Notes from Ann

Greetings from 

The journey to relaunching this website has been a pilgrimage unto itself, but so be it — spring is here, and the site is born again! 

Those who know me personally understand that I spend most of the year on pilgrimage, and otherwise planning upcoming journeys, speaking at conferences, salons, Zooms, retreating with the Benedictines, and handling the ceaseless logistics of readiness. For years, I’ve been dissatisfied with the website, struggling to keep it properly maintained as a platform for sharing information and staying connected. My hope is that this new design—sustainable, informative, and easy to navigate—will meet those needs at last.

With this relaunch, I’m making a personal commitment to update this page at least three times a year, striving for more when the pilgrim schedule allows. These will offer reflections on recent pilgrimages and highlight upcoming journeys. I hope you’ll enjoy them!

A year and a half ago, many friends, acquaintances, and fellow pilgrims joined me in celebrating a milestone: 50,000 miles (80,000 kilometers) walked—a distance twice around the Earth - as a pilgrim. That physical milestone represents countless spiritual quests and the humbling privilege of meeting extraordinary people along the way. If I attempted to capture every adventure and transformation in one newsletter, it would be far too long! Instead, we’ll begin anew from here, embarking on this next chapter together.

The wisdom I had the grace to understand on my very first pilgrimage in 2007 remains true: A silent pilgrim does the world no good.

Greetings from Denver, friends!

I spent the winter walking another 2,000 miles around the Grand Est of France in the fourth of the five circuits I've organized to visit every town in France named for Saint Martin.  I met lovely people from another 66 Martintowns this winter.  As always, there's a bittersweetness when a pilgrimage comes to an end.  The beauty of this extended project is that I'll be back on the Martin trail by midsummer.

Naturally, being in winter, the weather was an ever-present challenge, a particularly wet winter left me slogging through quite a bit of inundated forests and fields and a few cold snaps put me in the eerie encompassing whiteness of frozen fog.  As always, the less agreeable the weather, the more agreeable the people.

It's futile to rank cherished experiences, but what stands out a month out was the opportunity to be interviewed by 15 newspapers in 12 weeks, and spontaneously, not by efforts on my part.  I also gave two radio interviews about Saint Martin and my pilgrimage. The cast of my net as an ambassador for Saint Martin and his extraordinary character is greatly expanded with broadcasts through local media.  It's a lot of fun, too.

Looking ahead, I plan to set out for Ireland again in May and June to continue with my pilgrimage to explore and celebrate the early Celtic saints, influenced as they were by Saint Martin.

After that, I'll forego a young adult high adventure pilgrimage this summer in order to begin the last of the circuits of the Martintowns in mid August so that the grand finale of the project will fall exactly on his feast day - 11 November.

I hope that there will be enough interest this autumn to pull together another group pilgrimage for Saint Rose Philippine Duchesne across Missouri.  We've got a seasoned pilgrim eager to organize and accompany pilgrims again to arrive on her feast day, 18 November.

As always, happy trails, pilgrims!