, I’d love for you to share them!). Playing on Spotify is Phoebe Bridgers’s album, Stranger in the Alps, and I’m eating some crackers and cheese and drinking a glass of seltzer with lime.

What else can I tell you? It’s 6:15pm and the sun is shining and it’s so nice to have these longer hours of daylight, and the approach of a warm spring. It’s been a slow approach, and not consistently warm yet, but I think those days are right around the corner.

It feels as though so much is right around the corner, and that’s a good feeling. Two weeks ago I took a small trip to the mountains of Virginia, where I hiked and explored and did a little writing and took stock of the first three months of the year. And then I thought about what the focus of the next few months would be about, and all of a sudden it felt like time was moving quickly. Even though work is busy and my days feel full and I can’t wait until I head off to Europe in mid-June, I also want to slow time. Not the days, necessarily, but the years. I want to slow down the years.

Where am I heading with this? I don’t know. Today, a student I work with was telling me how much trouble she’s having about choosing between two colleges. “Why can’t someone just decide for me?” she said.

I looked at her. “Because it’s the first really big decision that you have to make on your own. It’s practice for life, in a way. Because actually, besides loss, I think that’s one of the hardest things about life. You have your one life, and you have to figure out what you’re going to do with it. You’ve got to make decisions about which direction to take and no one does it for you.”

She buried her head on the couch and I heard her muffled voice from under the pillow. “Why if I choose wrong? It’s so hard because I don’t get this time back. And I don’t want to waste it.”

We don’t get time back. Maybe this is one of the hardest things about life, too. I think about this a lot, with where I am in my life, with the things I want to do, with what I want for myself. I want to be doing exactly what I’m doing now: working with kids and living in my beautiful neighborhood and visiting my friends and family and traveling in the summers and writing in the evenings at my kitchen table. And, also, I want to live in a tiny attic apartment in Paris and buy a baguette every day from the corner boulangerie and write a novel. And, also, I want to be married and raise a child and buy a small home somewhere close to the woods and a lake.

And I want to hike the Appalachian Trail (maybe). And I want to see a giant panda in China. And I want to live in Maine. And I want to set up a darkroom and develop pictures and have exhibits in local cafes and galleries. And I want to have dinner parties and children’s birthday parties. And I want a garden. And I want a yard with a magnolia tree.

Sometimes it feels like to chose any one of these things means to give up another. Sometimes I think I have the time to do everything. Sometimes I worry that it’s already too late.

I don’t have much regret with the choices I’ve made so far in my life, but what does sometimes keep me up at night is the thought that my time is so precious. It’s so, so precious. I like what I’m doing and how I’m living but there is always a voice whispering, “And what else? And what else? And when? And when?”

I don’t have any big changes just on the horizon, but I also know that time does not wait for me. I have to make my choices even if it means that one choice might eliminate another. I have to make my choices because one choice might lead to another. I have to make my choices because time marches on, and the years in my one life slide by, and slide by, and slide by.

The years slide by, but to have this time at all is such a gift. What a beautiful thing, to get to make choices in my life. To be free, to have an education, a roof over my head and crackers and cheese on the table before me. To get to choose my direction, to have so many choices.

So, happy spring my friends, here’s to another season, the one that ushers in new life and growth. Let’s make our choices, and see where they take us.

A Walking Stick and a Loaf of Bread; Day One of walking Hadrian’s Wall (Newcastle-upon-Tyne to Heddon-on-the-Wall, 15 miles)

April 22, 2017

We’d arrived in Newcastle-upon-Tyne the day before, on a train from London. Newcastle wouldn’t be the start of our walk- not exactly- as the official beginning (or ending) of Hadrian’s Wall path is in Wallsend, a 15-minute metro ride east of the city. But it’s a great place to begin a long walk, with plenty of amenities, entertainment and transportation options.

I was exhausted when our train pulled into the station. I’d managed only 30-minutes of sleep on my overnight flight, along with just a bit of shut-eye on the train journey. But despite this fatigue, I managed to rebound after we dropped our packs in our hostel and set off to explore the city. I’d originally thought that maybe Heather and I could knock off the first 5-miles of our trek that Saturday afternoon; from Wallsend, the route passes directly back through Newcastle, and I thought this could be a nice introduction to the walk.

