When pilgrims and townsfolk ask me why I'm here, volunteering as an innkeeper on the Camino de Santiago, I make something up. Anything. I got a severence package from a downsizing accounting firm. I was in Sweden doing lights for concerts the past 18 months. I have stock. There has to be a story,...

I'm in the market for steamer trunks. Maybe two or three or more, big ones, so all my stuff can fit. And once it's boxed sturdily, you can always find a way or a broke pick-up owner to move it. Lots of cardboard boxes is awkward. My clothes are nice in the trunks I have. The two blue trunks....

After trying to best the Camino, I went on autopilot: sock wash, shower, footcare, email. Getting weaker. On a stomach that had seen a day of only fruits and sweets, I went to bed. Crashed. Flies attacked my face. Hot. Bundled into my sleeping bag to dodge the flies. Zipped it up, hood on. Stopped the...

Elia from France looks like he could be 20 or 50. A boyish face with messy hair, bright patient eyes and smile creases all over. I guessed 26. He said his oldest daughter is 13 and I guessed 38, correctly. He started walking the Camino in Le Puy, has been to Santiago, and is on his way back to Le...

We arranged two long tables and the forty or so of us sat down, unaware of the hospitalero’s plans to demolish our hunger.

First, a mini-paella with oysters and shellfish. I cracked a shell to shards in my pilgrim frenzy but my teeth remained intact. The hospitalero filled my bowl a second time.

Driving over the Kingston-Rhinecliff bridge tonight with a torched orange sky popping the Hudson into a genie blue, I thought, Wow, this is a ridiculous part of the world.

1. Beberana Carta de Oro, Etiqueta Negra, on sale at 4.62€ from 8.75€

            Meaty aftertaste, which could have been the dirty glass. Smooth and non-offensive, it stays out of your way like a frightened intern.  8.6/10

I'm getting homesick for travel, for places to shine despite their normality. Buying groceries in a May Berlin drizzle, knowing the next few days will also be cold and wet. Homesick for the apartment we always went in and out of in the rain, and how that added to its value. How it only had a paper...

Bridges put boats out of business.