Posts

Posted on

Shah Jahan’s Other Masterpiece – Thatta, Pakistan

Mosque courtyard

Arguably the most exquisite example of Mughal architecture is the magnificent Taj Mahal in India, built by emperor Shah Jahan in the 17th Century. What few visitors to South Asia may know is that there are lesser known examples of his building legacy in Pakistan; among them a lovely mosque in Thatta, the ancient capital of Sindh that is also the site of one of the world’s largest examples of a necropolis, a “city of the dead”. That makes Thatta a tantalizing option for exploring off the tourist trail.

Continue reading “Shah Jahan’s Other Masterpiece – Thatta, Pakistan”

Posted on

A “Camino San Esteban” – Spain, 2025

Iglesia San Esteban

After walking across the Pyrenees from France into Spain, my plan was to continue along the thousand-year-old “Way of Saint James” as far as Pamplona. There I’d declare an end to my brief pilgrimage and catch a train for Madrid and a flight home. But what I love about the Camino de Santiago is its way of tweaking the simplest of plans, suggesting life lessons to the pilgrim with a receptive mind and heart.

Continue reading “A “Camino San Esteban” – Spain, 2025″

Posted on

A Flâneur on the Way of Saint James – Paris, 2025

Rue Hachette

I love the serendipitous rewards of unstructured travel. If I had any doubts about spending a week in Paris with no plan other than to immerse myself in the local scene, they were dispelled before even checking into a hotel where Ernest Hemingway stayed in the 1930s, conveniently located in the Latin Quarter and one street in from the Seine. An early morning arrival meant a couple of hours to kill before being able to access a room.

Continue reading “A Flâneur on the Way of Saint James – Paris, 2025”

Posted on

Plodding Across the Pyrenees – France to Spain

People on a ridge

Spring is a fine time to walk the “Way of Saint James” from the south of France and across northern Spain to the great cathedral at Santiago de Compostela. It can mean fewer crowds and cooler (if unpredictable) weather. On the other hand, some things are still closed early in the pilgrimage season, not least the challenging but spectacularly scenic option for crossing the Pyrenees.
Nine years ago, when I first walked a Camino to celebrate a 70th birthday in early April, the route was still closed to pilgrims by snow and unpredictable mountain weather. Now in 2025, to celebrate being halfway through my 80th, I was taking advantage of a dry, warm autumn.

Continue reading “Plodding Across the Pyrenees – France to Spain”

Posted on

Naming a Goddess – The many guises of Mount Everest

Everest from Rongbuk

I’m about to take a three-month sabbatical to deal with webmaster matters and do a bit of travelling, but before going offline I need to make a correction. In April, and for that matter whenever I’ve written about visiting the world’s highest mountain, I’ve repeated the common story that the Tibetan and Sherpa name for Mount Everest – Chomolungma – means “Goddess Mother of the Earth”. I’ve now learned that’s not quite true.

Continue reading “Naming a Goddess – The many guises of Mount Everest”

Posted on

The Art of the Kowtow – From Beijing to Washington

Forbidden City

Browsing through photos of a 2007 visit to the vast “Forbidden City” in Beijing got me thinking about how, in imperial China, even the most distinguished foreign visitors to the Emperor were expected to prostrate themselves to acknowledge his supremacy. Imperial officials would ensure that this was done, after which the Emperor would condescend to accept tribute and grant gifts. That got me reflecting on an unrelated event in the US capital a few months ago.

Continue reading “The Art of the Kowtow – From Beijing to Washington”

Posted on

¡No Pasarán! – La Rioja, Spain, 2016

Distant view of Azofra

On a hot mid-morning during a 6-week walk from France to Santiago de Compostela I was grateful to see an enterprising young man selling cold drinks, fruit and souvenirs to pilgrims in the middle of nowhere. His little dog bounded up, wagging its tail and barking so furiously that I couldn’t resist joking “¿No pasarán?” to its owner. He looked startled. “My God” he said, “Do you know what that means?” I did – but not the significance of the day on which I’d said it. Which led to a thought-provoking discussion about the Spanish Civil War, 80 years earlier.

Continue reading “¡No Pasarán! – La Rioja, Spain, 2016”

Posted on

Matters of Age – Tibet, 2019

Everest from the monastery

Tourists are told that Tibet’s Rongbuk (Rongphu) monastery is the highest in the world, but it isn’t. That honour goes to the slightly higher monastery at Dirapuk, facing Mount Kailash far to the west.(*) Nonetheless, at 5,000 metres (16,400 feet) above sea level, Rongbuk is magnificently located on the northern approach to the world’s highest mountain, known in the West as Mount Everest and in Tibet as Qomolongma, “Goddess Mother of the Earth”. A visit can be humbling, in more ways than one.

Continue reading “Matters of Age – Tibet, 2019”

Posted on

Pleasures and Portents – Helsinki, 2015

Helsinki Street

One of many lessons I’ve learned from long-distance travel is to seize any opportunity for stopovers, no matter how brief. They’re a chance for unique mini-adventures, like the 10-hour stop in Jordan and 24-hour stay in Malaysia that I’ve shared previously. Recent events remind me of another stopover, just three months after the trip to Washington described last month – an overnight in Finland’s capital. Ironically, both memories prompt reflections on Friday’s  disgraceful episode in Washington and so (trigger warning) I feel compelled to continue a political theme raised last month.