But I quickly realized that there was no way I could do a walk on so little sleep, so we meandered through the city instead, moving slowly and soaking up unexpected warm air and sunshine (Northern England was experiencing a bit of a heat wave at the beginning of our trip!). We wandered up to The Great North Museum: Hancock, a free museum with a large room dedicated to Hadrian’s Wall. There was an interactive model of the wall that snaked through the room, as well as lots of wall artifacts on display.

This would have been a great introduction to the walk IF the museum hadn’t decided to close an hour early that day. We only had about 10-minutes to look at the displays but maybe it was just as well: there’s something I like about a journey where I’m heading into the unknown. I didn’t want to see too much of the wall before I actually saw the wall itself.

We walked along the Quayside and ate an excellent dinner at a place called Red House. The only thing on the menu were their homemade butcher pies, mash and peas, and thank goodness for that. It was one of the best meals of the trip!

Sunday morning rolled around and we both agreed that staying in a hostel might not have been the best way to start a trek. The hostel itself was fine, but we were there on a Saturday night and most of the others staying in our room and down the hall weren’t trying to get a full night’s sleep before a long walk. So it was a long night of people coming and going, drunk bunk mates arriving back to the room at 4am, and generally just a lot of noise.

But, that’s nothing that a good cup of coffee can’t fix! We left the hostel early and grabbed drinks and pastries from the only open shop in sight, then jumped on the metro for the quick ride out to Wallsend.

Now, a note about the direction of this walk. Heather and I were walking east to west, starting in Wallsend and ending in Bowness-on-Solway. People do walk in this direction, but the more I learned about the path (and the more we heard as we encountered people on our journey), the preferred direction seems to be west to east. Supposedly, views of the wall are better in this direction, plus the wind will be at your back, pushing you forward as you walk. (Oh, just wait until I write about Day 3 of our journey… the wind was mighty. Really mighty).

And I’d read all of this while I was planning the trip, but something made me choose to go east to west. Honestly, I think some of this has to do with the Camino. Or my long-held dreams about my east-to-west road trip across the United States. “Go west, young man.” Somehow, walking east just doesn’t have the same ring to it.

So beginning in the east it was. Despite studying two different guide books, we had some trouble finding the start of the walk, but eventually we found ourselves on a path, snapped a photo of the first Hadrian’s Wall sign we saw, and began walking.

The day was glorious. Soon, our layers were peeled off and we were walking in t-shirts. Within an hour I found a suitable walking stick, and before long the path wound down to Walker Riverside Park, where we were able to walk along the Tyne for several miles as it lead us back into Newcastle.

And once we were in Newcastle- still walking along the Tyne- we passed through a large, bustling outdoor market. It was like a slice of heaven for a walker! The sun was shining, families were out and about, and there were what seemed like hundreds of stalls filled with crafts and mementos and food and treats. There was ice cream and crepes and baked goods and tacos and pulled-pork sandwiches and coffee. We saw several little carts or trucks that were converted into moveable cafes, an espresso machine fitted into the trunk space.

Heather and I lamented the fact that we were passing through around 10am, too early for lunch. But we lingered there anyway, and I bought a little package of coffee beans to bring home, as well as a large loaf of artisan bread. (It was a really, really large loaf of bread. I struggled a bit to fit it into my pack, and once I started walking I began to wonder why I would buy such a large thing… but it turns out that the bread came in handy over the course of my walk. Lesson #1: Never pass up the opportunity to buy a loaf of fresh bread).

The walk carried us out of Newcastle, continuing along the River Tyne but eventually meandering off. It continues for a stretch through the Tyne Riverside Country Park, which was crowded on such a warm and sunny day. I could only find two drawbacks to this first day of walking. For starters, there’s very little evidence of Hadrian’s Wall along this stretch (aside from a bit of wall at the very beginning of the route in Wallsend, but Heather and I didn’t exactly know what we were looking for so it’s anyone’s guess as to whether we actually saw the Wall here or not). And the second is that the entire day- all 15 miles- was on pavement. This is a tough way to begin a walk, and my feet were aching by the end of the day.

