When I roll into town at the end of the day I do it on a full stomach, so I can politely refuse offers of food and still not go to bed hungry. However, last night in Horsunlu my new friend Huseyin and his mother insisted I eat something. After a bit of a row we...
Tonight I am camping in a public park in Horsunlu, a village of about 2000 people in Aydin province. Got the clearance from just about the entire village, including the park supervisor, so I should be good. Also have a half dozen people to friend on Facebook....
I pulled into a gasoline station for some water and ended up having some tea and a chat with the station manager. He mentioned Darek and Piotr, the two Poles I ran into Sunday, were here this morning. They camped in the same spot I’m resting in now, under a tree...
I stopped off at a tea garden near the village of Hamzali to top off my water supply. The tea garden was attended to by a hyperactive 15-year old named Halil who couldn’t stop talking about how fast his Peugeot scooter was and how rich he’d be after fixing...
Turkayfe’s Joy Anna Crow walked the entire length of the walk’s first day with me, god bless her heart, and she wrote up notes from an interview here. A quote from the interview: “You don’t need to be a world traveler to implement something...
A big thanks goes out to recent Kickstarter backers for pushing the Kickstarter campaign to 72% of its goal, with about three weeks to go. (A few of my backers backed the project outside the normal Kickstarter channels, and it’ll take a few more days for their...
See the mountains? Turkey’s Aegean region often reminds me of California’s central coast. If the language weren’t so different, I’d swear I was walking through San Luis Obispo.
This is a typical Turkish breakfast plate. My normal breakfast on walking days is shaping up to be simit and cay (tea), gozleme and cay, or something like that. When I finally rolled out of bed this morning at 10:00am and stumbled downstairs for some simit and cay, I...
Some people who are very dear to me have been wondering, “Why on earth did Matt name this project Heathen Pilgrim?” This post is for them. If my use of the word “heathen” disturbs you, please be assured that I do not use that word because I am...
A handful of people have expressed interest in coming down from Istanbul in the next couple of weeks to walk a leg with me or to see the sights, and have asked where I’ll be and when. Here is an updated forecast:...
Finished the first week’s walk, and instead of spending the afternoon stressing out about a place to stay, I walked straight into the nearest hotel and asked for a cheap room. Soon it’ll be back to work, but for now all I can hear is the shower calling...
It occurred to me last night that after today I will have walked 5 days, which means I get Thursday and Friday off. I won’t be walking, and I can even ride the minibuses, but come Saturday I’ll have to go back to where I leave off at the end of today. If...
The other day someone asked me what simit was. This is simit sitting next to the glass of tea. Today I shared my breakfast table with Mehmet bey, a dolmus (semi-public minibus) driver who drives the same stretch I’ll be walking today.
