“As long as I live, I will hear waterfalls and birds and wind sing.” John Muir

Oh, how John Muir would have loved Plitvice Lakes National Park in Croatia if he had a chance to visit this Natural Wonder. I could not contain my joy during our visit to this beautiful National Park. I found myself just saying, “Wow”, over and over as we turned a corner and saw another beautiful waterfall. The sounds of birds singing and the frogs croaking made it all so magical. I found myself, just shouting out my joy with screams of delight!

“The beautiful stops the viewer in his tracks and then plants within him a desire to speak to others of what he has seen.” Hans Urs von Balthasar

At times it seemed surreal almost and there were no words to describe what you were seeing. One of the reasons I have not posted a blog recently is I have been trying to figure out some way to do that, to describe something that defies description.

The National Park consists of two large lakes and lots of trails and boardwalks that weave in and around the lakes with waterfalls everywhere you looked!!

The color and the clarity of the water was stunning and the sounds of water rushing and flowing around you was you walked through this gorgeous landscape was just overwhelming.

These photos provide you with only a small sample of the visual delight walking through the landscape of this beautiful park. I also wanted to share with a sample of the soundscape of the park. Here is a short clip of some of the sounds.

Sounds of Plitvice

They say “A picture is worth a thousand words” so I will leave you with a few more images of the park to speak what cannot be described in words.

On the path together,

John

“Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,

Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home...” John Howard Payne

Indeed, there is no place like home.

I woke up this morning and this beautiful sunrise greeted us. I could think of no other words, other than, “there’s no place like home.” I grew up watching the “Wizard of Oz” from a little boy, so the phrase, “there is no place like home” was embedded in my mind and heart.

It turns out that the novel “The Wizard of Oz” that inspired the 1939 movie was written in 1900, by L. Frank Baum and the words Dorothy replies to the Scarecrow when asked why she would ever want to leave the beautiful land of Oz are:

“No matter how dreary and gray our homes are, we people of flesh and blood would rather live there than in any other country, be it ever so beautiful. There is no place like home.”

Maybe that is also a benefit of travel. It sure fired in me a great appreciation of home. To sleep in our own bed (and with my own pillow). Travel is good for us and in so many ways.

I discovered some deeper history this morning about the phrase, “there’s no place like home”. The quote at the top of this blog is from a popular worldwide hit song, from 1823, called “Home, Sweet Home.” The song was written by American lyricist John Howard Payne and English composer Sir Henry Bishop for an opera named Clari, or the Maid of Milan.

This song became deeply embedded in American and British culture during the 19th century.

I was curious where my “AI friend” found this information and asked for the references. There were four references provided from musicology and cultural history literature.

One of the references was from a Master’s thesis written by N.E. Bock (University of Central Florida) titled “Home, Sweet Home: Gender, the Civil War, and reunion through popular music”. It was in this research that I learned that this song, “Home Sweet Home”, was widely considered the single most popular tune of the American Civil War era for soldiers on both sides!

Home Sweet Home. A song sung by all soldiers.

On the path together,

John

(Grave site of childhood friend of our guide, Mili Kapic. It was extremely painful for Mili that he is still “missing in action”)

“Begin challenging your own assumptions. Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won’t come in.”

Alan Alda

Travel really does a good job of challenging our assumptions. I had a “good scrubbing” of some of my assumptions on this trip. Traveling is not just for “sight-seeing”, I think it is a necessary remedy for our tendency for narrow-mindedness because it forces you to realize that your way of living is not the only way, or necessarily the “correct” way.

Sometimes our assumptions might be simple ones that get changed when we explore different food when we travel. I remember traveling to Venice and trying fresh anchovies for the first time. I was never a fan of anchovies but I decided I try fresh anchovies.

Boom, crushed that old assumption. They were good. It turned out I did like anchovies.

Another fun food assumption I had was changed during this recent trip was by our amazing guide, Roberto. He asked us about the most famous Italian dish called “Pasta al Pomodoro”. We knew it was a famous Italian pasta dish and we all assumed it was all Italian, through and through. Italy must have invented it right? Wrong? What? It turns out the tomato plant was brought to Europe from western South America in 1500’s!

So while Pasta al Pomodoro feels like an ancient heritage dish, it’s actually a product of global trade and cultural fusion—only becoming a true staple of Italian life in the last 200 years.