But overall, what a beautiful start! Riverside paths and parks, sunshine and outdoor markets, coffee and bread, a classic Sunday roast for lunch, and a wonderful spot to rest our heads at the end of the day. We stayed at Houghton North Farm in Heddon-on-the-Wall; some of the farm’s buildings were made with stone from Hadrian’s Wall! (This is typical in the villages and towns close to the route of the wall; once the Romans left, much of the wall was dismantled and the stone was used for other purposes by local landowners). I suppose that our lodging at Houghton North Farm could be considered a hostel or a bunkhouse, but with a twin room and only a few other people staying there, it felt both spacious and cozy.

Overall, it was a very satisfying and great start to the journey. By the end of the day, I could feel that I was back in the walking groove, and it was a good thing, too. Because the next day, we’d be tackling a 23-mile/35km stage!

Next Post: Day 2 on Hadrian’s Wall

Springtime Notes

May 17, 2016

I’d just started typing a post- I had a couple paragraphs written- but my fingers must have been moving a little too fast because they hit a couple of keys at the same time and the post disappeared. I can only think that it’s been too long since I’ve blogged and I’m out of practice.

So, let me start again. I had just been thinking that two years ago, around this time, I was about a month away from my first Camino. I can remember those days so clearly: the training hikes, the trips to REI, the packages from Amazon. I can also remember the feeling of those days, the nervousness of what I was taking on, the quiet thrill of pushing myself and learning something new. I had no idea what I was doing, and yet, with each day, I felt like I was getting closer to something. As the weeks progressed, I added miles to my hikes, and weight to my pack. I settled into a pair of shoes that comfortably fit my feet, and I finally bought the right kind of socks. I remember how I would snap a bar of dark chocolate in half, and tuck the pieces into the outer pocket of my pack so that I could enjoy them after my hike. And when my walk was done, that chocolate was maybe the best thing that I had ever tasted.

Wasn’t I just doing this? How could it be two years ago that I was about to embark on my first Camino?

Time is flying. My days are just speeding by, and I’m constantly thinking that I don’t have enough time for all that I want to do. I blame most of this on the book that I’m trying to write, but it’s also more than that. Two years since the first Camino. Two years! The time rushes past whether there’s book writing or not, and I have a fear that the days are only going to keep moving, faster and faster.

Two years ago I was blogging a lot; in the month before my first Camino, I had a lot to say. But now? My next trip is just over 6 weeks away, and I think that so much of the writing I want to do is going to happen when I arrive in Europe.

Because what can I say that I haven’t already said before? I bought new shoes, I’m squeezing in training hikes when I can, several of my friends are on a Camino as we speak and I’m following their journeys with envy. Otherwise, time just marches on, the days here have been cloudy and wet, I’m wondering if this cool, damp spring is just going to slip into summer without me even noticing.

But today we finally got some sunshine: a full day of perfect blue sky and beautiful light, and I drove straight from work to my park and went on a solid, 7-mile hike. And something about the day reminded me of the days before my first Camino, when I just settled into those hikes and dreamed about what my summer might be like.

I daydreamed on this hike, today. I thought about all of my summer plans, how I’m attempting to do everything that I want to do, how I’m combining all of the things that I’ve grown to love in these last few years: travel and walking and writing and connection. I thought a lot about the future, too, how I wish that I could live all of my days enjoying these very things- the travel and walking and writing and connection. Maybe someday I can, maybe right now I already do, in whatever small or large ways I can manage.

I feel calm, thinking about my summer, which is a very different feeling than two years ago, different from even a year ago, when I wasn’t sure if walking a second Camino was the right thing to do. But now I just feel calm, like I’ve gotten myself on a good path and that I’m headed in the direction that I want to be moving in.

And that’s it for now, I think. I have a few ideas for blog posts- well, actually, I have tons of ideas but I’m just not finding the right kind of time- but in any case, I plan to check back in a few more times before I leave for my trip at the end of June. And then, with any luck, I’ll be writing a ton, and man, I just can’t wait. I can’t wait to see new places, to do more walking, to finish up a rough draft of my book, to meet new friends and make more beautiful connections.

But for now, here are my shoes, all of my Camino shoes. It’s time to break the new pair in!

