Beth and I are planning this trip as we go. When we land in a place with a good internet connection we sort out the next leg, bouncing ideas off one another, scrutinizing maps and web sites. Most often we end up renting private apartments which becomes our base camp from where we conduct excursions exploring the area. This has worked out really well. We meet our local host who almost always helps us unravel the mystery of a place much faster than if we relied on biased or indifferent hotel clerks.

Arriving at a foreign place, be it an apartment or a country, is usually intimidating. Us humans come preprogrammed with a negativity bias.  During the course of our evolution, this bias has helped keep us out of harm but also confounds modern man with anxiety based upon threats that are not real.  Injecting yourself into an unknown culture in an unfamiliar place heightens this protective but paranoic mechanism. This is why hotels worldwide have a comfortable uniformity of experience. Little islands of familiarity in a dark sea of menacing mystery.

We realized that we would have to book the weeks around the holidays well in advance. We choose Sri Lanka first because it is a mostly Buddhist country that  largely ignores Christmas and, secondly, because we anticipated needing a vacation after our  sojourn through India.  We could kick back for a couple weeks with a more relaxed schedule, reading, napping and staring at the ocean.  We booked an "Aruyvedic farm house" in a rural village about 5 kilometers from the Indian Ocean.

Our new host, Hetti, came to Columbo with a driver and we drove several hours south to our new digs. Hetti, about my age, spent many years traveling the world as a sailor. His English is good and he was brought up in the tiny village of Uruvitiya where the farmhouse is located. The house is substantial by local standards. It is a two story concrete building with lots of rooms and many decks and patios. However several things set off alarm bells when we arrived. The kitchen was primitive and filled with old bottles containing unknown liquids, pastes and herbs. There is an open fire pit with ancient looking cooking tools and many many clay pots. The house, situated in the jungle with interspersed rice paddies seemed like a mosquito's wet dream. There are no screens on the many windows and mosquito netting above the beds. And then there was Hetti, by all appearances  a kind and gentle soul but it appeared he came with the house, something we had not anticipated and were anxious about. Finally it was hot and muggy, being just 5 degrees north of the equator and surrounded by water.

That first night we slept poorly worrying that our vacation retreat was instead an incarceration.  The next morning I woke to the distant sound of Buddhist monks chanting. I stepped out onto the upper deck as   the first tentative light appeared and looked out. Acres of green rice paddies fed by gently flowing streams, lush tropical foliage including coconut palms, mango and banana trees. Egrets and storks plying the paddies as small flocks of Ring Necked Parakeets flew from tree to tree quarreling. Then the loud squawk of a peacock roosting on top of the highest palm declaring his sovereignty.  A tiny primitive road cut through the scene, and as the light grew the village around us awoke.

During the course of our stay, looking out over the village has become a favorite pastime. Old men feeding fish left over rice out of pure  Buddhist charity.  A young boy whose charge it was to keep the birds out of his family rice plot by waving his arms and shouting,  throwing pebbles and the occasional firecracker. He took his work very seriously and with great joy leaping barefooted lithely along the dykes his toddler brother in his arms at times.  And everywhere people stopping on the road to chat.

Whenever we walk down any of the myriad roads and paths that crisscross the jungle, we are always greeted with beaming excited smiles and salutations. We are the only white people here and most of the locals know only a few English phrases: hello hello, where you from, Ok Ok good. This does not in anyway limit the clear message that these are happy people who are sincerely glad to see us. Their eyes beam and they have this irresistible head-shoulder wiggle that is perhaps the most disarming and open gesture that I have ever experienced.

And then there is Hetti. He has taken us under-wing a great protector and guide in addition to being a warm loving man. His stories of sea travel include being captured by Somolian   pirates and harrowing failed  attempts to round the Horn of South Africa in raging storms. His success was hard earned, leaving home at a tender age, penniless and alone, traveling overland  through Afghanistan and Iran to dubious prospects in Great Britain. There he worked the docks until his incredible work ethic was noticed by a Greek captain and his career was launched. Now Hetti and I cook for each other and sip Arrack in the evenings together.

And so what at first seemed unsettling is now completely comfortable. Our stay here is almost done and it will seem, once again, like leaving home when we depart. It's bittersweet but one of the best things about traveling is the way strangeness converts to comfort. If you take the effort to learn a place and its people, it lives in your heart forever- you own it and it owns a piece if you.

Things that could have gone wrong but didn't. One of my suppositions for this trip was that, contrary to what mass media would have you believe, the world is largely a safe place filled with nice people. I have unintentionally tested that theory by letting my guard down occasionally. Yesterday we were exploring Columbo, the capital city of Sri Lanka. It's a bustling modern city with crowded side walks and few westerners. I stopped at an ATM kiosk, withdrew some cash and started walking away. Suddenly a man tapped me on my shoulder and handed me my bank card which I had left in the machine. Here, the ATM screen displays your bank balance at the end of a transaction and asks if you'd like to make another transaction. My balance was an obscene amount far exceeding the per capita annual income of the country. Kindness knows no national boundaries.

