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Well, after driving a 2003 Land Rover Discovery II across the Americas and a 2004 Lexus IS300 down the Mississippi River valley in recent months, I am now tackling the less glamorous but just as adventurous task of driving a 1984 Chevy Celebrity down the West Coast of the USA (and points beyond). My first stop was Eugene, where I caught an excellent Pixies concert two nights ago. Forthcoming stops include San Francisco, Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, and San Diego. I have no definite plans yet for the southern stretch of that journey, but I do plan on joining Jen Leo’s all-comers-welcome picnic this Sunday at Washington Square Park in North Beach, San Francisco. Come on out if you’d like. Jen tells me it will start around noon and last into the afternoon. More info can be found at her Written Road blog here.
“You can’t see the teeth on a buzz-saw. …Too much diversion can keep us from knowing how miserable or how happy we are, what bores we are or what fun, how much we want, need or lack. Each day on the river I shed more and more of my external self until I find eventually that I’m left totally alone with the core, facing myself as angry and aggressive, often afraid, no physical superman. Just a man and nothing special. A vacation is external. A pilgrimage is internal. An adventure combines them.”
–Eddy L. Harris, Mississippi Solo (1988)
I’ve been curious about the independent travel ‘zine Young Pioneers ever since the editor, Dan Eldridge, intereviewed me over a year ago in Seattle. Now, finally, the first issue of the ‘zine (officially called Young Pioneers: A Journal of Independent Travel Culture) is out, and it’s an impressive debut.
In some ways Young Pioneers reminds me of Motionsickness, though it’s hard to tell yet if its editorial mission will be as focused. In the opening editorial, Eldridge is optimistic, if a tad vague. “Travel has so much to offer that it often seems impossible to catalog its endless benefits,” he writes. “Confidence building, though, is a biggie. If you’re not sure exactly who you are, or what you believe in, or what you want out of life, a good, hard trip will prob
“When you strip people’s homes of their distinctiveness — either by homogenizing them or by destroying them environmentally — you undermine not only their culture but also social cohesion. Culture, at its best, can be one of the most powerful forms of voluntary restraint in human behavior. It gives life structure and meaning. It sanctions a whole set of habits, behavioral constraints, expectations and traditions that pattern life and hold societies together at their core. When unrestrained globalization uproots cultures and environments, it destroys the necessary underlying fabric of communal life.
“And this brings up back to sustainable globalization. You cannot build an emerging society — which is so essential for dealing with the globalization system — if you are simultaneously destroying the cultural foundations that cement your society and give it the self-confidence and cohesion to interact properly with the world. That is why my concern for developing countries that get stream-rolled by globalization goes beyond a narrow preoccupation with wanting them to remain colorful places that we can all enjoy as tourists. My concern is that without environment there is no sustainable culture and without a sustainable culture there is not sustainable community and without a sustainable community there is no sustainable globalization.”
–Thomas Friedman, The Lexus and the Olive Tree (2000)
Over at the Vagabonding.net Q&A, a reader asks me about the worldwide trekking scene. “Having hiked the Appalachian and Pacific Crest trails in the States,” he writes, “I’m hooked on walking. I’ll be starting my world travels post-Peace Corps later this year. Any recommendations for nice long trails anywhere in the world?”
The world, I tell him, is full of great hiking — so much so that, in the end, his decision may well be where not to go. If you’re looking for classic mountain treks, for example, you might consider the Annapurna Circuit in Nepal, or the Inca Trail in Peru — which are both wonderful, time-honored options. Outside those trails, the Himalayas and the Andes provide countless trekking options. Europe has great trail systems, too — as does New Zealand.
In fact, you’ll discover previously unknown (to you) hikes everywhere you go in the world. Just this year, I discovered some great trails in southern Chile; two years ago I spent a week on the trails of the French Pyrenees; four years ago, I walked most of the way across Israel on well-marked and maintained trails.
Travel guidebooks are a great way to research which trails might be best for your interests. A good general trekking book, which covers classic hikes around the world, is David Noland’s Outside Adventure Travel. I’ll mention (and link) a few other trekking books below, by region:
“There are some things in life, and they may be the most important things, that we cannot know by research or reflection, but only by committing ourselves. We must dare in order to know. Life is full of situations to which I can respond not with part of myself but only with commitment of my whole being.”
–J.H. Oldham Life is Commitment (1953)
Last week, while he was in San Francisco promoting his book Dark Star Safari, Paul Theroux was asked by fellow travel writer Brad Newsham what he thought individual Westerners could do to affect the world’s current situation. Theroux’s reply, which Newsham posted on his website, is as follows:
“I think there’s a lot you can do. The main thing, the first thing you should do, if you’re reasonably fit…is go to the place you wish to help. Don’t put money in an envelope and send it. Maybe Afghanistan ain’t a great idea, but let’s say you want to give money to help people in Kenya. I would say go to Kenya first, walk around. Have your b.s. detector finely calibrated and then go to a village, go to villages, travel around, talk to people, ask questions about the government.
“In other words, before you do something, pre-ramble the territory and see what they need. Actually, I think what people need doesn’t come from the outside, it has to come from the inside. But if it makes you feel good to give something I would say go — be a traveler first, a reader, a traveler, an investigator. Research the whole question, and then you might say that someone needs a cow. Buy that person a cow. You might want to find a little individual and give him some money to go to school, adopt someone. I wouldn’t give money to a charity, I wouldn’t give money to an NGO, I would not give money to a religious organization, I would give it person to person. I would go, find the person or the situation, and then adopt that thing to make myself feel good. I would not give money personally.