Daylight and Writer’s Block

March 13, 2016

I sat down at my kitchen table, just past 6:00 pm, my usual time. I poured a glass of wine and loaded up Ryan Adam’s ‘1989’ cover album onto Spotify and I pressed play.

This is how I write my book. It’s happening in very, very small increments, from day to day. My kitchen table, sometimes a glass of wine, always the Ryan Adams music.

But right now it’s a bit after 7:00 and I’ve written just a couple of really bad paragraphs, and mostly I’ve just stared out the window or I’ve gotten up a few times, and peeked at the bread that’s rising underneath a dish towel at the other end of the table.

Some days are just not good writing days, but this has been a particularly bad one, so I hopped over here, to the blog, instead.

Twice a year in the US we have daylight savings time: clocks one hour behind in the fall, one hour ahead in the spring. We sprung ahead last night, and while I don’t like losing an hour of my day, I love this time change. The days have already been stretching out, longer and longer, but now daylight will extend well into the evening and for me, this means a return to life.

I always hibernate a bit in the winter, and this winter was no exception. Despite the mild days and very little snow, I took advantage of the darkening late afternoons by coming home, hunkering in, and getting to work on my book. The progress has been slow but it’s also been steady, and right now, I have a pile of (virtual) pages, something that’s actually beginning to resemble a book. Well, probably I’m getting ahead of myself- mostly it’s just pages and some of it strings together but other parts just hang out alone, waiting for something to come along and connect them to the greater whole. I have a long way to go, but all of this winter writing has been getting me somewhere.

So I’m maybe all the more frustrated by the lack of focus tonight. I try really hard to guard my writing time, giving myself as many evenings as I can to sink into my routine and force out something onto the page. But in the past few weeks I’ve noticed a growing fear. It started sometime when the days began to lengthen and the sun began to shine a bit stronger, when the air felt warm on my skin. The fear whispered in my ear: “How are you going to stay inside and write when the world becomes beautiful again?”

The pattern of my life changes when winter starts to fold into spring- I go outside and stay outside, on long hikes and walks. I buy water ice and I spread out on a blanket in the grass. I plan things and see friends and show up more to the stuff that I tend to say ‘no’ to in the winter.

But what will this mean for my writing? What happens to the 6pm writing time, the mellow music and the glass of red wine, everything set up just so, so that I’m conditioned to sit down and work?

I’m not so worried yet, not really, but tonight hasn’t done me any favors. I know I’ll need to adjust my routines or find new ones, and I’m convinced that I will, because I’ve written too much of this book to stop now.

But in the meantime, I have to say, I’m so excited for warm weather and the slow approach to summer. My plans for July and August are all over the place- about every other day I come up with a new idea, and mostly, I want to do it all: another Camino. A writer’s retreat. A walk in France. A walk in England. A walk in Scotland. I fall further and further down the rabbit hole, collecting more information and ideas and items to add to my bucket list, and there are so many right now that I don’t know what to chose.

Not a bad problem to have. But before any of that, I have a mini-vacation coming up in a week, and I’ll be headed to Cumberland Island, a 17-mile stretch of land on the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of the state of Georgia. Maybe this is why I’m worried about my writing- it’s my first trip in months, and will cause a serious disruption to my very rigid routine.

But I have to say, I’m so excited to be getting away. I’ll be camping on my own for the first time: three nights in my little tent, in a reserved campsite that’s a stone’s throw from running water and showers. So for now, a perfect scenario. It’s also a stone’s throw from quiet beaches and numerous hiking trails, and maybe most importantly, instead of black bears there are wild horses. (Lets hope the horses don’t come stomping into my campsite, but even if they do, I’ll be far less terrified of them than a visit from a bear).

I still have to practice setting up my tent, and I’ve got to gather up some food and see if I can work the little camp stove that I bought a few weeks ago. But all the planning aside, I can’t wait to explore a new place and to sleep outside and watch the sunset over the ocean. And I’m also excited to blog about the trip, so even if I don’t get much book writing done in the next few weeks, you can be sure to have some blog updates about this upcoming adventure.

