While final details have not been hammered out yet, I will be away on travel from the end of May through late June and thus there will be no BBotE or Stein of Science production during that time. I will leave ordering on to let people get in line pending my return and add a biiiig banner to let people know nothing ships until the end June.
Why is this happening? Because it’s important to achieve life goals. I have been wanting to take a long hike where I ramble for days and days at least since high school and have never really made it happen. The one I was going to do in New Zealand went very awry due to poor planning/available information, please click here to enjoy my two part tale of our misadventure on the Otago Rail Trail. But this time my path is extremely well documented as people have been walking it for over a millennium, so my chances of misadventure are greatly reduced! I will be walking the Camino Primitivo from Oviedo to Santiago de Compostela with my friend Fr. Gabriel.
I had sufficient fun going with Fr. Gabriel to Israel & Jordan so that he could collect Catholic bling and experience points to level up, that I figured it walking the Camino would be a great way for him to earn even more. I get my long walk in a beautiful place filled with history, with fantastic food & cider all the way, and me walking with Fr. Gabriel helps him fulfill the Rule of Augustine (“two by two, hands of blue”) so that he can even go out and do this. The whole reason the Rule of Augustine is there is to minimize the shenanigans monks & priests can get up to when they’re out on their own; somehow the upstanding moral character of their companion to keep them on the straight and narrow is never questioned. This does mean I do now need to make some effort to be in better shape by the end of May and try to remember more of my Spanish.
Come to think of it, the last longish hike I did was the St. James Walkway in New Zealand, but the mosey for this St. James will be much longer. No, I didn’t do it just because it had a place called Cannibal Gorge, but it did catch my eye while planning.