Boom, there goes another assumption busted.

These assumptions are not the tough ones though to bust through. It is ones we hold tightly. Maybe even the ones that have evolved into long-held beliefs.

Travel really is good for us! Mark Twain wrote his book, “The Innocents Abroad”, after traveling through Europe and the Holy Land. He noticed that people who never leave their hometowns tend to develop a rigid, distorted view of the rest of the world. He has this famous quote in the book.

“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.”

It takes courage to admit we are wrong. It begins with open-mindedness.

“I will live by the best I can discern today. Tomorrow I may find out I was wrong. Since I do not live by being right, I am not destroyed by being wrong.”

Verna Dozier

Let’s all just keep holding on lightly to our assumptions and not be afraid to let go of them when we find they were wrong.

On the path together,

John

“We don't just do sightseeing; we work to create a unique esprit de corps that turns a bus tour into a merry band of travelers.” Rick Steves

In a letter from Rick Steves to us before the tour began, he said, “your tour group will be like family… People are good. People are curious. And people are interesting. It is rare to have so much opportunity to connect in such a stimulating environment, with both fellow tour members and the Europeans you'll meet.“

This Rick Steves tour was no exception! We genuinely enjoyed each other’s company and the conversations were stimulating and the guides were much more than just informative they got us engaged and really seeing from a new perspective. Here a few fun photos of us!

Time is precious. We had time to get to know each other and at the same time to learn and grow through the shared experiences we had together.

We were also so fortunate to have an amazing tour guide, Mili. I will never forget the deeply moving personal story he shared of what he endured when he was sixteen years old during the war between Bosnia/Herzgovena and Croatia in 1991.

It is the people the make these tours special! On our last day of the tour during our tour of Dubrovnik, we were honored to have had one of the best guides to end our tour, Roberto. His knowledge of history and way he wove his stories, really challenged our thinking and opened our minds. I could have listened to him for hours.

I will end this post with a poem written by Judy Fleischmann, one of our “merry band of travelers”. Judy shared this poem with us as she reflected back on the tour and her “significant” Birthday milestones that occurred during the tour.

On the path together,

John

P.S. I am planning to keep posting even though the tour is over. So, stay tuned.

Getting up early in morning when there is almost no one out if so much fun getting lost and discovering something that is just charming and different. This was in a small town called Bale.

This scene reminded me of a similar photograph I took in 2005 during a visit to Tuscany.

Found an Asian Fusion restaurant in Korcula. Yummm!

In Mostar, walking these old streets was really challenging. The cobblestone rocks were raised and also almost polished smooth!

Our stay in Korcula was really special. We had the whole day to do what we wanted nothing scheduled. Just swim in the Adriatic Sea, walk the old town and just relax.

Now this was one of my favorite things I will not soon forget. So, many special moments!

In the path together,

John

The story was a very personal sharing of what happened in this wine cellar during WWII. The first Partisan fighters from the entire region around the area were gathering in this basement cellar. The Germans eventually found out about this secret hiding place and Boris’ grandfather was taken away to the Nazi concentration camp, Mauthausen, where he died. His grandmother spent 20 months in Auschwitz and survived the concentration camp. Only Boris’ other grandmother was left behind on the farm on the land they had left.

After the war his grandmother was released from Auschwitz and it took her 8 months to walk home. The family started all over again and rebuilt the family business to this top award winning winery.

Hearing Boris’ story was very moving and we were honored to be in this special space and hear him tell his family’s story.

On the path together,

John

“Even though love is embedded within nature and God is “all love”, we have a hard time believing that.” Matthew Fox

We like to take tours when we travel internationally. The local guides are so good at assisting you in “seeing with new eyes”. I particularly find them helpful when we visit museums.

We visited a WWI museum in a Kobarid, Slovenia. It is a small town located in the Julian Alps along the Soca River. It was a very sobering experience.

We learned about the “battle of Kobarid” which took place two and half years into the war. The battle resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties, prisoners, and refugees, completely reshaping the political and military landscape of the war in southern Europe.

As you come into the museum, this is what you see.

On the one wall, are black and white photos of young men and women from all sides of the war. This was a museum that wanted you to strip away their uniforms, nationalities and politics and see their common humanity.

