Chapter 2

Your shine becomes even more radiant

a new you is coming to life

your profound sadness and pain

will surely become your strength

- Miyuki Sato (translated from Japanese)

Bret knows just enough Japanese, Dutch, Italian, and French to be dangerous. That makes for an excellent travel partner. As a result, we found ourselves in a small hill town called Seguret. Bret heard this group of three Japanese women talking so he engaged them. As it turns out, it was a mother, daughter and a friend who they had just met and was studying to be a wineconnoisseur. The next thing you know, the mother is dragging us into the home they are renting to show us her daughter’s paintings and to feed us wine. Miyuki is an amazingly talented girl who writes and paints. In one book she compiled, she painted the picture and wrote something next to it. The poem above is one of the writings she had in this book and I thought it was beautiful and poignant, especially to me at this point in my life.

We spent the day with this group which deviated from our plan but you have to be fluid and adventurous when you are traveling. There was a pretty good communication barrier but Bret knew enough about Japan to say names, places or things and they would reply with, for example, “Ah yes! Sony!” After finishing off a bit of wine that afternoon, since we were walking to the next town and they were as well, we escorted them. Every time a car came I would announce it in Japanese and they couldn’t get enough of it. “Your hero,” they would say. I bet the locals had never seen a scene like that.

When we got to Sablet later in the afternoon, the third girl wanted us to meet her French friends so we walked all over Sablet to try to find them. Finally we did and we sat in this person’s backyard with two fifty year old men, their 93 year old aunt, Bret, myself, and three Japanese women sipping on Pastis. You just can’t make these things up. The Mistral was blowing gently and we all sat around a flowery table cloth getting snippets of each others life stories. When we finished our drinks, the kind gentleman drove us to a campsite.

I had basically only heard horror stories about the French but we have been warmly received everywhere we have been. They all seem to be intrigued by these two American men walking from town to town with 40-50 lbs of gear on their backs. “You are doing what?” is a common reply. They probably figure only Americans would be so foolish to be doing this in the Provence heat of summer. I really don’t think there is a better way to do it, however. France is a walkers paradise and as long as you have a map and some map reading skills, it is pretty easy to get around. We are taking the GR4 in thewine region and all over on trees, rocks, and telephone poles little red and white lines guide us on our route. All day we walk through vineyard after vineyard, down country roads, up into the mountains where you cansee the vineyards disappear into the horizon, and at all times you are surrounded by lavender and sunflower fields. It is ultimate freedom to wake up each morning and decide in which town you will be drinking great wine in that evening.

Every day we have had some amazing little treats like meeting the Japanese people or some stranger who sees us walking invites us into their house for lemonade. One old lady actually bowed to us when she heard we were Americans. Last night we met Michael and Darby from L.A. and they were a trip. We wound up meeting them at a wine tasting at the local office of tourism. They are very liberal with the wine at these events which is great and each of us walked away with a half of our own wine to drink from the bottle. We followed them to the center of town and had a little smoke they brought down from Amsterdam. They were in their early to late 40s and they were pros. Michael’s first Dead show for instance was in the yer I was born. I think at one point early in the evening they thought we were gay because here we are, two dudes walking through France tasting wine and then heading up to the lavender fields next. It was quite funny. We got dinner with them and later she gave us a Chinese blessing so that we would get laid by French women. Time will tell if her sorcery is legit. They were a treat, however and made our evening.

The amazing thing about this type of travel is the head-space you can get into. I think sometimes you need to remove yourself from your day to day life for an extended period of time, to get into a new physical space so it can create that mental space. In the process you gain clarity, have the freedom to imagine a new life or the life you want to lead, and then walk into it. Off to a wine tasting...

Chapter 3