In Munnar India our driver talked us into getting an Aruyvedic massage. I cannot tell you how many times we've read never to take this kind of advice. The internet is full of reported scams involving kick-backs, robberies and even kidnapping. Well we really liked Santosh, our driver, and although we had just met, he really wanted us to do this- our experience would not be complete without it. So OK, wtf, we agreed. Our appointment was for 6:30pm and we went for the deluxe package, one hour of full body massage followed by half an hour of hot oil dripped on our foreheads. Jealous? Driving there we left the paved road at the outskirts of town and bumped our way along to a ramshackle building on the jungle's edge. It was dark when we arrived but not so dark that we missed the ripped threadbare rugs and stained walls. We were ushered into private rooms and the procedure commenced. Stripped naked except for a 5 square inch loin cloth I lay on the table trying to ignore the slightly cloying smell. The massage was interesting and I relaxed as he withdrew demons from me and realigned my shakras. After an hour the hot oil drip commenced and I discovered the source of the smell. This was also strangely relaxing even when half was through I realized this was recycled magical oil. I mused about how old it could be and how many foreheads had this oil dripped off of? Then the biologist in me turned to the bacteriological host properties of warm oil. Soon it was over and we waited the prerequisite hour before showering. Actually it took two showers to fully degrease. At no time did I feel I had put myself in harm's way until,calling home, my son Dan noted "sounds like a good way to wake up missing a kidney".

 Madurai is one of those Indian Cities which attracts few western tourists. It has an amazing living Hindu temple but otherwise is a seemingly endless working city, crowded and frenetic. As was often the case our hotel was fine but seemed misplaced by western standards. In the evening, waiting for Beth to shower I decided to check out the street scene. Stepping out the door I entered a cacophony of sound and motion. A scrap metal dealer next to a store selling milk jugs and a guy selling betel nuts on and on down the street forever. Tuk-tuks are three wheeled open air taxis that are everywhere. In some places they are metered and reliable and in others they prey upon tourists. It is not uncommon for some hapless schmuck to be driven to some unknown location and held up for a higher fee or worse. Standing on the street in front of the hotel a driver struck up a conversation. We talked about New York, our trip etc. I was curious about his life and started asking questions about his business. How long had he driven? Did he own the Tuk-tuk? How much did they cost... Soon he, smiling and nodding insisted on taking me on a ride. I laughed and showed him my empty pockets having left my wallet in the room. No problem sir, you are my guest! Maybe it was the two beers in my belly but I agreed and hopped aboard. Off we flew, my new best friend excited about demonstrating his skills as we careened down the crowded roads horn honking and swerving. It was quite exciting and my laughter egged him on and he also started laughing (somewhat maniacally) as he careened through the streets the fastest driver in Madurai. After about 14 blocks, all of which to me seemed exactly the same, I realized here I was, no wallet, no phone, lost in a city I could not spell and staying at a hotel whose name I never bothered to notice. I am proud to say I did not panic. I dug down and retrieved my what will be will be mantra and was calm when we pulled back up to the hotel. Later that night he took Beth and me for another ride, for pay this time, and we learned more about him. A grandfather who had just lost his daughter to suicide and left the care of her two young kids to him. How sad this world can be and yet how amazingly kind people remain.

It's hard to write about India without sounding like a travelogue. The land of contrasts, deep historical roots astounding art and riches and heart wrenching poverty. Making eye contact here ensures an interaction be it a hard sales pitch, a desperate plea for help or, just as often, a warm loving smile behind which lies thousands of years of cultural spiritual practices emphasizing that all there is is love.

The filth and grime of so much of the subcontinent takes a lot of getting use to and there are many westerners who could never see beyond it. Garbage is everywhere and it is burned in small fires on the roads. In cities the air is always hazy and usually smells. It is the dustiest place I have ever been. Open sewers, animal shit and men pissing road side are omnipresent. In the train stations are many rats, and young beggars no older than 5 do acrobatics on the dirty platforms their skin so steeped in grime I wonder if they could ever be clean again. And then there is the traffic. Cars, busses and trucks, tuk-tuks, horse carts, rickshaws, bikes and motorcycles, oxen, camels, water buffalo, Brahman cattle, goats, cows, and pedestrians all vying for the space just ahead in a confusing but efficient dance where no one gets hurt and no one gets angry.

Sounds terrible, and there were a few times when it got to me and became a hellish visage, but for the most part we are loving this part of our trip beyond any expectations. For one thing, despite the dust and noise and poverty, everywhere you see contentment. The children, whether dressed in adorable school uniforms or mostly naked clothed only in dust, are full of energy, laughing and playing, open and joyful. Then there are the woman. Rich or poor they adorn themselves with amazing clothes and jewelry, the colors perfectly matched. The men, be it emaculately dressed Sieks, or bone thin holy men with matted hair and beards, all carry themselves with a calm composure signifying inner peace. The Indians I have met are among the most earnest and optimistic people ever. They seem to uniformly love their history and their country. They have great tolerance for other cultures and religions. This does not imply naievity. Even the taxi can drivers seem to have a deep knowledge of national and international affairs far exceeding the typical insular American's.

