Posts Tagged With: blogging

Carryoncouple climbs to a new peak


A view from our trek on the Way of St. Francis in Italy.

As the 21st century began its last year as a teenager, carryoncouple turned seven in record-setting fashion.

Our travel blog collected 8,758 views from 3,654 visitors in 2018, both eclipsing our previous record of 5,232 views by 1,561 visitors in 2013, the year we walked the Camino de Santiago.

People stopping by our blog represented 75 countries, led by the USA with 5,813 views. Canada was in second place for much of the year, but lost the No.2 title to the United Kingdom, which had 486 views, topping Canada by nine views.

Our 2012 post from Italy–Basilica Honors San Zeno–mysteriously continued to attract attention, with 91 views, but lost its 2017 top post title to another surprising choice, Coming Soon to Amazon. Was it the “coming soon” or just the word “Amazon” that attracted the clicks? Or Sue’s book cover? We remain puzzled by the record-setting (for us) 564 views of the post from many countries.

Although our numbers are humble by WordPress standards, we remain thankful to our blog followers and viewers. We hope to keep the interest going through several adventures in 2019, including another one with backpacks, to be announced.

Our favorite trip of 2018? That’s easy; see Sue’s slideshow by clicking here.


Categories: Reflections, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

2018 is a record year for Carryoncouple

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Carryoncouple thanks you for helping our blog travel to new territory in 2018. Our site has recorded nearly 5,300 views this year, surpassing our record from 2013, when we walked the Camino de Santiago. Your interest in our Way of St. Francis trek this spring exceeded all our other trips, including 181 in one day.

Since our kickoff in 2012, carryoncouple.com has recorded more than 25,000 views in 119 countries, led by the USA, the UK, Canada, Australia and Italy. We await someone in Antarctica to extend our reach to every continent.

What is our most popular post? It comes from our 2012 visit to Verona, Italy. Pictured above, our post about the Basilica di San Zeno still attracts views and has been seen nearly 700 times.

Here’s to Word Press, to nearly 400 followers, and to many more adventures!

 

 

Categories: Camino de Santiago, Inspiration, Reflections, The Way of St Francis | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 13 Comments

The Way of St. Francis: Tuscan beauty

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Our steps took us along several large Tuscan villas Sunday. Sue liked this one best. Plenty of room for family and friends, plus a place she could play tennis!

This is a quiet trail (we saw just five trekkers Sunday), but there is obviously interest in the Way of St. Francis, based on the record numbers (from many nations) viewing our posts. Will this be the Camino de Santiago of the future? If you have questions, feel free to ask through the comments at the bottom of the page. If you click the box to see future comments, you should get our reply. You can also view comments by clicking on the prompt on the website.

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Categories: The Way of Saint Francis, The Way of St Francis | Tags: , , , , | 7 Comments

Backroads Across America: Hello Ol’ Man River

Two traveling days have taken us from the Texas Hill Country to the banks of the Mississippi River, just across from Natchez, Mississippi.

We have ambled along backroads lined with lush green grass, forests (even some pines) and rainbows of wildflowers. The beauty of the Hill Country continued through most of eastern Texas. Today, in Louisiana, it was more of the same colors without the hills.

We missed the picnic areas and rest stops of Texas today and settled for lunch in the trailer parked at a gas station. We passed no picnic or rest areas across Louisiana.

This is our third straight RV park next to water. In the Hill Country, it was the Guadalupe River.  Sue found a fantastic spot last night on Lake Livingston in eastern Texas. We walked along a wonderful path next to the Mississippi tonight after dinner.

Quite a river, indeed. I think we’ll settle here for a spell.

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Categories: Backroads Across America | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | 12 Comments

Backroads Across America: Thinking Small in Texas

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Small-town Texas was on display today as we drove southeast to the Hill Country, where we are staying for a few days at the By the River RV park in Kerrville.  Our site is on the Guadalupe River and spring green is the color of the month. What a view for happy hour! It is quite a change from the stark desert scenery of western Texas and much of our journey through Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico.

Brady, the geographical center of the Lone Star state, and Mason were welcome chances to walk and soak up the atmosphere.

Categories: Backroads Across America | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments

Travel theme: Work

A fascinating part of travel is the opportunity to see work in other cultures. Here are some people in various countries we have visited as they toil, often in the service of tourists. The theme for this post was suggested by wheresmybackpack.com, a blog we follow.

Sue found an accordionist in Rome and was enchanted by a piper at Glen Coe in the Scottish Highlands.

A calligrapher paints our name in Shanghai, China. A woman on the Li River in southwest China brings our tour boat fresh food for lunch.

Men in Spain operate a transplanter next to the Camino de Santiago during our trek last spring.

 

 

 

Categories: Reflections | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Blogging Is the Way to Go!

We visited Riomaggiore today, part of Cinque Terre on the northwest coast of Italy bordering the Ligurian Sea.

Our current trip to Italy seemed like the perfect time to start blogging, and we nervously put our toes in the water. We thought it would allow us to catalog our retirement travels and allow interested family and friends to follow along. Word Press offers several options and we decided for a public blog and were a bit nervous about how our posts would be received.

After about a month, we enjoy blogging and it has enriched our trip in surprising ways. We have “met” people from the United States, Israel, the United Kingdom, Australia, Malaysia, Cambodia, Greece, Italy, the Czech Republic, Netherlands, and Canada who have visited our blog. Many of them sent comments or “likes.”

They may disagree, but, in a way, we feel like our friends back home in California and in our second home in Scotland are traveling with us.

Retirement is opening a new world to us, and so is blogging!

 

Categories: Italy | Tags: , , , , | 9 Comments

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