“When I left Africa after this trip I stopped giving money to panhandlers, I stopped giving money to aid agencies, and I started decrying the IMF and the World Bank throwing money at problems. I thought: It’s the worst thing I’ve ever heard of, because in 40 years nothing has improved, nothing in Africa has improved because of money.
“But if personally you want to make a contribution, I would say be a reader first, then a traveler, and then maybe… give something.”
Last month, while I was driving down the Mississippi River on a magazine assignment, I had a curious experience in Rosedale, Mississippi. As I was eating lunch in a place called Leo’s Market, a waitress mentioned that Rosedale is the place where the legendary bluesman Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil in exchange for musical genius (an event alluded to in — among other places — the Cohen brothers’ movie Oh Brother, Where Art Thou). As if to prove it, the waitress handed me a wrinkled, typewritten transcription of a “vision” about Johnson’s fateful moment that had appeared to bluesman Henry Goodman as he was traveling the road from Rosedale to Anguila. For the sake of posterity (and because I have never seen it elsewhere), I am publishing Goodman’s “vision” in full below, as well as a postscript by Rosedale’s Crossroads Blues Society.
Interestingly, there are other contenders in the myth of Robert Johnson’s devil-purchased soul — and the crossroads of US 61 and US 49 in Clarksdale is where most blues tourists pay their respects (the newest Romantics album is called “61/49″ for this reason). Of course — as with ancient Roman tourists setting off to find “sites” from Greek myths — the location of Johnson’s crossroads is not exactly something that can be proven. He was born in Hazelhurst, and his supposed grave is in Quito (near Itta Bena) — but Rosedale did figure in the lyrics for one of Johnson’s most famous songs, “Traveling Riverside Blues”.
“Lord, I’m goin’ to Rosedale,” he wails, “gon’ take my rider by my side.”
“Traveling Riverside Blues” had a huge influence on rock-n-roll, and was remade as “Crossroads” by Eric Clapton — which mentions Rosedale with the same phrase Johnson uses. It was also covered by Led Zeppelin (whose more well-known “Lemon Song” famously steals a lyric from that same Johnson tune: “You can squeeze my lemon ’til the juice runs down my leg”).
None of this proves much about Robert Johnson’s crossroads, of course, but I for one like the notion that it happened in Rosedale. The text of the “vision” follows…
Meeting with the Devil at the Crossroads
A “vision”, as told by Henry Goodman
Robert Johnson been playing down in Yazoo City and over at Beulah trying to get back up to Helena, ride left him out on a road next to the levee, walking up the highway, guitar in his hand propped up on his shoulder. October cool night, full moon filling up the dark sky, Robert Johnson thinking about Son House preaching to him, “Put that guitar down, boy, you drivin’ people nuts.” Robert Johnson needing as always a woman and some whiskey. Big trees all around, dark and lonesome road, a crazed, poisoned dog howling and moaning in a ditch alongside the road sending electrified chills up and down Robert Johnson’s spine, coming up on a crossroads just south of Rosedale. Robert Johnson, feeling bad and lonesome, knows people up the highway in Gunnison. Can get a drink of whiskey and more up there. Man sitting off to the side of the road on a log at the crossroads says, “You’re late, Robert Johnson.” Robert Johnson drops to his knees and says, “Maybe not.”
The man stands up, tall, barrel-chested, and black as the forever-closed eyes of Robert Johnson’s stillborn baby, and walks out to the middle of the crossroads where Robert Johnson kneels. He says, “Stand up, Robert Johnson. You want to throw that guitar over there in that ditch with that hairless dog and go on back up to Robinsonville and play the harp with Willie Brown and Son, because you just another guitar player like all the rest, or you want to play that guitar like nobody ever played it before? Make a sound nobody ever heard before? You want to be the King of the Delta Blues and have all the whiskey and women you want?”
“That’s a lot of whiskey and women, Devil-Man.”
Though my stint with Land Rover’s Drive Around the World expedition has finished, the rest of the team is set to begin the next leg of the journey in Australia. I’m sure new dispatches will start up in the next week or so on the expedition website.
In the meantime, the DATW organization has put together some cool new media regarding the expedition, including a great flash intro that walks you through the route of the journey, as well as a five-minute video that includes footage from Peru, Bolivia, and Chile. (The buzz-cut, Carnival-wearied soul talking about Parkinson’s Disease in the video is yours truly.)
In other random DATW news, expedition press kits have started to show up for sale on Ebay, here and here. As far as I can tell, there are no bidders yet.
Of course, if you’re going to spend money on something DATW-related, I’d recommend donating to our efforts to cure Parkinson’s Disease. A pledge form is here, and a donation of as little as $10 puts you in the running to win one of the expedition Land Rovers.
This month on the RolfPotts.com Writers page I interview Stephanie Elizondo Griest, whose first book, Around the Bloc, was published last month by Villard/Random House.
In the interview, Griest warns prospective travel writers against making broad conclusions about other cultures. “Our world is an intensely complex place,” she says. “It is imperative that we as travel writers not jump to easy conclusions. I catch myself making outlandish claims like ‘Russians think/feel/do _______.’ Instead, I should be saying: ‘My friend Nadezhda
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