Backpacks And A Wine Key

Wandering winos on a pilgrimage to nowhere searching for a glass that is more than half full.

Stories

Travel, food and wine, life, health, and the occasional sermon on perspective. Here is the latest – read the rest here.

The Latest

Pilgrim Journal – Chamonix

Well, we are on our way. The road to Rome has officially - unofficially started in Chamonix, France. Why Chamonix? Well, we are starting our official Via Francigena pilgrim walk in Lausanne, Switzerland, and we didn’t want to take the trip from Spain to Lausanne all...

Walking Notes – Losing track of everything I think is true

A stream of consciousness project of turning on the speech-to-text feature on my phone and having it record whatever I say as I take my morning walk – with very little editing and even less proper punctuation.

Leaving 55 in 2020

2020 will probably be one of the, if not the, most significant years of my life. This was the year I had been waiting for; the year I was planning to retire.  What a year it’s been.  2020 kicked off with me suffering from and recovering from a pretty severe...

No substitutions, please.

Hi.  Yes, I’m ready to order.  I’d like your double-cut pork chop with apple sauce, but instead of the braised cabbage, I’d like steamed broccoli.  And, rather than the shredded potatoes, may I have a house salad with ranch dressing on the side?...

Airport executive clubs are the worst

I guess I just don't get it. Why is access to airport executive clubs so coveted, everyone think they are so great, and rush to them the second they arrive at the airport? You see them sneaking in with their black carry-on bags and laptop messengers, flashing their...

Pilgrim Life – Are we conditioned to pick the easy path

I want to be a person that, for no reason at all, will sometimes take the harder path without there needing to be a benefit. I want to seek the longer path. But, what’s maybe more important is I want to consciously brake the conditioning that makes me always take the easier way, the path of least resistance, simply by default. I want to think about it. I want to at least consider taking the harder path sometimes without it feeling like I’m breaking some hard wired rule.

The Theory Of The Witness Wine

When my mother told me I would have to use math when I grew up, this is exactly what I was hoping she meant. The Math: A normal wine bottle contains 750ml of wine, or a little over 25 ounces. Our extraordinary math skills tell us that is equal to five glasses of wine,...

How To Wine and Cheese

The best way to demonstrate the beauty of wine and cheese is to invite some friends and throw a wine-and-cheese tasting. Now, most people do this all backwards. They read about mixing cheeses from cows, sheep and goats and adding a selection that ranges from soft to hard, new world to old and fresh to aged.

Wino Journal

Stories, logs, and blogs on moving on from a life of work and routine.

Notes On The Feeling Of Freedom

Notes On The Feeling Of Freedom

When I was 18, I left the house to go to college. I took with me all I owned, a duffel bag full of clothes, a guitar, and my bed to set up in my first apartment. For the next few years I lived in the moment. Now I’m over 50, done working, and have spent the last year roaming the world. I’ve gone from having nothing to having everything, and then intentionally back to nothing again.

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Adventure

Stories, logs, and blogs on our pilgrim journeys as we grab our backpacks (and a wine key) and walk through Italy, Scotland, Spain, and the great wine regions of the world – including New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, and Argentina, to name a few.

Urban Food Adventure London

Urban Food Adventure London

It’s been over 20 years since we strolled through London. First time was for touristy stuff, this time…pretty much just to eat. How priorities change over the years.

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Paris Café Culture

Paris Café Culture

A not-so wise man once said, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop to look around for a while, you could miss it.” Nowhere is that advice more needed than here in America. Nowhere is that advice more honored than in Paris. Paris is a busy, bustling city of over...

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Finally a real wine rating system

Finally a real wine rating system

The thing I hate most about wine ratings is the thing that makes them what they are. Wine ratings are subjective. They are one person’s judgement of quality and don’t take into account what really matters – how much you drink, what you can afford, when to drink them,...

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