Continue reading “Pleasures and Portents – Helsinki, 2015”

Posted on

Rome on the Potomac? – Washington, 2015-2025

Lincoln Memorial

A lot has changed since I was last on business in Washington. Its imposing classic architecture and urban landscape had got me imagining what it must have been like to stroll through ancient Rome at the height of its imperial glory. Who would have thought then that the Western world’s mightiest economic and military power was on a path from great republic to imperial oligarchy, and ultimately to inglorious decline and fall? A decade later that’s not so hard to imagine.

Continue reading “Rome on the Potomac? – Washington, 2015-2025”

Posted on

Saladin’s Legacy – Damascus, 2001

Interior of Umayyad Mosque

The leader of Syria’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham rebel movement certainly had history at his back in December when he appeared in the ancient Umayyad Mosque in Damascus to announce the fall of the odious Assad regime. The site had begun as an Aramean temple to the god Hadad, then to Zeus of the Greeks and Jupiter of the Romans, becoming a Christian basilica in the 4th Century and finally, in the 8th, a Muslim mosque. But impressive though it is, my favourite memory of the place is a modest mausoleum tucked outside the northern wall ‒ the tomb of Saladin.

Continue reading “Saladin’s Legacy – Damascus, 2001”

Posted on

An Environmental Morality Tale – Baku, 2007

Baku Pollution

Seen from the walls of a medieval castle the view couldn’t have been more dissonant. As far as the eye could see it was a dystopian, post-apocalyptic landscape of oil-soaked ponds and rusting Soviet-era oil pumps. A low plume of smoke drifting in front of the city skyline marked a huge landfill which had been burning for years.  Many have criticized the choice of Azerbaijan as host for last month’s 29th Conference of Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP29), especially as it was the second “petro-state” in a row to do so. Yet Baku is the birthplace of the modern petroleum industry and its history has environmental lessons to offer.

Continue reading “An Environmental Morality Tale – Baku, 2007”

Posted on

Reflections on Ceasefires – From Ex-Yugoslavia to Gaza

UN and ECMM observers

Each year I take the eleven days between November 1st and Remembrance Day to reflect on the folly of war. This year, talk of ceasefire in the Middle East recalls memories of facilitating one in the Balkans three decades ago. As with most issues of war and peace, especially in places like the Balkans or Middle East, things are rarely simple.

Continue reading “Reflections on Ceasefires – From Ex-Yugoslavia to Gaza”

Posted on

El Camino del Caracol – Spain, 2016

Road on the Meseta

One difference between pilgrimage and a walking adventure is that while everyone may be treading the same physical path, the pilgrim is also on an inner journey: walking mindfully; living simply; accepting rather than avoiding challenges; being open to lessons along the way. On my first Camino de Santiago, walking mindfully along the eight hundred kilometre pilgrim way across Northern Spain, I was reminded that even the simplest of experiences can offer profound life lessons. Like watching a snail cross a road.

Continue reading “El Camino del Caracol – Spain, 2016”

Posted on

An Adriatic Anecdote – Venice, 1994

Piazza San Marco

I can never quite decide whether it’s endearing or annoying when Canadians ”punch above their weight” in world affairs and then passively allow our collective memory to fade away. Case in point: while today’s clash of hard-line ideologues rips lives apart in the Middle East, few people these days remember that that thirty years ago Canadians were assisting Israelis and Arabs from across the Middle East and North Africa to build confidence and cooperation, including at sea among navies, coast guards and, in the case of Palestinians, coastal police.
Continue reading “An Adriatic Anecdote – Venice, 1994”

Posted on

The Bright Side of the Rhodo(dendrons) – Nepal 2024

Rhododendron Trees

And time seems to go by so fast
In the twinkling of an eye
Let’s enjoy it while we can (let’s enjoy it while we can)
To the bright side of the road
(Van Morrison)

I’m a great admirer of professionals who make difficult work look easy – none more so than the guides, cooks and porters who support foreign travellers in the mountains and foothills of Nepal. Mountaineers know this of course: few would reach a Himalayan summit without an extensive local support team behind them. But less recognized – outside Nepal at least – are those who support ordinary trekkers from around the world whose “summit” is not a mountaintop but rather a peak experience; walking spectacular countryside in the company of its tough, resilient, gracious and hospitable people.

Continue reading “The Bright Side of the Rhodo(dendrons) – Nepal 2024”

Posted on

On the road again

Nepali Prayer Wheel

I’m off to Nepal again soon and may take the opportunity to do some site maintenance after I get back, so it may be a couple of months before the next post. Meanwhile, there are sixty-one stories from around the world already here (or, if you’re really bored and desperate for something to read, links here to published work on professional matters).  Otherwise,  I’ll be dusting off the keyboard again some time after returning home.

