Meandering to Jerusalem
Nov 2010 25
Petra’s leg in progressing. She walks with one crutch most of the time now and with no crutch at all some of the time. We are walking two to three kilometers (1.4 to 2 miles) a day. The other day she walked almost four kilometers. Tomorrow she has an X-ray and checkup at the hospital [...] [...more]
Petra’s leg in progressing. She walks with one crutch most of the time now and with no crutch at all some of the time. We are walking two to three kilometers (1.4 to 2 miles) a day. The other day she walked almost four kilometers. Tomorrow she has an X-ray and checkup at the hospital in Genoa.
We have just now planned far more ahead of ourselves than we have for the almost two years we have been on the road. We have booked the next two weeks on Ischia Island near Naples. Petra will be able to take advantage of the hot springs there to strengthen up her leg. And I’ll be able to lie in the same waters to relax and get some of the kinks out of myself.
Then on 14 December we fly to Cairo to join a tour of Cairo and the Holy Land following the steps of the ancient Hebrews out of Egypt to Mt Sinai then to the rock city of Petra in Jordan and on into Israel. We will finally arrive in Jerusalem on 23 December and be in Bethlehem on Christmas day. We will have arrived at the goal of all our walking. We want to close this pilgrimage before returning to the States. This is a wonderful way to do it. I’m excited. We’re excited.
With Petra’s broken leg our life is heading in a different direction. This is one of the most important happenings of the pilgrimage. The broken leg ends our first seven years together when we walked a lot. Now we begin the next segment, a more sedentary segment. We will return to the States and do things in a very different way. We don’t even know what that is yet. But we will find out in due time.
This change is very personal. It is not the social interaction we have had with so many along the paths we have followed. It rather signals a change in the way we do things. It is seeing the Universe tell us it is time to take off our walking shoes and find a place to stay longer.
Comments: 3.
Nov 2010 19
We are in Sestri Levante south of Genova staying at a retreat house/convent. We have been here since last Sunday. Petra in recovering quite quickly and I am learning to walk slowly again. She has been on only one crutch for a few days now. Today she walked better than 3 kilometers (2 miles). Her [...] [...more]
We are in Sestri Levante south of Genova staying at a retreat house/convent. We have been here since last Sunday. Petra in recovering quite quickly and I am learning to walk slowly again. She has been on only one crutch for a few days now. Today she walked better than 3 kilometers (2 miles). Her next checkup is next friday when the doctor wants to see her with no crutches. Last Friday he told her “Walk. walk, walk.”
Comments: 3.
Nov 2010 09
Hello to you all. I’m back on the desk also. Thank you so much for all the thougts, prayers, comments, emails, telephone calls, and…. It’s getting better every day and I am suprised how good I am doing now. The heavy beginning pain is over, but sometimes I can not believe this happened because when [...] [...more]
Hello to you all. I’m back on the desk also. Thank you so much for all the thougts, prayers, comments, emails, telephone calls, and…. It’s getting better every day and I am suprised how good I am doing now. The heavy beginning pain is over, but sometimes I can not believe this happened because when I look back I see myself walking, walking, and walking. And now I am stopped. Walking and enyoing was the main thing I was doing. Now the main thing I am doing is resting, healing, and enyoing being togehter with Mike. To be together, hold hands, and love each othter more than before. We have a totally different life together and this is a great gift. In every situation a great gift is included. The only thing you have to do is accept that nothing will be like before and not let the pain get into the way of seeing the gift, the diamond, in the misfortune. This is my experience in life. Like when a baby is born there is so much birth pain but afterworths you experience the greatest joy.
Have a great day with a many loving moments.
Petra
Comments: 2.
Nov 2010 06
Two evenings ago Petra left the hospital, five days after her operation. She is doing well, walking on her crutches a little more each day here in the room and in the hotel. She tires easily and bumps the leg once in a while. But she is in fine spirits. We are beginning our [...] [...more]
Two evenings ago Petra left the hospital, five days after her operation. She is doing well, walking on her crutches a little more each day here in the room and in the hotel. She tires easily and bumps the leg once in a while. But she is in fine spirits.
We are beginning our third night in a hotel in Genoa. Yesteday the hotel upgraded us to a room with extra sitting room when the one we were in wasn’t all we needed. And there’s a solarium on the roof to drink in the sun, something we can still do on the Mediterranean where the temps remain in the mid-60s (around 20C).
We’ll stay here at least till next Friday when Petra has a checkup visit with the doctors who operated on her.
I made a venture into the city yesterday to find a coin laundromat. Most hotels in Europe have no washing machines. It can be hard to find one sometime. Yesterday was one of those days. I had to take a long city bus ride followed by a long walk to the one I finally located and then it turned out I had to leave the clothes anyway and make another trip today. Another day in the life of a nomad pilgrim.
Thanks for all your good wishes.
Comments: 3.
Nov 2010 03
Petra got her crutches yesterday and immediately used them to go the bathroom. Today she got up to wash and we’ll likely be walking together outside in a couple hours. She is in fine spirits. Thanks to all for your prayers, good wishes, and comments. [...more]
Petra got her crutches yesterday and immediately used them to go the bathroom. Today she got up to wash and we’ll likely be walking together outside in a couple hours. She is in fine spirits. Thanks to all for your prayers, good wishes, and comments.
Comments: 2.
Oct 2010 31
Petra continues to recover. Neither of her joints, the ankle or the knee, were hurt. She can move both well, though not completely. She exercises the joints often. Two bandages cover the surgery sites and she has much less pain. She continually compares the process this time to that of 13 years ago when [...] [...more]
Petra continues to recover. Neither of her joints, the ankle or the knee, were hurt. She can move both well, though not completely. She exercises the joints often. Two bandages cover the surgery sites and she has much less pain.
