Why this Travel Blog ?

Following a change of circumstance in my life, I have decided to go and travel for a year or two on different continents. Something many of us dream about during our active life but seldom have the opportunity or will to realise when engaging in the last straight.

For the last 10 years or so, whilst pursuing a profession I rather enjoyed, my mind was mostly meandering. Trying to peer into the future, often lingering nostalgically in the past, only occasionally living and enjoying the present. I was in a state of wavering awareness, at times mixed with mild anxiousness. Frequently preferring abstract thought to spontaneous expression. Preferring the upper reaches of the spectator’s gallery to the lower arena where you risk getting exposed. Typically struggling to gain perspective, without realising that to achieve one, you first need to stand firmly on the ground, as it is only from there you can gain one.

Then, on a certain winter evening in early 2021, the love of my life, my soul partner for over 50 years, collapsed there and then, struck by an irredeemable brain haemorrhage. For her, an immediate slip into unconsciousness, soon followed by death. Brutal but painless. For me, a thunderclap moment, a bolt out of the blue, when the present slaps you in the face while you stare at the slack face of the grim reaper taking your loved one away. And the dizzying descent into grieving.

Two years later, I have finally emerged from the tunnel of grief. I am now wide awake, dealing only with what matters most to me at this present time of my life.

I sold the family house, left the capital and bought a cottage on the south coast of England. I packed my travelling bag, pushed by a strong sense of having to keep going if I wanted to fully connect with my new circumstances.

There is an African proverb that says, “to get lost is to learn the way”. Coupled with the Italian proverb “Solvitur ambulado” (the solution comes while walking) that I live by, these two sayings seem to define my new register. That and sticking to the present tense: I am, you are, he/she is. Forget the past and the future for a moment, just stick to the present. What is is, accept things as they are rather than as you would like them to be, and just keep moving.

After I started travelling, I thought about setting up a blog. This is it. To share my impressions, reproduce pictures, record my thoughts and feelings as I go from place to place and country to country. And note what emerges as I come into my new own.