Because there are so many beggars I sometimes, as instructed by locals, act as though they do not exist; no talking, no eye contact. This is a difficult exercise for me and my bleeding heart. Yesterday approached by two boys around 7 or 8 years old, instead of ignoring them I faced them and, putting on my best demonic face I snarled at them which sent the screeching and laughing away. Maybe it's true what a local told me, that I look like a Bollywood villain.

I cannot even begin to describe my experiences here. As you drive you see a million vignettes: old men sleeping on bamboo cots in the shade, woman shelling beans, holy men crawling on knees in pilgrimage, a naked toddler splashing happily at the village well. It all feels right and according to some ancient plan. I mostly feel so fortunate to have been able to come here. Namaste.

Paradise Lost

When I tell people about this trip Beth and I are on, the most common reaction is excitement mixed with a bit of jealousy. I suppose traipsing around the globe for six months evokes in people visions of the unknown, of things that are out there just out of sight which are strange and wonderful and which, just might, fill some hole in their life, real or imaginary, that keeps them from their full potential. Well I am here to report back to you all that that's a pile of poo. There is no magic pill and moving around from place to place is the same as any endeavor in life, it is what you make of it. You know how a nice Thanksgiving day can be? A brisk walk in the autumn woods with loved ones. Returning chilled to a warm bustling kitchen redolent with the smell of turkey and fixings and the aproned grandma fussing over you as she pours you a hot spiced wine. Or the other scenario, when you slightly burned your sweet potato casserole and your mother in law won't let you forget it. Uncle Jim came late with some crappy store made green bean salad, sullen and stinking of vodka. The kids are overly excited and your mother does not approve. They pound around the house screeching and all you can do is hiss at them and shoot them secret angry looks. Then you eat too much too fast and all you want is to be alone but it looks like no one leaving anytime soon... Well traveling can be like that. Here is an example of the way not to travel. We have been proud of our success at winging this trip and letting it unfold according to God's plan. Actually we have been cocky about it. Things were going so well! The week in agriturismo farms in Italy, the perfect apartments and houses we booked in Slovenia and Croatia! What the hell we decided, feeling all road warriorsish, let's go to India! On it, we dove into the internet and emerged holding a 19 day trip across the north and south of India with private drivers and guides the whole way. A couple of days living on a boat, a day on elephants in a tiger reserve etc. We made all the arrangements, wired a rather large sum of cash to some guy named Ashu in Delhi and sat back on our laurels. Then it occurred to us we need an Indian visa. Whoops and double whoops. Things up to this time has been going so well we felt surely some divine hand was guiding our path and all would work out. Besides India is our close ally and they are really pushing the tourism thing. Then we crashed headlong into the brick wall of Indian bureaucracy. In Europe the embassies are for the most part located only in country capitals. Lucky for us we were in Budapest at the time. I called the Indian embassy intent on charming them with my American wit and seducing then with my treasure but amazingly could not get even one scrap of information regarding visa applications. I was put on hold, transferred and put on hold, told to call back in twenty minutes, twenty minutes later told to call back in fifteen minutes and finally connected with an answering machine informing me the embassy was now closed even though it was only 4pm and their web site had them opened until 5. We did some research and found that step one is to fill out an application on-line. Then you must wait 24 hours before coming to the embassy, paperwork in tow. You submit the paper work, wait for one week and come back and pick up your shiny new visas good to go. Looking at our calendar we saw we could do this. We could apply in Athens, stick to our booked trip to the island of Naxos, return to Athens, get the visas and fly out the next day to Istanbul (flight and apartment also pre-booked). One problem, we had to get color copies and print many forms and it was Sunday in Athens. Everything except the churches are closed in Athens in Sunday. A challenge! We started with the guy we were renting our apartment from. Dimitrus is super nice but man does his printer suck. Undeterred we found addresses of local colleges, internet cafes and hotels and set out to do this thing. No luck. The students were unable, the internet cafes without color printers and the hotels unwilling until finally, miles from our apartment we stumbled upon the business center of the Intercontinental which met all our needs (and with a smile as well). Yeah we were saved! Next morning we were at the embassy gates early, papers in hand and confident. The crowd outside the gate swelled with a mix of Anglos and Indians united by their pensive apprehensive attitudes. The gates opened and we were admitted one by one in a manner pretty much exactly like I imagine being processed into prison to be. We were ushered upstairs to a room reminiscent of a rural small town bus station in 1952 where we were given numbers. And we sat. A prisoner of war gallows humor emerged after several hours and we found some solice in that. And then our number was called. A pretty but hard edged Indian woman spoke to us from behind her plexiglass window. The microphone was broken and I could barely hear a word which apparently frustrated her. She successfully communicated that I was not standing in the precise right place so I took two giant steps backwards which seemed to mullify her. She spent some time looking over our paper work and asked why we had not applied in the US. We laughed nervously and tried to let her see we were free spirits who were so enamoured of her country that spontaneously we decided we must go. Well she said, we had not filled out the form explaining that and also the on-line form we had completed was filled out wrong. On the address line we had put our home address when what is needed is our Greek address. No prob we can fix that.....not. We must reapply on-line, wait 24 hours and come back. Impossible we pleaded. We are going to Naxos tomorrow for a week and would also have to rearrange our Istanbul trip. You should have thought of that before she scolded but then in a moment of divine pity allowed that she would waive the 24 hour requirement but that was as far a she could go. The embassy closes at 3:30 it's 2:30, we have no computer or internet access. Hearts in our mouths we flagged down a cab. The driver was an overly chatty angry Greek who hated his trip to NYC. We rushed into the Intercontinental business center and as if a gun were to our heads completed the on line form, printed it, grabbed a cab and made it back to the embassy with 15 minutes to spare. And then we waited and waited and waited. First in last out our number finally got called and nodding and bowing we resubmitted our paperwork. We felt great relief when she asked us for money, cash only and twice as much as the amount stated on line. We didn't care. We paid the bill scooped up our paper work and fled feeling like 5th graders leaving school on the onset of summer vacation. Then in the cab Beth started rummaging around and with a look that can only be classified as terror asked me if I had the passports. I did not. Despite our emotional exhaustion adrenaline once again flooded our synapses and with edgy alertness we talked it through. We realized the embassy might have retained them but for the next week never fully believed that. We carried on and despite the gnawing background trepidation really loved our stay in Naxos. At times, usually fortified by wine, we integrated the idea that oh well, it is what it is, we are healthy alive and way more fortunate then most of the world. That worked to a point. It wasn't until we returned to the embassy, suffered through their lines and suspicion and had both our passports and visas firmly in hand that the black cloud lifted. Now all is sunny and bright again. We are flying off to Istanbull for 3 days and then to India. The mind is a trickster, it tells you you are doing great when you are not and when all is fine it constantly warns of danger. If I learn anything from this trip I hope it teaches me how to wrestle that beast. Wishing you all peace love and happy holidays.

