The orange heroine rain cape

In preparation to hike and bike El Camino, the 500 and so miles across the North of Spain, I went on a search for the best possible rain cape. We – my pilgrim buddy Susie Q and myself – were told that in the region of Galicia and its mountains, there might be lots of […]

A biker’s version of a Swiss-Army tool.

I have chosen – so far – not to be a handy-woman in terms of fixing mechanical bike problems. I will get there sometime before I get too old and can’t ride. Oh no! Life without riding…! Anyway… I know how to change my tires if they get flat or re-attach the chain if it […]

Aerial wheels or how the bicycle got infused with Spirit.

A true gratitude feeling must be shaped like a wheel: the circle pattern never ends, it keeps turning and turning, coiling and coiling into its very infinite center. I have woken up today grateful to the brilliant inventor of the pneumatic tire: Robert William Thomson. The term “Pneuma” meant for the ancient Greeks what for […]

Mama hiker finds a gem backpack.

My baby girl has just turned 10 months old! The journey of being a mama has been life affirming and beyond transformative…and along the way I have been, gently and as much as possible, choosing to remain in touch with myself and those things I have always loved to do-hiking and biking- something that it […]

Lesson 4: The importance of being goofy

Triggers: Every hard, unexpected, serious curve that Life throws at you. My dear sister in law crossed to the other dimension last year. Being goofy was one of her ways to be in the world. I believe it helped her to cope with a loaded trauma from her childhood. It was mesmerizing and refreshing […]

Lesson 3: Finding your own pace

Trigger: everyone passes you. If you think about it, Life is that ever present stage where we get to practice the act of “living”. Therefore, the nuances that you learn in a certain pose in Yoga, for example, are completely practical and relevant in your work space or with your friends, lover, etc. I […]

Lesson 2: I can

Trigger: stubborn pain The Pyrenean, a range of mountains older than the Alps, form a natural boundary between France and Spain. As the story goes, there was a time that a princess named Pyrene was raped by a drunk, full of lust, Hercules. She became overwhelmed with shame and escaped to the mountains where she […]

Lessons from “El Camino”

Albergues (hostels) would become the hot spaces where we would test our compassion, patience, tolerance and creative capacities.

Epilogue or Foreword?

When does a pilgrimage really start and end?

An army of women…

An army of women is walking the long route of El Camino. They walk and walk, sing, spend time with the animals inhabiting the passing lands, they rest under trees, they bond with other women. They tend their blisters and pains, pray, eat, drink wine, celebrate, cry. Some snore, some sleep in deep silence. It […]