The Booky Chronicles

I’m at about a seven or eight on the booky scale right now.
— Jonny, after an eight year old boy on a horse told us we were certain to be eaten by bear or wolf if we slept where we’d pitched our tents.

Jonny has brought some roadman slang with him from London. Booky quickly becomes the word of the trip — we adapt it to our purposes by choosing to believe it’s a fitting amalgam of Bear + Spooky — Jonny then fashions it into a 1-10 scale of his level of terror in the wilds of Armenia.

Jonny and I have only met once before (in Pëllumbas, Albania, that village of 200 people I called home for the first winter of the walk), but we have stayed in touch since then. Last year he wrote and recorded a song for/about me and we have have been having semi-regular phone calls for a while. Earlier this year he reached out to ask if he could join me for a section of the walk, and on the night of the 24th of July he landed in Armenia and walked with me into the unknown.

So began The Booky Chronicles.

Much happened in those nine days, too much to write it all up, but we both journaled as it unfolded, and I plan on gradually turning some of those experiences into legible artefacts here. Stay tuned as I add more.

Day 1: Alaverdi via the Tense Apricot Police Taxi Scam
Day 2: Fear, Feast, Fire
Day 3: Cherry vodka and a trip to the ISS