Walking 550 Miles Through Italy, Portugal, and Spain
By Todd Bigelow, Contact Press Images
When people ask me what to see and do when traveling in Europe I tell them “nothing,” and I’m completely serious. Ditching the travel agenda, taking to the streets, and becoming a wanderer is the key to travel. I’ve walked over 550 miles the last few years in small Italian towns tucked against the Alps to the backstreets of southern Spain and the mountains of Portugal and believe that a street photography approach to travel will yield far more insight and experiences than an overbooked itinerary.
Let’s face it, Americans’ lives are mostly dominated by appointments and deadlines that dictate how the day unfolds and manifest an insatiable appetite to accomplish as much as possible each day. But in much of Europe that’s not reality. The preference is to walk more than to run, to find meaning in idleness and pleasure in encountering friends in a square. If you don’t believe me, try visiting a shop around 3pm in Spain because many close for lunch and a siesta before opening again in the evening. Absorbing new surroundings is best done slowly and requires replacing the idea that you must see everything with a determination to see nothing.
When planning trips like my recent forays to Italy, Spain and Portugal, I start where I always did when packing for an assignment and that’s with the approach that less is best. Simply put, I don’t check luggage and never my gear. Where I used to rely exclusively on my Think Tank Airport roller to get me to assignments for Sports Illustrated, People, and others, my go-to bag for travel now is the BackLight 26L backpack. My Canon R5, 24-70mm and 70-200mm fit perfectly in the main compartment along with all my cables in a Cable Management 10 pouch. Throw in a hard drive, card reader, batteries, charger and card wallet and I’m good to go. My Apple MBP 14” slips into the front pouch along with my iPad and I’ve never had problems sliding the bag under a seat. This is vitally important to me because I want to be mobile so I can get through train stations and cobblestone streets with ease. One backpack and one carry-on suitcase is all I travel with for well over a month on the road.
The minimalist approach to gear and packing carries over into the streets once I reach my destination. I grab my R5 with 24-70mm, stuff a battery and extra card in my pocket and set out to explore with little more than a vague idea where to go. That’s contrary to what you find when visiting some of Europe’s most popular destinations where the default agenda pushed by travel agents and influencers is to fill the day rushing from museum to gallery to UNESCO site, often in a cattle like formation carrying heavy backpacks behind a tour group leader rushing visitors in a concerted effort to see everything posted on Instagram. Sorry, that’s not for me, a lifelong photojournalist whose preference is to go in the other direction figuratively and literally. I avoid scheduled tours and museum entry appointments like the plague, opting in exchange for observing and embracing everyday life. My love for just wandering with a camera helps me slow down and experience more, see more, feel more; more cafes, more wine bars, more piazzas, more neighborhood streets. Of course, I’m not implying that you must avoid the popular destinations (after all they’re popular for legitimate reasons), but rather that you allow yourself time to see the people instead of just the places. In doing so you’ll discover the simple beauty of, for example, an elderly woman chatting with a friend in passing and placing a loving kiss on her forehead as they move on.
Searching for spontaneous reality, the kind of which is abundant in streets, squares, and crowded markets, will yield a new excitement for the ordinary while everyone rushes to see the extraordinary. Watching people engage with one another or simply go about their daily life gives the kind of insight that is more enlightening than just observing a life size statue amid a throng of selfie stick yielding influencers.
To do this requires a mind reset akin to resetting your body clock for the new time zone. Recalibrate to prepare for days of meandering and, ultimately, sitting idle for periods of time and accepting what you encounter. Traveling is best when you assimilate to the culture and embrace your day unfolding without interference, when there are no concrete plans, itinerary, tickets, or appointments. Just pick a place to spend time and, once there, put one foot in front of the other (bring good shoes!) and open your eyes to the excitement of everyday life. If you’re willing to look for it, there is quiet beauty to be discovered in daily life that’s lost amid the crush of tourists at iconic destinations.
Walking without an agenda requires a willingness to get off the beaten path and venture onto side streets, beaches, or mountain villages. There you might find old men playing bocce on a beach in Lido, Italy or a neighborhood festival in Alicante, Spain or the daily rhythm of life along Portugal’s tram system. Ultimately, the goal is to see the people who create the region’s life and energy and take in the culture, architecture and vitality while doing so.
I should make clear that in everyone, including me, desires to see the iconic art, historic sites and architecture that the continent is renowned for. But, walking quickly by a dense neighborhood with narrow, vibrant streets where life abounds just to get to the crowded Colosseum as quickly as possible utterly defeats the purpose of traveling and restricts you to a commercial guidebook interpretation of your destination. Instead, if you have a required appointment to enter the Colosseum or to see The Last Supper in Milan, consider leaving hours in advance and meandering through nearby neighborhoods so you can experience life beyond the iconic site. It’s only then that a city or town will reveal itself such as the sidewalks containing small bronze plaques commemorating holocaust victims forcibly removed and sent to a concentration camp, never to return. I’m sure if you read about these things in a book, you could add a stop to your GPS agenda and head straight there, but it’s so much better to discover them while walking without a predetermined destination. As they say, it’s the journey that really counts.
Each day of our extensive travels in Europe, my wife and I would wake up and simply pick a neighborhood from a map, do a little reading on travel blogs while sipping a cappuccino at a local bakery and then just start walking. We’d often get lost or thought we were heading in one direction when, in fact, we were heading in the opposite direction. Every traveler has experienced this but, instead of being frustrated that we might miss a time slot to enter a museum, we would laugh and just keep walking. Usually, we ended up finding something totally unexpected such as a real bullfight in Seville. There was the time recently when we took a dimly lit path through lush landscape that was quiet as a monastery with no idea where it led. Turned out that it led to, of all places, a hilltop convent with gorgeous views of the Ligurian countryside.
I guess it goes without saying that Europe’s immense popularity means it’s nearly impossible to avoid a crush of people unless you are way, way, way off the beaten path, but crowds are as enjoyable as solitude if you accept them as part of the allure. Venice is a perfect example since there’s no place you can really go in Venice to escape crowds but the fact that it’s full of people is what makes it exciting and vibrant. I stopped once to capture a young couple’s amore amid a crush of people on a bridge over the Grand Canal, their love casting them seemingly oblivious to the madness around them, their isolation amid the crowds serving as a reminder of how to accept some locations for what the madness they offer.
If you’re considering a trip to Europe and want to take in the culture without following a flag-waving tour guide speaking to you through an audio device dangling from your neck as they hustle you from one destination to another, consider planning a trip around no plans. Pick the cities or towns you would like to visit and pack lightly and smartly (again, I recommend the BackLight 26L for the backpack). Remember to see the iconic sites, but don’t do so at the expense of strolling into a neighborhood and sitting idle for a while as you sip coffee and breathe in the daily life as it happens all around you. That’s where you find reality.
Todd Bigelow is a Los Angeles-based contributor to Contact Press Images who has worked with national and international magazines, newspapers, and non-profits and is the author of The Freelance Photographer’s Guide To Success: Business Essentials.
Along with his wife of 35 years, Judy, he’s walked over 550 miles through countless towns from northern Italy to Southern Spain. After a five week jaunt through Europe this Spring, Todd just returned from a two-week road trip photographing some of America’s national parks with his go-to BackLight 26L on his back. You can see Todd’s work at www.ToddBigelowPhotography.com