Soul Train

We are taking a lot of trains on this trip. In Croatia we took one that went fast and tilted like an airplane banking as it swept along curving tracks clinging to rocky mountain sides. This made me euphoric and Beth nauseous. We've had spacious private cabins and crowded old cars where you sit backwards and the headrest are black with the oil from a million heads. One of the oldest coaches we rode was beautifully fitted out with custom wood work and sleek art-deco chrome. Yesterday, we took the train from Zagreb to Budapest. Well we started out on a train. Just as we were beginning to settle in the train stopped and there was a confusion of passengers shuffling around and exiting the train. The conductor, a sweet-heart of a man who spoke no English, pointed our way to a bus which we boarded and drove off for about 30 minutes arriving at another train station where we boarded a second train. A bit later this train stopped and we were herded off to another bus and finally to another train. At this point in our trip Beth and I have become adept at taking things as they come. The trip has washed the New York out of us exposing our Bedoin core. On the final portion of the train ride yesterday the sun was setting as we rushed over the flat agricultural landscape of central Hungry. The cabin lights were on so that as I fixed my stare on the distant horizon the reflection of the trains interior was superimposed as was the mirrored view of the world rushing by in the opposite window. The swaying train and rhythmic clack of wheels on track put me into a deeply relaxed mood. I felt totally in the moment. For a second I was taking in everything, the distant steeple, the sheep, endless field and trees, endless sky, all at once, my mind open and giving no special attention to any one thing. A trance state that felt like nothing I could imagine more than an eagle wheeling from some rocky spire and off down into the valley on the edge of some November night.

So we never made our way to Germany to visit the place Oma grew up in. I had hoped to but this trip has a mind of its own and here we are now in Klek Croatia a stones throw from the Bosnian Coast. This is Hallie's land. In the back of my mind coming to the Dalmation coast was a way to connect to her and now that I am here I see her everywhere. In the ethnographic museum in Ljubljana the folk costumes are just like the dolls of her youth.  In her dancing days whirling and sashed, long skirt flowing and hair braided and bundled she was a Slav. And as she aged she adopted the head shawl worn by the old ladies here. The Croats are self effacing with a witty dark sense of humor that masks the kindest type of soul. Just like Hallie.

 When we arrived in Croatia 3 days ago we had the first rainy weather of the whole trip. The Yugo (a wind from Africa that is said to drive people crazy) was blowing mixing the clouds fog and rain. A melancholy mantilla cloaking the mythological landscapes of wind swept hills and azure sea. A place and mood perfectly fitted to the fantasy and romance literature Hallie loved so much.

 Today we are off to Dubrovnik where my sister spent the happiest time of her life. I know this by the way she described eating a plate of oysters on a terraced restaurant overlooking the Adriatic and the tumble of  pan-tiled roofs below. It is also to the best of my knowledge the only full scene she ever painted, the roofs and alleys of the old city. I miss you sis and will toast you memory today in the city you loved.

Touched

Small kindnesses from strangers take on special importance when you're on the road. These acts also support one of my trip hypotheses, that the vast majority of people in the world are kind and decent. Here are a few examples of how strangers have touched me on this trip so far.