Namaste
p.s. The picture is of spinning a prayer wheel en route to Mount Everest in 2013

Posted on

Hitching with Truckies – Australia, 1979

Truck lights

“You’ll have no trouble getting a ride out of Sydney mate” I’d been assured. Hitchhiking was common in Australia and lots of people would be driving out of the city for Easter. So, standing on the outskirts of the city I was mystified at the lack of response to a jaunty thumb and cheerful smile. It was getting dark when the driver of a little Mini stopped, rolled down his window cautiously, and asked if I was having trouble getting a ride. And that’s how I learned two murderous rapists had escaped from a ward for the criminally insane, triggering the biggest manhunt in the history of New South Wales. And that the police description of one sounded very much like me. It was promising to be a long night.

Continue reading “Hitching with Truckies – Australia, 1979”

Posted on

Musing on Marxism – Guayaquil, Ecuador, 1989

Crowds in Guayaquil

Ecuador’s seaport of Guayaquil made the news recently when armed youths burst into a television studio during a live broadcast, threatening everyone with pistols, shotguns and dynamite. Looking back on a visit to Guayaquil thirty-five years earlier, I may have some appreciation of motives, although I certainly don’t  condone the crime.

Continue reading “Musing on Marxism – Guayaquil, Ecuador, 1989”

Posted on

Of Kremlins and Camaraderie – Russia, 2005

Astrakhan Kremlin

Mention “the Kremlin” and most of us will picture the brooding fortress-palace in Moscow, and perhaps use it as a shorthand title for authoritarian Russian regimes, from medieval tsars to Vladimir Putin. But although it’s customary to refer to it as “The” Kremlin it is, in fact, just one of about twenty such fortified complexes still standing in Russia – ornate monuments to its vibrant culture and stormy history.

Continue reading “Of Kremlins and Camaraderie – Russia, 2005”

Posted on

An Advent Adventure – South Africa, 2002

South Africa train

Security was a hot topic in December 2002, just over a year after a gang of mostly Saudi suicides had hijacked four American airliners (along with the good name of Allah “the Compassionate, the Merciful”) to murder thousands on 11 September 2001. I’d been invited to give the keynote address to a security panel at the International Ocean Institute’s twenty-ninth Pacem in Maribus conference. It was to be held in Cape Town, but I wasn’t going to travel all the way to South Africa without seeing something of the country. So, I flew to Johannesburg to visit a friend in nearby Pretoria (the nation’s capital), then boarded a train for Cape Town, 1,500 kilometres away.

Continue reading “An Advent Adventure – South Africa, 2002”

Posted on

Child Camel Jockeys – Qatar, 2002

Child Camel Jockeys

Many things will have changed in the Gulf States since I was last there. Happily, one of them is abolition of child slavery associated with the camel-racing industry – one of the richer sports in the world. Twenty years ago, I was appalled to see tiny, skinny boys, some as young as four, who had been trafficked from poor Muslim countries to be exploited as camel jockeys in Qatar. Across the region such kids were being under-fed, educationally deprived, often injured and sometime killed. Now, it seems, innovative application of technology has contributed to much-needed reform. Continue reading “Child Camel Jockeys – Qatar, 2002”

Posted on

A Walk to the End of the Earth – Galicia, 2023

Cape Finisterre

Somehow I had imagined Spain’s Cape Finisterre – “End of the Earth” – to be like a finger of Europe pointing westward toward the open sea. But it isn’t. It’s more like an appendix, hanging “down” from north to south. And that’s part of the magic. The pilgrim who augments their Camino de Santiago (the “Way of Saint James”) by walking an additional 90 kilometres westward eventually turns south toward the point, through the charming little town of Finisterre. To their left is the familiar land from which they have come. Over the hill to the right, the western cliffs plunge precipitously into open ocean and empty horizon. It’s not hard to see why, for millennia, Finisterre was a revered destination in its own right; a threshold between the known and unknown worlds.

Continue reading “A Walk to the End of the Earth – Galicia, 2023”

Posted on

Musical Diplomacy in the Middle East: 1993-1995

Rabin and Arafat shake hands

Thirty years ago this month the world watched as Israel’s Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and the Palestinian Liberation Organization’s Yasser Arafat joined US President Clinton on the White House lawn to sign what became known as the Oslo Accord. Nowhere was that being more closely watched than at the Canadian Coast Guard College, where wary naval, coast guard and other maritime professionals from Israel, the PLO and a number of neighbouring Arab countries were meeting for the first time.

Continue reading “Musical Diplomacy in the Middle East: 1993-1995”

Posted on

Epiphany at a Fire Temple – Baku, Azerbaijan, 2007

Yanar Das natural flames

On Azerbaijan’s Abşeron Peninsula jutting eastward into the Caspian Sea, the ground on a hillside called Yanar Dağ appears to be on fire. At one time that was not uncommon here. Indeed, Azerbaijan may take its name from the words “azer” (fire) and “baydjan” meaning “guardian”. Ancient traders and pilgrims along the Silk Road, including Marco Polo in the 13th Century, marvelled at flames emerging from the ground, and occasionally from water. Strangely enough, there’s even a (very) loose connection to the Christmas story.

Continue reading “Epiphany at a Fire Temple – Baku, Azerbaijan, 2007”

Proudly powered by WordPress