One way or the other, I’m plugging along. Just continuing to plug along: my book, the blog, myself, my car (oh boy, my car!), my dreams. I hope you’re all plugging along as well, enjoying the extra daylight (if you’re in the same part of the world as me), and making exciting plans for the future. See you soon.

A Long Winter’s Walk

March 5, 2016

The title of this post is a little deceiving, I thought I should say that upfront. I am going to write about a long walk I took last weekend. And it was the end of February, which still sits squarely in the winter season here in the northeastern US. But it was also a 64 degree day with strong, uninterrupted sunshine. For all intents and purposes, I felt like I had stepped straight into spring, and I loved it.

I never really stopped walking this winter, though the nature of my walks changed. I still try to get out to my local park but instead of hiking the soggy, snow-covered trails, I stick to the paved path. And I spend more time in my own neighborhood, racing to beat the setting sun as I loop through the streets. I bundle up in my long underwear and fleece headband and I rush through the hour-long walk and then hurry back inside to where it is warm.

But I’ve lucked out with a relatively mild winter, and last Sunday we were hit with that 60-degree day. I was just getting over a long and lingering cold and had been shut up inside for much of the past week, so my feet were itching to move, and I was craving fresh air and the outdoors and, more than anything, a bit of warm sunlight.

I headed to the Delaware & Raritan Canal Towpath, a place I discovered last year on one of my first outings with the Philadelphia Camino group. It is a 77-mile trail in New Jersey that runs mostly along- you guessed it- the Delaware & Raritan Canal, and passes through New Brunswick, Trenton (my place of birth!!), Lambertville and Frenchtown. There’s so much history along the trail; in the 19th century, the main section of the canal was used to transport goods to New York City, and other industrial cities. There are old mills and lockkeeper houses, as well as Washington’s Crossing (the place where George Washington crossed the Delaware River during the American Revolution… I just read that this marked a turning point in the war, so maybe this is a spot on the trail that I’ll have to walk to next).

There are also 5 bridges at various points along the trail that cross the Delaware and connect you to a somewhat parallel trail in Pennsylvania- the Delaware Canal Towpath (which is 60 miles in length). Basically, this means that there are lots of possibilities for good walking and good scenery and, if you plan it right, good coffee as well.

One thing that I really miss about my walks and hikes here in the US is the lack of villages and towns that conveniently provide coffee breaks. Multiple café con leche stops on the Camino were one of my very favorite things, and it was rare that I had a day of walking on the Camino that didn’t pass by at least one open bar.

So one of the greatest perks of walking along the D&R Canal Towpath is the chance to pass through quaint villages with their restaurants and markets and coffee shops. It’s perfect, actually: you walk along a sometimes paved, sometimes hard-packed dirt trail for a mile or two, surrounded by nothing but nature: gurgling water, tall trees, grassy fields. Then, all at once, you pass through a little town that is filled with Victorian houses and galleries and shops. This might not happen for the entire length of the trail, but it did for the section that I decided to walk on Sunday, a 12 mile out-and-back stretch from Lambertville to (nearly) Bull’s Island.

The path is totally flat, so this was an ideal late-winter hike for me. For the last few months my walks have been short, and they haven’t included many hills. So I need to ease back into my Camino-training (is there a Camino #3 in my future?? Possibly/probably, though I’m still trying to figure out my summer plans). In any case, a long walk on a flat and mostly smooth path was exactly what I was looking for, and for most of the walk I moved along quickly and easily. I was fueled, of course, by the cappuccino I bought at Stockton Market, an indoor farmer’s market in the village of Stockton, which was about three-miles into my walk. There were stands and tables filled with goods: fresh vegetables, bottles of olive oil, trays of cheese and rounds of bread, but I went straight for the coffee. I carried it with me as I walked, and it all felt kind of luxurious: warm air and bright sunlight, a cup of creamy coffee in my hand as I strolled along the canal.

All signs of luxury left, however, by the last two-miles of the walk. As I plodded along, I did some mental calculations of the last time I had walked more than 7-miles. And as I counted backwards, further and further, I realized it had been sometime in early December, nearly three months earlier. So it was no wonder that after nearly 12-miles, I could feel a small blister developing on the bottom of my right foot, and a slight ache in my left knee. But just as I was feeling rather grumpy and wishing that Lambertville- and my car- would appear quickly, I heard a small commotion off to the side of the trail.

