Me and Richard in Brussels, January 19 2009. The beginning of our pilgrimage.
Sleeping in a barn. Despite the cows below us, it was still very cold.
Richard, cold and fed up, heads for home on 29th January. He didn't make it out of Belgium.
I had no money for food, so I survived on whatever people gave me. I didn't ask for food ever.
Walking through the German countryside
I wasn't used to walking and my toes blistered quite badly. The top of my right big toe was a constant problem.
Sleeping in a vicar's garden house and feasting on German breakfast. Too much snow on the ground to put my tent up.
Karnival - the German version of Mardi Gras. These people are not naturally black, they're dressing up.
Having my brainwaves tested by some weird machine. I was diagnosed with several diseases and given two different packets of tablets and a bottle of vibrated water to restore my health.
This is a pretty gross looking foot, but due more to bad hygiene than to blistering. Washing wasn't always possible and was often too much effort.
Jan, the first person I met in Austria, walked with me for a day. It rained.
Getting thinner and thinner, I started looking for food in rubbish bins. Supermarkets can sometimes provide a free feast.
The Danube. The big sign is telling me that I'm 2,000km from the Black Sea and I was planning on following it almost all the way.
Lucas, a German guy who was biking to Africa. We asked a nearby resident for some water but he was Bavarian, so he gave us beer instead. He made coffee with water from the Danube.
Hungary. I asked these men what they were doing and it seems they were making wine. We had to drink a few glasses to be sure.
Hungarian picnic. Sausage, bacon, ham - all mostly fat. I started to put weight back on in Hungary.
Police declaration. The statement I had to give to the Romanian police for crossing into their country at a non-official place. They gave me lunch.
Alin, who invited me into his house so his friend could burgle my tent. He took €30 which someone had given me a few weeks before.
Butchering a pig. The sound of a pig being killed is extremely loud and piercing. It's a very effective way to wake someone up, but not very pleasant.
Romanian women
Romania. A goat on a Dacia with a satellite dish.
This house is made of mud. I'd never seen a mud house before. Also I slept the whole night in the same room as a turkey. I've never done that before either. Spot the turkey.
St. George's Day in Bulgaria. A sheep was slaughtered and this man is cleaning some interior pipe by blowing through it. The chickens are not vegetarians, it seems.
Mount Shipka in Bulgaria
I had no money when I arrived at the Turkish border, so I had to beg for €15. My sign says "I NEED €15 FOR A VISA". I had to wait for a couple of hours before someone gave me the whole lot.
Turkish humour. After cutting up a cucumber for lunch, Mehmet made little horns from the cucumber ends and stuck them on our foreheads.
Turkey has some pretty dry areas. The mountains in the distance are about a day's walk away and if you zoom in you can see the desolate road that leads there.
My mum came out to join me for a few days. She wanted to buy me lots of food but people kept giving it to us as a present.
Turkish breakfast. Sitting on the floor, bread is the cutlery and loads of tea. Photo by my mum.
My tent was ransacked my some hooligans. Nothing was stolen...
...But they found my camera and used it to take photos of themselves. This is a hooligan examining my penknife.
Andre, another pilgrim who had walked from France. He had been turned away for no reason by the Syrian border police and was stuck in Turkey.
Begging in the border again. This time to get into Syria, which I was more worried about than Turkey. This man gave me the money I needed and, it later turned out, enough to get into Jordan as well.
Syrians are pretty crazy. This man, to overcome the language barrier, showed me his guns. And his bullet wounds. He's not a soldier, he's just a lunatic.
Syria is the beginning of Arabia. Long robes and head towels are now in fashion.
Dry ground and flat rooves. The beginning of the desert.
After 9 hours in the Israeli border I was told I was not allowed into the country, and in case I didn't believe them they put this in my passport. Two red lines is not a good sign.
Me in Amman. I was not allowed into Israel so I couldn't complete my pilgrimage. I spent a long time waiting to speak with people from the embassy, but no joy.
Then Richard said he would come and finish the pilgrimage for both of us. This is us heading off from Amman.
At the Israeli border I handed over my staff and Richard took it onward
August 29 2009, seven months after setting off from Brussels, Richard arrives in Jerusalem without me.
The Holy City. I won't be able to go there legally for at least 10 years.