The Prostitute. If you have been following this blog you know that our apartment building in Genoa was also the working place of several prostitutes. We quickly got used to them, and they to us, sharing quick nods of hello as we came and went. One day Beth and I were out walking and we had a small argument (yes all is not perfect- we do argue occasionally).  I walked on ahead towards the apartment with Beth somewhere in my wake.  Obliviously I zipped right past the tiny alley of our apartment.  Our prostitute had noticed however and I suspect she also noticed the tension. Although she spoke no English she took the effort to explain to Beth that I has missed the turn and was down the street a way where Beth found and retrieved me.

The toll booth incident. Toll booths on large foreign highways can be intimidating. Each country has devised a different style. There are often multiple lanes with multiple signs offering multiple options and, in Italy, none are in English.  You really don't have enough time to pull out a dictionary with 10,000 local motorists behind you. Well we picked the wrong lane. We picked the lane that took credit cards but not American ones. "Carts di credito rifiutata" kept appearing no matter which card I used and which way I stuck it in. I saw there was a help button which I pushed about 80 times but finally realized no humans worked here, it was a robotic toll station of the future. I looked sheepishly around and motioned to the guy stuck behind me that he should back up cause I was going to be here a while. He tried to help but his English  compared to my Italian  and he drove through the toll in another lane. A few minutes later the toll gate miraculously opened and allowed us through. There parked on the side of the road was the man who was stuck behind us. He waved and I could tell by his smile that he was our rescuer.

The vegetable lady. Shopping at the local Slovenian farmers market I was buying vegetables for dinner from a plump older farm woman who spoke no English. She was straight from a Brugler painting, weathered hands, flowered apron and the prerequisite kerchief on her head.  She was amused rather than annoyed by the tiny amount of vegetables I was buying.  My last purchase was a single carrot which struck her as especially funny and after I paid she slipped another carrot into my bag with a warm grandmotherly smile.

The Arab.  Crossing from Portsmouth to  Santander we ended up on a second rate ferry which was filled with Arabs. These were Arab families, middle and lower middle class, travelers who kept well to themselves and did not interact with the few scattered  European  travelers.  They had their own mosque and their own entertainment. Many did not have berths and instead camped in the hallways of the ship. Although I did make eye contact a few times it usually ended with them dropping their eyes to the floor and passing by. It's easy to have bad thoughts about groups of foreign people who seem dismissive of all but their own people. It is also easy to imagine that in this world Islamic people are so focused upon that they feel sensitive  and somewhat awkward when among other people of the world.  In any case I was trying to withhold judgement as I explored the ship. Quite frankly I found the whole thing fascinating. As I was returning into the ship from an outer deck I came upon an Arab couple blocking the door. I saw the man was taking pictures of his wife against the ocean and setting sun. I waited for him to finish which took some time. Suddenly he noticed me and saw he was blocking my progress. He gave me  an apologetic look. I smiled and non verbally let him know that I did not mind at all. A look of total warmth and appreciation spread into his eyes and as I squeezed past him through the door he touched my head gently with two fingers in a gesture of thanks.

I am sitting in a beauty salon in Piacenza Italy waiting for Beth to get her hair styled. Now this may not seem so bad but let me tell you it is something I would never have done at home. Travel reconfigures your priorities and preferences. Like using toilets with no seats. At first I was a bit put off by this but when nature calls I answer. Actually I have had several really nice moments, or should I say movements. The cool porcelain is quite nice. When I get home I am removing all  the toilet seats.

Speaking of clean that is one of the other things that marks the passage of time when on the road. That's the clean and grungy cycle. It is amazing how dirty things are out here in the world. Sticky banisters, just about every surface in the Metros grimy, quaint cobbled alley-like streets in ancient cities punctuated with puke and smelling of pee.  On top of that wearing the same clothes for 3 or 4 days running all makes the allure of a good shower right up there with sex.

It is amazing how many permutations and combinations of shower hardware there are in the world. That coupled with varying water quality, volume and heat can make for some interesting experiences. Last night for instance we had had a shitty day of travel filled with stress and sweat. Finally reaching our apartment (in a brothel) I immediately stripped down and jumped in the shower. Zero hot water. At the end of my rope I bit the bullet and embraced the bracing experience. Actually when it was over I felt quite a lot better, all tingly and alive. When I get home I'm disconnecting the hot water tank.

The Old Man and the Sea

I love to swim. In the back of my mind I knew that this trip would not really be baptised until I immersed myself in some foreign sea.  Swimming is where I most easily break down the barrier between self and place.

Sagres is located right on the south west corner of the approximately rectangular Portugal.  We walked from our camp site, about 2 miles from the ocean across the scrubby arid land that was reminiscent of Cape Cod and yet exotically different.  The water was not visible until about 50 feet from the precipitous cliff edge.  There is a magical feeling you get just before you arrive at your first site of the ocean or a mountain top.  It's almost as if premonition warps time for a moment and you somehow know there is a vast and soul soothing site just beyond the next rise even though you have never been there before.  And so it was.  The cliffs were high and straight with long massive combing waves rolling in from infinity and crashing in great plumes on the rocks far below.

We walked a few kilometers along the cliffs looking for the playa (beach).  Sangres is all about beach culture.  Surfing shops and fish restaurants. Old men with big bronzed bellies juxtaposition against topless teens splayed out in the sand for any who dare to look.