I wandered over and it was a little oasis: three children were set up behind a tiny, make-shift stand. A white plastic table with a brightly colored cloth and a hand-drawn sign, advertising popcorn and lemonade. I could hear a fresh batch popping in the background, along with the clink of ice cubes as a little girl poured a glass for a woman in front of me. I stood in line and smiled at the woman, and we discovered that we both had the same ‘life rule’: if you pass a lemonade stand, you have to stop.

So I finished my long walk with a plastic cup in each of my hands: one filled with icy cold lemonade, the other filled with freshly popped, lightly salted popcorn. My entire body had that tired and satisfied feeling of exertion, and my spirit felt rejuvenated from the sun and the warm air.

It feels like spring is almost here. And it feels like a return to my favorite seasons of life, the ones that include long walks and vigorous hikes, fresh air and adventure and traveling. I can’t wait.

Photo of the Week #7: A Return to Hiking!

April 5, 2015

A few weeks ago I drove out to my trusty state park to check out the conditions of the trails, and found that they were still covered in snow. And because I’m not a fan of walking over snow and ice, I’ve been sticking to a 4-mile paved trail that runs in a loop around the park. It’s a nice option for outdoor walking, but it’s just not the same as a wooded trail. I was anxious to get back into the woods, so to speak.

And this week felt like a turning point. It helped that I spent the first part of the week in western Virginia, where the weather was a little warmer and there were mountains almost at my doorstep. I took advantage of this beautiful area of the country and went on a few hikes: the first, an 8+ miler to a decent overlook, and the second, a 3+ miler straight up a mountain to a 360 panoramic view of the countryside (this is the hike that tortured my legs).

This part of the state is home to a section of the Appalachian Trail. Hiking the AT isn’t something that I think I’ll be doing any time soon, if at all, and yet… every time I’m on the trail or near the trail, I think about what it would be like to spend 6 months walking through the woods. There’s something immensely appealing about it- to spend all of that time almost entirely in nature. Moving slowly up a country (not unlike what I’ve done on the Camino, just a much greater distance), carrying not only my possessions on my back but also my food and my home… and doing nothing but walking. The Camino was such a great accomplishment, and I can’t even imagine what it must feel like to walk the entirety of the Appalachian Trail.

But for all of the trail’s appeal, there’s a lot about it that doesn’t appeal to me. Namely, wildlife. Specifically, bears. And snakes. And anything that moves during the night. And the fact that I can’t routinely pass through towns and indulge in cups of coffee and glasses of wine. So for now, I’ll stick with the Camino.

In any case, my 8-mile hike this week found me on the Appalachian Trail, but just for a mile or two. I was hiking the John’s Creek Mountain Trail- or at least, I was trying to. Supposedly, I would be on the trail for about 3.5 miles and then link up to the AT, where I would hike for another mile over to Kelly’s Knob, a ridge offering a decent view of the New River Valley. Except I couldn’t find the trailhead for the John’s Creek Mountain Trail. I drove up and down the mountain roads until I finally pulled over in a clearing that led to a wide, flat, dirt covered track. The track meandered up the mountainside at a very slight incline, and a sign indicated that no motorized vehicles were allowed through, but that foot travel was welcome.

After a few miles I came across an orange blazed trail, and for once my navigational instincts were correct: I turned right on the trail (which was indeed John Creek’s Mountain Trail), and after a mile hit the Appalachian Trail. I’m not sure where I went wrong and missed the trailhead, but I’m glad that I did. The mountain track was an easy way to start the hike, and as it wound around the mountain, I was frequently treated to beautiful views and blue skies.

So here’s the photo of the week, from what felt like my first real hike of the year:

The Beginning of a Season: Snow and Water Ice and Answering the Big Questions

March 20, 2015

Something I’ve always loved to do is to use a point in time- New Year’s, my birthday, the beginning of a season- and think back to the previous year and where I was/what I was doing. I’m not alone in this, it’s a natural way to mark our progression (or regression??) through life.