At the base of this wall was the projectiles of the weapons of the war and the partially exploded fragments. On the wall on the opposite side was just crosses and tombstones. The guide says this is all that needs to be said.

The crosses and tombstones of lives lost in this deadly battle in the beautiful mountain valley.

The horrific things that happened during the war were hard to take in during our visit to this museum.

“Love and fear are not compatible; so often we prefer fear over love. It is a choice we make but and ignorant one…” Matthew Fox

On the path together,

John

“In all of the natural world, we see the vestigia Dei, which means the fingerprints or footprints of God.”

Richard Rohr

Sometimes you get the opportunity to in nature to see something that takes your breath away. That is what happened when we visited Lake Bled in Slovenia. We arrived in mid morning and we were brought to the top of a Bled’s hilltop castle that sits on a rock 300 feet above the lake. When we walked up to the point where you could view the lake, it was definitely one of those breathtaking moments. The “fingerprints of God” were there for all to see and behold.

“What we cannot comprehend by analysis, we become aware of in awe. “

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Herschel

Awestruck is the right word it seems to me. Beautiful and breathtaking. Hard to comprehend with our mind but only there to behold.

Moments like these come along every so often and the only response is AWE it seems.

On the path together,

John

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.

Marcel Proust

There is some great wisdom in this quote. Even though we are on a journey in new lands, this quote still works for me. I was watching the traffic of people crossing the Ljubljana’s Triple Bridge (3 bridges built side by side) and I took this short timelapse. I thought it speaks to the speed of our lives and the importance of slowing down so we might see with “new eyes”. I have do have the tendency to want to see it all when on travel. As I don’t want to miss anything and so if your time is limited, I find myself just taking “snapshots” as I go quickly from place to place.

Yet, to see with “new eyes” means I must “take more time and cover less ground” as the song by Carrie Newcomer goes. Just slowing down and taking more time to be fully present can definitely help. I think sometimes about this simple truth and wonder why do I not do this more? Why am I rushing so often?

Sometimes when I write down my thoughts like this it helps me to clarify what is important. I look back at today and think how I really did not heed my own advice. Tomorrow is a new day and I want to take more time and cover less ground.

On the path together,

John

Ljubljana is a real gem! The city has its old and its new and it is green all over. It is a walking and bicycling city with cars restricted in the city core. What fun it is to explore and walk through this city. We especially love walking along the river with all the restaurants and shops and lots of trees.

This city has trees! It has a 50% tree canopy cover rating. The average European city sit at around 30%. Through deliberate urban planning combined with a generous geography the vast majority of its green spaces are publicly accessible. They call it “the right to green”. That is a right I can get behind.

They have a couple of contiguous forested areas wedged directly into the center of the city. In fact, I went hiking in a beautiful forest that is a short walk from our hotel. The park is called Tivoli and it is over 1200 acres!

Old and green. Speaking of old at the hotel where we are staying they have a 200 year old grape vine in our courtyard! That is pretty cool.

A few blocks from our hotel is an old monastery that is lots of old trees all around it as the city buzzes to life.

The city comes alive each day with so many visitors and tour groups and young adults from the university in the city. What a great city to visit or stay awhile!

On the path together,

John

Spring in the mountains stirs inside me some of my deepest memories of freshness, joy and adventure. When I look at this photograph I took in Austria, on our train ride to Innsbruck, it brought back those springtime climbing memories. On some of the spring climbs you would start low in the clouds and climb up through the clouds and be in total sunshine as you ascended up the slopes kicking steps in the snow all the way to the top. You would feel like you were on top of the world. The sounds of water flowing and running down the mountain, waterfalls, and spring birds and sunlight through the trees made it all so magical.

During our train rides through Switzerland and Austria there were so many beautiful natural landscapes with small towns at their base. I wondered if they also experienced this same excitement of spring climbing? Oh, I think that might be a silly question as climbing traditions in Switzerland and Austria are deep and long. In fact, REI was founded in 1938 and the entire foundation of REI was built on importing the superior Alpine equipment of countries like Austria to help Pacific Northwest climbers safely tackle peaks like Mt. Rainier.

Our train ride through the Alps was such a fleeting glimpse. So, glad we got to see its Springtime beauty in all its glory.

