Dream Trip 2009

Great Travel Moment

People who aren't afflicted by wanderlust often ask me why travel appeals to me so much. I tell them it's the sense of newness, of not knowing what's coming around the next bend. This moment on a little-visited section of the Great Wall of China--cresting one hill and seeing a steeper one before me--encapsulated that feeling precisely. What was over the bend: a local man who offered to accompany me along the steep, crumbling path. We walked together in mostly silent companionship. When I offhandedly referred to him as a guide, he said, with vehemence and pride, "I am farmer. Not guide." My new farmer friend, the guide who was not a guide, was the unexpected gift before me. I define travel as the layering of such small surprises into something that is wholly new.