She continually compares the process this time to that of 13 years ago when she broke her other leg. The procedures have improved a lot in the intervening years. I think it helps that St. Martino Hospital where she is here in Genoa is a university teaching hospital. They try new things more quickly in a place like this, I think.
Petra says, “I’ll now have an Austrian leg and an Italian leg and I have never been in a German Hospital.” The other leg was operated on in Austria.
Now that the initial shock is over, it is clear that it was a bit premature to pronounce the pilgrimage over the other day. We clearly cannot walk to Jerusalem now. But we do really want to arrive there. We can go by plane or boat instead. We’ll need our cart back, or another one, for me to push the baggage. Petra has enough to do to manage herself with crutches.
But before moving forward Petra’s leg has recover a while, likely somewhere here in Italy. It’s not time to go back to the US yet.
This is a wilder meander than we were planning on when we said we were going to meander this half of the pilgrimage.
So don’t stop checking in on this site now and then. And though plans will change again and again, there is more to come…much more.
Comments: 5.
Oct 2010 29
They put a pin in Petra’s leg this morning. She is hurting but doing well. Now it is time for her body to heal. [...more]
They put a pin in Petra’s leg this morning. She is hurting but doing well. Now it is time for her body to heal.
Comments: 0.
Oct 2010 28
The pilgrimage is over. Yesterday afternoon in the mountains south of Sestri-Liguri, Petra slipped on loose dirt along a narrow path and fell and broke her left leg. We were quite remote. She was helicoptered out to St. Martin’s hospital in Genova-Nervi. She is in full command of everything except her leg, which is saying, [...] [...more]
The pilgrimage is over. Yesterday afternoon in the mountains south of Sestri-Liguri, Petra slipped on loose dirt along a narrow path and fell and broke her left leg. We were quite remote. She was helicoptered out to St. Martin’s hospital in Genova-Nervi. She is in full command of everything except her leg, which is saying, “You cannot move.” And she cannot.
Both lower bones are broken, the larger has a heavy spiral break. They will operate tomorrow morning to put it together and place a pin in the larger bone. This is the second break for Petra. She broke the other leg 13 years ago and went through a similar procedure to repair it then.
After initial recovery for a couple months or more here somewhere, we will be returning to the U.S. and looking for a more permanent place for extended recovery. If anyone out there has a place or knows of a place for us, we would appreciate any help you can give us. We are leaning towards the southwest or west where it is warmer and dryer for a winter recovery. But we are open for suggestions at this point.
As Petra said last night, “this is a brutal way to end our pilgrimage.” But it is done, for now anyway. So thanks for following us. I will follow up here for a while to let you know our progress along this new path.
Comments: 7.
Oct 2010 24
Last night we came out of the mountains back down to the sea. We spent three days walking paths between 500 and 1,200 meters (1,600 and 4,000 feet). As you can imagine with those numbers, there was a lot of up and down. The first day was a long up followed by several long ups [...] [...more]
Last night we came out of the mountains back down to the sea. We spent three days walking paths between 500 and 1,200 meters (1,600 and 4,000 feet). As you can imagine with those numbers, there was a lot of up and down. The first day was a long up followed by several long ups and downs ending in one treacherous and long descent back down to around 500 meters (1,600 feet). It was so steep that we had to hold onto trees to keep from slipping down the muddy, rooty path. It was work.
We ended that day in a large, old hotel (Alberge Liguri), the only place we knew of in the village. (We found another the next morning, but it wasn’t a match for the one we were in-we made a good choice without knowing it.) We were only five people in the Liguri. But the restaurant made us a fine dinner all the same.
The next day was the work day, more than 800 meters (2,600 feet) up and up and up. The path was often full of rocks washed free by water coming down the same paths we were walking. The paths were once stone paved roads but long since eroded to stone stairways up the mountain side. We had little we could do except concentrate on the next step, let alone steps. It was another work day. We saw little except rocks, mud walls, and trees. And on top we came to a forest of microwave relay towers surrounding the place we wanted to stay. We refused and walked another few kilometers to another refugio where we had a cool night with a warm-hearted young family trying to make an ill-kept-up place into a nice place of rest. We enjoyed our night.
Yesterday could have offered spectacular views because the trees were gone and the road was much easier to walk. But as in other times of life, fog closed in and we were only offered glimpses of the mountains and Mediterranean far below. Only later in the day could we finally see some of those far views.
When we arrived at our chosen alberge for the evening, there were no rooms. The rooms were closed for the season. But the owner gave us a ride down to the next town. And what a ride. The mountains plunged from the road to the sea. He said that this place is the most steep and high descent in all of Italy.
Failing to find a place to stay on the mountains, we caught a quick bus ride down those mountain to the outskirts of Genova (Genoa) and eventually found a hotel for the night.
Today we walk Genova along the sea.
Comments: 0.
Oct 2010 21
This morning we begin walking on the Alta Via di Liguri, a long path through the mountains that parallels the arc of the Italian coast from Ventimigli to La Specia. We have walked the coast a week and now we will go the same in the mountains. We took a bus up from Savona last [...] [...more]
This morning we begin walking on the Alta Via di Liguri, a long path through the mountains that parallels the arc of the Italian coast from Ventimigli to La Specia. We have walked the coast a week and now we will go the same in the mountains. We took a bus up from Savona last night to Altare where we will catch the path.
Check out the path at Alta Via dei Monte Liguri. Use Google to translate it if you cannot understand Italian at all. But the maps can give you an idea without knowing Italian.
Off to the mountains.
Comments: 0.