Beth and I, well aware of our age and relative uncool stature, found the way down the cliffs to an amazing sandy beach almost entirely occupied by fit young people.  And the beach, due to the towering cliffs behind us and the endless sea before us, was not big.  Fuck it, we hung out anyways staking a small parcel of sand where, because the tide was receeding, were we probably could sit without being washed away.  It was a cool scene, really large and regular waves rolling in and all the kids beamingly excited, surf boards proped In the sand and guys in wet suits milling around.

But, nobody was in the water!  Finally a young svelte guy went in but only up to his waist and tentatively.  The conditions didnt seem so bad to me and I desperately wanted to swim but what was up? Some killer undertow? Octopi?  Two young surfers went out but hardly breeched the breakers and neither made a clean ride to shore.  I had had enough and, in order to fully commit myself to the swim I announced to Beth "I'm going in".  She was not impressed and so I had no choice.  And guess what?  It was about the most lovely conditions imaginable.  Not a rock or shell just soft sand and caressing light blue water,  the waves totally predictable and manageable.  I dove through the breakers and floated on my back over the swells.  I went ashore and grabbed my snorkel and became porpoise like, riding them in and cavorting about.  Suddenly the water was filled with young svelte people.  Now I realize that this may have been due to some cryptic Portuguese surfer culture rhythm but I like to think that a fat old American acting like a child encourged them just a bit.

Paris, Dunkirque, Hastings, Brighton, Portsmouth, and Santander, these are the places where we have laid our heads in what I am now thinking of as phase one of this trip.  We had already deviated significantly from the original skeletal outline of the journey and phase two is shaping up to make the squiggly line of our trip even more serpentine.

Phase two began in Madrid where in some back water industrial park we picked up the camper van that is to be our home for 10 days.  At risk of blowing my macho cover, I confess to sweaty palms as I eased this diesel behemoth (with a standard transmission) into the city's rush hour traffic heading for parts it unknown.  In our pre-trip negotiations I had agreed to Beth's one demand that we would never head off into the sunset without knowing (and having reservations) where we were going to sleep that night.   And yet here we were heading southwest into rural Espania, the sun literally about to set and us having not a clue where we are going.  I rationalized that really we did know where we were going to sleep (in the camper)  but confess to sheepishness at this legalistic machination.

Just before dark we found a camp ground which only cost 16 euros a night. Being so happy to have found a place we ignored the piles of debris and broken machinery that graced the reception area and,upon request, handed our passports over to the youngish woman who worked there (a gypsy perhaps).  We settled in to our tiny site surrounded by other sites which were clearly permanently occupied by people who were not here now. We were essentially the only people there except for a bent over old woman across the way who scowled at me and a tired looking man down the road who kept a potentially mean German Shepard.  As is the norm in Spain nobody spoke English.  The surrounding camps were those ubiquitous working class summer refuges from the city.  In various stages of deterioration with plastic lanterns, garden gnomes and tiki hut additions the camps radiated both the joyous love of children's summers well spent mingled with the lonely end of dreams days of old couples realizing that this is it.

Beth set about to figuring out all of the mechanical mysteries of our new home as I prepared dinner.  The campground manager returned our passports calming our identity theft paranoia, the sun set, and we sipped rioja and ate dinner (proclaimed the best meal In Spain to date by Beth).  A sliver moon drifted behind the silhouetted pines, an owl hooted, the cool mountain air washed away our stress and the vino tinto added a soft warm glow to the night.

Now my and my RV are fast friends although we have come to a mutual agreement to avoid driving through mideveal (and earlier) town centers any more. Next we are headed to Lagos Portugal for three days on the beach and we are, all three of us, filled with excited anticipation.  So far so good.

27 Sept. 2014

Eating, walking, watching, reading and sleeping.  That's pretty much it, it's what we do.  Of course there are other things we do like talk to cab drivers and shop for food but these are incidental to our main activities (is sleep really an activity?).

Eating is usually a wonderful thing in a foreign place. Not only is it a perpetual source of something to look forward to,  it also forces you to engage the locals. Menus in strange languages delivered by waiters who adamantly do not speak English presents  a challenge that is best approached with humor and humility.  Sign language when properly combined with a smattering of foreign words and a little help from the language ap on your cell phone can end you up with an amazing meal.  Or not.  In either case you will earn a memory and perhaps leave the world with one waiter who despises Americans a little less.

Walking is the most intimate way to explore a new place. I love a road trip as much as anyone but it's not the same as being in the place where you are at.  It has the added advantage of being good for you and it not only makes you hungry, it also lessens the guilt of eating once you are done walking.

Watching is the thing we do most. Beth and I are unabashedly voyeuristic and watching the hive of humanity buzzing about their lives is something we never tire of.  The stories are the same everywhere:  fathers and sons, young lovers, short and stout old ladies caneing their way up narrow sidewalks, puppies and beggars.  The cacophony of voices, perfumes and body odor in a sea of colors and styles, the joyous and the depressed, in never ending kaleidoscopic repetition.

