Days 49 & 50 – Campello Alto to Assisi – 46km
The Via di Francesco, to the extent that it can be thought of as one, singular thread, is essentially composed of two halves. Over these days, I finished the first part, linking Rome and Assisi. Perhaps 90% of the pilgrims I encountered along the way were walking Assisi-to-Rome, in what has been suggested to me […]
Days 47 & 48 – Stroncone to Campello Alto – 74km
I’m sitting on a stone bench. An empty mug sits next to me; I just finished an espresso, which I prepared in the hostel kitchen, and then sipped down while staring into the valley far below. The parish church is to my left. To my right are my clothes, flapping in the wind on a […]
Day 46 – Rieti to Stroncone – 36km
One of the advantages that the Via di Francesco has over the Cammino di San Benedetto is the available source material related to its titular saint. There’s just a ton more to work with in the traditions surrounding Francis than Benedict. The dude also, it has to be said, got around. While Benedict didn’t move […]
Day 45 – Toffia to Rieti – 52km
I’m a competitive person. Probably more competitive than you. On the whole, I’m content with that. It has served me well enough professionally. Perhaps a little less so personally. I recalibrated over the years, and that made a difference. Early in my career, I wanted to be perceived as the best teacher at my school; […]
Days 43-44 – Roma to Toffia – 75km
There’s not a ton to say about the past two days of walking. Those who have walked the Via Francigena Nord into Roma, especially prior to the route change through a natural area after La Storta, will recall it as one of the worst stages of the entire pilgrimage, to the point that some opted […]
Days 41-42 – Poggio Bustone to Norcia – 65km
When the earth gives out beneath you, when the certainty you once took for granted–solidity, predictability, consistency–crumbles into ruin, what can you do? Where can you turn? More to the point, maybe: who will you be? Benedict’s birth place, Norcia, held out longer than his burial ground, Montecassino. The latter’s destruction came from above in […]
Days 38-40 – Vicovaro to Poggio Bustone – 84km
There’s a saying that circulates on pilgrim forums with some regularity: “The way is made by walking.” It comes, originally, from a poem by the Spanish writer Antonio Machado, but you’ll rarely see it in that full context. It’s the kind of expression that has immediate currency with many walkers, evoking a sage nod and […]
Days 36 & 37 – Collepardo to Vicovaro – 73km
It would be lazy and a bit out of place for a non-Christian to characterize ours as a “fallen world.” If it’s possible, though, to shift that from a spiritual term to an intellectual concept, speaking of a context in which traditional values and virtues have been diminished, distorted, or disregarded completely, then it feels […]
Days 34 & 35 – Roccasecca to Collepardo – 60km
Saint Benedict is, obviously, central to the story behind the Cammino di San Benedetto. And I’ll get to him soon enough. But these first few days spent walking the route have been an opportunity to get a feel for the character of this Cammino, its distinct flavor. Given the centrality of Benedict, and the paucity […]
Day 33 – Cassino to Roccasecca – 30km
If you didn’t know the history, didn’t know anything at all, you could be forgiven for thinking that Montecassino is today as it has been for more than a millennium, a single unbroken continuity extending back to Saint Benedict in 529. It took me two hours to arrive at this point, standing atop the staircase […]