This Makes No Sense At All

You may have wondered about my blog name "This Makes No Sense At All". It came about because one of the things we have always loved about hiking is the consistently wonderful community of hikers, when we meet them on the trail. No matter what their circumstances in the real world, on the trail they are without exception, friendly and go out of their way to be helpful. When we got more interested in long distance hiking, and I started following the related hiking online forums, I discovered that this spirit prevailed, but that there was also more than expected angry divisive commentary. It was this that made no sense at all. I could not match it with the people I met on the trail. Last fall when we noticed that our sales of Camino Chronicle abruptly dropped by two thirds, we did some checking and saw that a couple had bought a copy from Amazon, and then posted two very negative one star reviews. Since we didn't have a lot of reviews to begin with, that had a drastic...

I consider ourselves chronic walkers, possibly obsessed, but once in a while I run across someone who gives us a reality check. On the bell shaped curve, we are far from the outliers. This morning a Google Alert on Camino de Santiago popped up about our friend and walker, Sue Kenney , so I checked it out. She is picking up some friends in Ontario (Canada) who have walked from Paso Robles, California. I check further. Today's outliers are Peta Wolf and Mike Metras, walking from Paso Robles, California to Jerusalem. In the past they have walked the Camino de Santiago, and from Germany to Rome. Check out their website at https://www.walkingwithawareness.com/ctjwalk.htm

For a music backed overview, check out our YouTube video of the Dourgne to Oloron walk . In spite of the video appearances this was a somewhat difficult and stressful trip for us. Our seventh walk on a pilgrimage trail, we were looking at it as more of a vacation adventure, than as a serious trek. Our plan was 20 to 25k per day and to use B&Bs and hotels when possible, not using scarce pilgrim gite space, leaving that for the pilgrims bound for Santiago de Compostella. I'll give you an overview of the day to day, some planning tips, and then why it wasn't so fine for us, but could be for you. Trip Notes: 1. From Toulouse, got taxi to Gare Routiere got bus to in Revel, the closest point to Dourgne. From there got a taxi to Dourgne. Toulouse bus schedules at www.haute-garonne.fr and the bus lines that go to Revel are 56 and 57. Walked from Dourgne to St. Felix. Stayed at Le Cocagne - no star room, but food and ambiance good. In th...

We were strolling near the cathedral, late at night, when we heard voices singing in the distance. Walking towards the sound, we rounded the corner of the cathedral onto the broad plaza that faces the main entrance with the double staircase. On the far side of the plaza stood a small group of people, watching a group of brightly dressed singers. We crossed over and joined the crowd, watching enthralled for thirty minutes or so, capturing a moment on video. Hit play symbol below image to hear. Wait, there's more. After we got one of their cds, and crossed the plaza once more to get back to our lodging, we met a solitary man on the other side of the plaza from the singers, but dressed in the same colorful outfit, and with an arm full of records, cds and books. We told him we had already had a cd, but he went on to explain that the group we heard were fakes - just professional musicians, not the authentic musicians that he represented. His group only played in the wint...