I never read a lot because the time I allocated for it was bed time and I usually fell asleep after one paragraph. This is one way that this trip has fundamentally changed me. I am in my fourth book and reading for several hours a day.  I guess it's because I am well rested, am not preoccupied with life's daily problems and spend a lot if time in boats, planes, buses and trains.  Reading about the places I am in adds a lot to the depth of experience.

And finally sleeping, something that I am good at (Beth not so much).  Sleeping in a new and foreign place every few nights is really exciting.  Everyplace has its own landscape of sounds and smells, lights and air currents which inculcate into your dreams.  You wake each morning aware of the mystery waiting to be explored all around you.

Segovia Spain

Flanders and Beyond

Our stay in Flanders (northern France & Belgium) exposed us to a part of the world neither of us had experienced and yet was interlaced with the familiar. It is a largely agricultural area sprinkled with brick towns.  It's a place of people carrying on with their everyday lives and there is not a castle on every hillside. 

I feel now that I am getting into the rhythm of this long trip. For the first time in years I can sit over a coffee at a sidewalk cafe for hours without getting antsy. We are spending a lot of time just quietly observing little slices of life that present themselves to us; the ultimate reality TV. The days are blending together nicely, flowing sanguinly along. I am glad I have been keeping a daily log to contextualize our travels and to keep them all from melding into some ephemeral half forgotten dream. 

We took a ferry across the English Channel to Dover and have explored Hastings and Brighton so far. The site of the battle of 1066 was amazing but the 14 mile uphill bike ride in heavy traffic not so much. My wonderful cousin Ali has been putting us up and putting up with us. It's nice to have social attachments again. Even so, I must say that, so far, Beth and I are getting along better than ever (she reads this you know). 

Tomorrow off to Portsmouth for 2 days and our last glimpse of England. Then a 24 hour ferry to Santander Spain. We are thinking of renting a camper van there so that we can camp in the mountains and on the beaches.

FLANDERS

We have moved on to Dunkerque by train and are living on the Goelette Don Solano, a two masted wooden sail boat.  It's quite romantic and equally rustic.  We are moored in the outer harbor with expansive views of water and are a kilometer from town. It's quiet and peaceful here.  Gulls wheel and cry and the water laps against the boat gently rocking us.  The dark all wood cabin is aromatic with the smells of varnish and licoricey fuel oil.  Across the harbor are the industrial docks where giant cargo ships lay in wait, floating cities twinkling with a thousand lights.

Life here will be simple. We can wash with the water but drinking water is bottled.  The shower is nothing more than the rinse hose found on most kitchen sinks.  The head is rudimentary at best, no laundry, no refrigerator, no stove, no internet.  Lighting is dim and there is none on the deck but there are duel hammocks on the prow where you can watch the endless clouds cruise by.   The cabin where we sleep is just bed and walls and is about as cozy as can be imagined.We are off the tourist trail and off season as well.  Today we will explore the dunes along the English Channel and the farmlands of Flanders.

Paris

Sept. 8. 14 Paris
Our 6th day in Paris. Beth and I got the exact same cold at the exact same time!  This is remarkable because in 33 years of co-habitation it's never happened before. The same itch in the back of the throat growing into that icky burn moving north into the sinuses flooding us with snot, eyes watering in bright sun, dull headache throbbing, south to the chest, cough, cough cough.  And guess what?  We don't care!  If this had been a 10 day vacation I would be fuming but given the seemingly infinite expanse of time ahead of us it barely registered on my meter of concern.  We feel lucky that we got sick together.  No secret recriminations.  We are in synch!

Out illnesses has not kept us from seeing Pari either. Maybe our pace is a bit slower but we have seen and done a lot. We've walked and biked miles, visited markets and museums, eaten delicious things and had quite a few glasses of really good wine. It would be so easy to fall into a comfortable routine here but, because we are just starting out we are hungry for more exotic locales.  It sounds corny but the road really does beckon.  I am so excited about fading away into parts unknown.

We made the18 hour trip  from New York to Paris with no problems whatsoever.  This is a statement of fact but a lie nonetheless.  Yeah, all of connections worked out as planned and we never got lost but following is a more honest accounting.  Left Albany mid day in the most humid conditions of the summer so far.  The kind of heat and humidity that causes you glasses to fog over the second you leave the overly air- conditioned grocery store.  Despite having just showered I was a sweaty mess 

