A most unusual day indeed!After a grueling trekking day of steep, slippery ups and downs punctuated by more than 1,370 stairs, we found our accommodation in Clovelly after a walk down a cobblestone way too steep for vehicles.
How do they get supplies to the pub where we are about to have dinner? They slide them on sledges. And the bottles of Southern Comfort I am sipping? Same way.
Now, the question of the day: How will we make it back up in the morning with our backpacks?
Sue climbs a flight of the 30,000 stairs on England’s South West Coast Path. No, I did not add a zero. But I am adding as we walk. So far, 2,159 stairs in five days, 64 miles, and 13,200 feet of ascent.
But this is not a story best told by the numbers.
Looking for a path away from the post-Super Bowl blues? Check out our short slide show from the Tour du Mont Blanc.
Director/producer Lydia B. Smith invited us to Portland last week to help celebrate her documentary’s nationwide PBS broadcasts.
Lydia, joined by volunteers and a small core staff, worked more than nine years to film, edit and promote “Walking the Camino: Six Ways to Santiago.” The film follows an international cast of pilgrims aged 21 to 62 on their journey across northern Spain. We first saw the film in 2014, soon after its release, and have streamed it many times since. It continues to inspire us to keep on trekking.
You can see the full-length documentary (it was shortened for the PBS showings) at caminodocumentary.org.
Congratulations to Lydia and to all who worked on the wonderful documentary!
Runner-up:
Walk with Reg and Sue in Spain as you watch our short slide show with brief excerpts from Camino Sunrise: Walking With My Shadows.
Click here to see Sue’s pictorial journey.
Click here to travel to Amazon, where you can buy the ebook or Paperback. Your review, even if it is very brief, will help Reg as a new author trying to stand out among an avalanche of writers on Amazon.
When I took my first steps on the Camino de Santiago, I never could have imagined where the famed pilgrimage would lead me.
When I sat at my MacBook Air a year and a half ago to chronicle my journey in Spain, my words had an unknown destination.
Little did I know that the trek would take me back to my troubled childhood and lead to real dangers on the path, as my wife Sue’s illustrations show, above. Her ink-and-watercolor works grace each chapter.
Less than two weeks after publication of Camino Sunrise: Walking With My Shadows, my first book, readers have kindly shared where my words have taken them.
“Reading this book reinforced my own interest in “minimalism” and renewed my desire for peace in my own life,” one wrote. “As Reg bares his soul, you can’t help but reflect on what is important in life…just read it.”
Another shared his thoughts: “What an adventure! I was traveling every step of the way with you and feeling every bit of it.”
A third reader shared this: “So well described that I feel like I was there and that the connections you made along the way are my friends too.”
My story features humor, tragedy, triumphs, and hardships through a cast of characters that I call my Camino family. I describe real events and how the Camino stripped away the unimportant and exposed the best in life.
Click here to go to Amazon. I would love to hear from you after you read my book and ask that you consider reviewing Camino Sunrise on Amazon.
Thank you,
Reg
Greetings!
I am excited to announce that Camino Sunrise: Walking With My Shadows is now available on Amazon.
I hope you will read my book. I have been told that reviews—even brief ones–can place a book on the radar of more potential readers. If you choose the paperback edition, Sue’s illustrations will be in black and white. They are in color on the Kindle app if you have a color device.
If you are inclined to share this note with enough other people, Oprah is ready to add Camino Sunrise to her book club list. I should attach a “Ha!” to that, I suppose.
Camino Sunrise: Walking With My Shadows
By Reginald Spittle
Cover and illustrations by Susan Spittle
“Loved this inspiring and bravely honest book by a fellow pilgrim. The story of Reg’s journey inward while walking with his wife, Sue, on the Camino de Santiago, was a joy to read. Highly recommend!” –Judy
Click on book cover
Click on photo
Click on photo