On the path together,

John

Today we say goodbye to Zermatt as we head to Innsbruck, Austria. We arose early before the dawn and the Matterhorn slowly was coming into view as the early morning sun was lighting it up. The clouds would mysteriously cover and uncover it giving you shining glimpses of it. Oh, what a way to say goodbye to us with one last fleeting look.

Life is filled with fleeting looks of the goodness, grace and beauty of this world. It is our minds so busy and filled with thoughts like that cloud our view. Yet every so often, when we slow our minds down and spend time in nature we open ourselves up to the beauty, goodness and wonder of it all!

On the path together,

John

I really loved Zermatt. In real estate they say it is all about location, location, location. This was our lovely hotel here in Zermatt. Spring tulips a bloom with snow on the mountains with lots of wonderful places to stay in town. We loved our place with a view of the Matterhorn from our room and a nice deck out from our room to boot.

You can see the cranes of all the new construction going on here. Zermatt is growing. With the new the old is still retained though with the old aged timbers. Old and new next to each other. I like that.

There is character in this town and history of mountaineers too. It has changed a lot since though early town days but time moves on a the algae grows on the graves of the old mountaineer town gravestones.

Times are a changing in this high mountain town.

On the path together,

John

“Nature and Grace are in harmony with each other.” Julian of Norwich

Greetings from Zermatt, Switzerland and what a train ride we had today from Geneva to Zermatt. We spent about 4 hours to get here today and though it started in the rain it quickly changed to blue skies and sunshine during the train ride. The weather checks we did the days before we left did not sound good. It looked like we were going to be in the middle of a Spring snowstorm and both of us prepared ourselves that we not likely to see the Matterhorn.

After arriving in Zermatt, we were very hungry, so we headed to a restaurant for lunch (which was amazing). We then started walking to our hotel when we had a moment of shear grace. The Matterhorn cleared and we got to see it in all its glory!! What a huge surprise!!! We just sat there and stared at it and took lots of photographs. It was a stunning moment in nature when everything aligns in that perfect moment. It was just total grace that we arrived at just the moment when it cleared. It was not more than and hour later and it was all covered up with clouds and was snowing in town! I have been out in nature enough to know how brief this moments happen. What a great anniversary gift it was for us to see this gorgeous mountain since we got married on a mountain 45 years ago.

Can not wait to see what magic Zermatt brings to us tomorrow!

On the path together,

John

The domain name we selected for our blog we started back in 2014 when we walked the Camino de Santiago was “We Are All Pilgrims”. Even though I stopped writing the blog years ago I wanted to keep that domain name and kept paying for the rights to the name. Why did I like this name? Well, I guess I see that we are on a pilgrimage in this life. An interior journey enacted exteriorly.

I chose this image today that I created using photographs taken during a June hike in 2006. I think it is a perfect match to the idea of life being an interior journey where we are we are journeying in new lands but always looking for the good, the true and the beautiful.

“Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us, or we will find it not.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

On the path together,

John

Maybe why I love photography so much is that it is a language where you communicate without words. A picture is worth a thousand words as the saying goes is so true. I believe I am hearing the love language of nature when I am fully present in nature.

“Love is rooted in the fundamental nature of reality itself….

Love forms every star, atom, leaf, daffodil, bird, earthworm, cat, giraffe, tiger, and human;

everything that exists is born from love.” Illia Delio

This photograph of this Rhododendron was taken right in front of our condo as the early morning light was illuminating it. I heard it calling to me in its love language. I find that I am drawn and in the most alluring way to those special moments that happen in nature.

I am sometimes asked why I do not take more photos of people, and I am really do not have a good answer to that question. I usually say something like I am not good at photographing people. I have another gift I guess that I want to share with the world.

On the path together,

John

Hello everyone,

It’s been a few years since I last wrote under the name We Are All Pilgrims, but as I prepare for a major trip this month, it felt like the right time to bring this space back to life.

You’re receiving this because you’ve followed my photography and reflections across a few different chapters. I’ve truly valued your presence on those walks, and I wanted to invite you along for this next one.

Where we’re headed: On May 12, I’m departing for a multi-week trek through Switzerland, Slovenia, and Croatia. I’ll be using this space to share “visual postcards”—my way of practicing presence through the lens of my cameras.

I’m looking forward to sharing the peaks of the Alps and the quiet corners of the Adriatic with you.

On the path together,

John Peters