before leaving my driveway.  A friend dropped us and our two 2,000 pound suitcases and carry-ons at the bus station.  So many people going to NY and no reserved seats!  In the mayhem of loading the bus the kind door attendant picked us out as different from the other low income travelers and, with empathy, convinced us we should wait for the next bus where we assuredly would get a seat together.  30 minutes later we were zipping towards NYC realizing that, given rush hour traffic, maybe we did not allot ourselves the gigantic margin of error we thought we would have for arriving early to an international flight.  At least the bus was comfortable and the sweat had dried.  Only then did I begin to research how to get from The Port Authority to JFK in the peak of rush hour.  My ample experience of being stuck in traffic on long island was lent credibility by my ever helpful Iphone GPS traffic indicator which showed a mass of red lines in and about NYC (if you could know when you were going to die would you want to?).  My incipient travelers paranoia was fed by the egregiously slow trip through the Lincoln tunnel and into mid-town breathing the fumes of 10,000 buses  Before really deciding if we were going to take the bus to JFK or a cab to Penn Station to the LIRR and then to the air train, we stumbled upon the bus stop, purchased tickets and were in a flash crawling across Manhattan.  We navigated check-in, security and boarding without incident except for the seriously over priced dinner in the airport (seriously 20 bucks for a glass of wine?).  The trip to Paris was also uneventful and Beth had bribed the airline to assign us bulk-head seats which allowed us poor coach passengers more knee room than we deserved.  When I say the flight was uneventful I mean uneventful the way I imagine purgatory to be.  Endlessly uneventful and uncomfortable enough so that there is only an illusion of sleep.  Eight hours of waking up stiff and drooling to see that 7 minutes has passed.  I spent my time well and completely figured out our passage from Orly airport to our apartment in Paris.  Deplaning in Orly we once again met no resistance and were whisked through customs and burped out into the airport where we expertly followed the signs to the tram which would take us to the train which would take us to the subway where after two transfers would take us to within 10 blocks of our new home.  Despite all my preparedness, when confronted with the french guy behind the ticket counter I stumbled.  My cool cat cover was broken for sure when he told me, with total kindness and sincerity, calm down, take your time, you sir are on vacation and I will help vous.  Apparently the French give no credence at all to the Americans with Disability Act because for the next hour we carried our 2,000 pound suit cases up and down at least half a dozen long stairways.  We? Well actually I carried both.  Heroic as Beth really is, carrying her luggage up stairs could seriously injure her so I carried both.  The dried, travel infused grime that crusted my body bloomed with a new out poring of sweat.  Our first truly foreign experience was on the subway when a severely crippled and impoverished old gypsy woman burst into a melancholy beggar's song.  I did what all the other cool French people on board did and ignored her but not without paying a karmic price.  We found the address of our apartment but it was not really apparent which door was ours or how we would exactly get in.  We milled about a bit, standing out to the Parisians I am sure,  when a man appeared introduced us as our host and escorted us up four flights of stairs (yes 4) with our 2,000 pound suitcases.  The apartment was fine, just a shade below our expectations, we showered and realized that if we could stay awake for 5 more hours we could go to bed a 8PM French time and have a chance of getting back on a normal schedule.  We had a nice late lunch, walked around a bit, bought a bottle of wine and some groceries and went home.  By this time sleep deprivation and a day of travel had fried my brain making me exhausted and yet agitated.  What the hell were we doing!  We've been gone one day and I am ready to go home!  Why did I think traveling was going to be fun?  With these cozy thoughts I lay down in bed and realized that that hip bar down on street level really did not get going until after 11PM.  Falling in and out of sleep to the surrealistic sounds of intense drunken French revelry punctuated by the frequent screams of motorcycles revving off, a strange and yet comforting peace washed over me.  I was here now.  I could no longer assign the bipolar swings of my mood to externalities.  I am stripped away of excuses and pretense, naked to myself.  I am back in school and I am excited again.

Well we are in our final hours- leaving at noon.  The last few weeks have been pretty much non-stop work.  As the time danced by my to-do list became shorter and shorter with all but the most mundane items (make sure the stove is off, lock the door) completed by 4:30pm yesterday.  It always amazes me how things fit into the space intended for them like pork chops in a pan.  We are both in good health and excited.  We have purged ourselves of clutter literally filling a 20 yard dumpster, and this ritualistic cleansing has led to simplicity of mind that I have not felt for years.  So even before we leave we have reaped advantages.  Beth is having a much harder time with goodbyes becoming weepy several times a day especially when she talks to one of the boys.  It’s a good kind of weepiness though and I am sure she is just as excited as I am.  Me I am not having trouble saying goodbye.  I feel like a young man heading to sea for the first time; the wonder ahead by far eclipsing any doubt or remorse.  Besides it’s hard to miss someone who you are standing next to.  Maybe in a few months I will start missing people but for now it’s all positive and I can’t wait to see nothing but the North Atlantic below me. 

We are leaving in less than a month and I can feel time accelerating like a tachycardia.  The past few weeks have been jammed with work and planning.  Not planning for the trip but planning for my absence.  I am living a list driven, hyper-alert life trying to put as many mechanisms and safe guards in place as may be needed.  Let’s say our home burns down while we are gone.  What would we miss most?  Should I put the family photo albums in safe storage?  Is my will up to date and could my sons sort out the mess I would leave?  Beth has arranged for emergency medical evacuation from anywhere in the world.  What if she is stricken and cannot communicate? I’d better get the name of the insurer and the policy number (make a note).   The stock market has been suspiciously good these past five years and undoubtedly will “correct” when I am in the mountains of St Lanka without access to the internet.  Should I sell now?  Hedge?   Oy!  The irony here is that all this high gain planning is prelude to what I imagine will be a deafening crash of quietude.  I envision myself getting settled in our Paris apartment, where we are starting off, going for a walk, coming back to the apartment and thinking “now what do I do?”  Our nightly TV ritual will no longer be in play making the expanse of time even greater.  Alone, me myself I (and Beth).  No lists to distract us.  Only our minds parsing the slow passage of time.