Today is the first day of spring, and I am staring out my kitchen window to at least 5 inches of snow piled on top of the bushes, on the trees, covering the ground. It snowed all day long. Sometimes light flurries, sometimes heavy, large flakes. But once again, everything is white, and still, and quiet.

This landscape is at odds with the season, it’s at odds with how I feel. I want the world to feel bright and alive, not silenced and soft. I want to feel some sunshine on my face and see a scattering of purple wildflowers on my neighbor’s lawn. I want the lengthening days to encourage me to be out and to be doing more; but instead, today, the snow forces me home, and inside.

I feel confident in saying that this is the last snow, for awhile. And spring is here. But it looks a lot different than last year. A year ago, I’d returned from a 5-ish mile hike through my state park and stood in a long line snaking around the block, waiting for a free cup of water ice. I stood in between families and groups of teenagers, I was dressed in hiking pants and an old pair of sneakers. I knew I would be walking the Camino and these were early training days: wearing shoes that gave me blisters and feeling my muscles ache after walking 5 miles through wooded trails. But it was satisfying: a long hike. A free cup of water ice. Spring.

The winter before had been a hard one for me, and it was a victory just to make it to that first day of spring. It was a victory to have decided to walk the Camino, a victory to push myself to go on long hikes after work. That first day of spring felt so full of promise and warmth and light, and I suppose that it was a good indicator of things to come.

This year? Maybe I don’t need the sunshine-y symbolism of the past. This year’s winter went by faster than any winter I can remember; there was cold, ice, snow, rain, and lots of gray… but there was something else. I’m struggling to put my finger on how exactly to describe it, I don’t know if I can. There’s been hope, and promise, and excitement for the future. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I haven’t had days of doubt and frustration. There have been times when I’m a bit down, even a little sad. Confused about how to go out and get the kind of life that I want for myself. But there’s also been this thrill, this… wonder. And it’s sort of underneath everything else, and it doesn’t feel like it’s going anywhere.

The Camino opened up some things for me. It’s taken me a long time to really feel its influence, but it happened sometime during the winter. I settled into the short, dark days, and let myself think about my life and my future, and then I just started moving. I started writing, but it’s been different than my dozens of other attempts: this time, it feels sort of permanent. I have a different kind of confidence about it, despite the days that I struggle. Because honestly, most days I sit at my computer and I want to bang my head on the table. Sometimes my eyes fill with tears of frustration because the things I am writing are just so, so bad. Some days I don’t write at all, and just watch Netflix. In the past though, these frustrations would have made me stop, they would have made me think that the elements of my life weren’t just right, that I needed to do x, y and z before I could actually start to write.

Now, I just recognize that this is part of the process. This is what it takes to write. I’ve said this before: it’s a lesson I learned on the Camino. It was the Camino: needing to start slowly, start with a single step, in order to get to the end of something very monumental. What I didn’t realize 6 months ago, however, was that the Camino gave me confidence: confidence that I can undertake something very big and scary, confidence that I can find my way through it.

I still have a million questions about my life and my direction. Will I be able to write a book? Will I be able to spend at least a year or two supporting myself from my writing? Will I be able to travel in the ways that I want to: back to Europe but also to Africa, to Turkey, to China and across the US? When will I focus on dating and trying to meet someone? Will I have a family? How can I set up my life so that I can have all of these things? Is it possible?

These are big questions, questions that I know can’t be answered all at once. So instead, I focus on today: Today, everything is great. I spent my work day talking and laughing with teenagers. I went to IKEA and had a $1.00 frozen yogurt. The snow is slowly falling outside my window. I have several writing projects on the desktop of my computer. I have a list of Spanish phrases to practice before I go to bed. Yesterday I walked through a park. Tomorrow I will drive to DC to spend the weekend with a friend.

Spring is here and I’m excited for the next three months. I don’t know if this season will answer any of the larger questions of my life, but I don’t think it needs to, not yet. Because what I’m doing is laying the groundwork for my future: the writing and the walking and spending time with people who make me happy. And for now, that’s all that I need to be doing.

Because in three months, my life will look a little different (in three months, I’ll be on a Camino!), and three months after that, maybe my life will look even more different. And on, and on, until each small step adds up to something monumental. Until they add up to the answer to all of the big questions of my life.