But the new path he had chosen was not always as easy or as straightforward as he hoped it would be.In this truly extraordinary memoir, Phra Peter Pannapadipo describes his ten-year metamorphosis into a practicing Buddhist monk, while being initiated into the intricacies of an unfamiliar Southeast Asian culture.Phra Peter tells his story with compassion, humour and unflinching honesty. It's the story of a 'Phra Farang' - a foreign monk - living and practicing his faith in an exotic and intriguing land.

    Her childhood memories are vividly portrayed, leaving the reader chuckling and enjoying a warm sense of comfortable nostalgia. Photographs and recipes complement page after page of tales that burst with the rich vitality we have come to expect from Victoria Twead.

     With their incurable curiosity and desire for adventure, they sold all their belongings and flew to America in search of a boat. The pull of the ocean was too strong to ignore any longer. Four years prior, they circumnavigated the globe on their thirty-three foot boat, Mariah. Now they wanted a new challenge. From the perils at Pitcairn to the grand statues of Easter Island, Jackie and Noel set sail south to the remotest inhabited island in the world. Along the way, they lose a friend and come nail-bitingly close to losing their new boat, but they gained so much more: a voyage that left them breathless from fear and a journey of not only travel but of two truly nomadic gypsies. This is a story of storms of emotions and oceans, travel, love and relationships, and two people figuring out life and fulfilling their need to move and be challenged.

    His body twitched, and then lay still.The Lama nodded again to the acolyte, who touched flame to the third stick of incense. "Spirit now released from the suffering body," said the Lama, "pay attention before setting out on your journey; pay attention for I shall detail to you the steps you must take, and the path you must follow..."The fourth stick of incense was lit, and the smoke trailed upwards, as if it had been drawn in blue-gray chalk, straight as a pillar in the almost airless room...

    Anything manmade or designed to make travel easy was out. With a backpack full of water bottles, and the remotest corners of desert before him, he began his toughest test yet of physical and mental endurance.Badwater Basin sits 282 feet below sea level in Death Valley, the lowest and hottest place in the Western Hemisphere. Mount Whitney rises 14,505 feet above sea level, the highest point in the contiguous United States. Arnold spent seventeen days traveling a roundabout route from one to the other, traversing salt flats, scaling dunes, and sinking into slot canyons. Aside from bighorn sheep and a phantom mountain lion, his only companions were ghosts of the dreamers and misfits who first dared into this unknown territory. He walked in the footsteps of William Manly, who rescued the last of the forty-niners from the bottom of Death Valley; tracked John LeMoigne, a prospector who died in the sand with his burros; and relived the tales of Mary Austin, who learned the secret trails of the Shoshone Indians. This is their story too, as

    Her glorified image of life abroad is crushed as she battles rogue tradesmen and vicious local wildlife.From stalking a neighbour to encountering trees with testicles, will she weather the storms of expat life or wish she had never left the UK?A Kiss Behind the Castanets is the first instalment of Jean Roberts's lighthearted and uplifting tale in her Moving to Spain series.Perfect for fans of Victoria Twead, Chris Stewart, and Alan Parks.

    In a book, rich with characters and plants, this is a romantic and alluring leap into Spanish rural life with the author and his partner, a flamenco dancer, who buy a farm in a remote, steep valley and set about clearing land, planting and harvesting olives.

    In The Soul of a Pilgrim, Paintner identifies eight stages of the pilgrims way and shows how to follow these steps to make an intentional, transformative journey to the readers inner wild edges. Each phase of the exploration requires a distinct practice such as packing lightly, being uncomfortable, or embracing the unknown. Paintner shows how to cultivate attentiveness to the divine through deep listening, patience, and opening oneself to the gifts that arise in the midst of discomfort.

    After almost twenty years in ministry, Walker was laid off twice, lost his home and savings, was diagnosed with bipolar II disorder, and then his wife filed for divorce just a few days before their twenty-fourth anniversary.Bonhoeffer saw the storms of political upheaval and pressure on Christians coming at warp speed, and he called believers to meet it head on by following Jesus, who bids believers to come and die.In BREAKFAST WITH BONHOEFFER, Walker brings to a new generation the timeless teachings of Bonhoeffer, especially the teaching that calls Jesus' followers to break free from the tyranny of popular culture and religious thinking. It also offers hope for those who face loss or have been hurt by the economic downturn.

    It is an observant and wry memoir and travelogue, intensely personal yet speaking to universal experiences of love and loss. Along the narrow roads and hairpin turns, the narrative reveals the beauty of the ordinary and the commonplace and asks stark questions about how we fill the empty places that a loved one leaves behind. It is a meditation on the possibility of faith, one that is unflinching, uncompromising, and altogether unsentimental when confronted by the ultimate test of belief. This book is not only a well-told memoir, but a testimony to the truth that love is stronger than death.

    Author Amanda Hudson provides a personal touch with cultural curiosities, profound questions about the nature and practice of faith, as she travels to five countries: Brazil, Wales, Tanzania, China, and Honduras.Part reflection, part entertaining travelogue, Coffee Tea, and Holy Water explores everything from each culture's offer of hospitality to life in a Masaai boma. "There are lessons to be learned from other countries that are not visible in our own culture," writes Hudson, "Questions that are not our questions. Struggles that are not our normal struggles. And yet, when we look around the throne one day at the nations assembled there, instead of marveling at the diversity, I think we will actually be fascinated by what we all had in common." This is a book about the places we meet, what we share, how we can learn to cross borders (geographical, cultural, personal), and learning that the steps to do so make all the difference.Honest, witty, and thought-provoking, these stories come from a young woman raised in the South, who found herself wondering what "normal" Christianity looked like in other countries.

    Whatever happened to planes, trains and automobiles? But Father Dave Pivonka knew that the Camino—the ancient pilgrim path to the tomb of Saint James the Apostle in Santiago—offered an opportunity to focus on God in the stripped-down environment typical of the religious journey known as a pilgrimage. Father Dave takes you along with him, eager to show that God wants to take care of you whether or not you can see down the road or, if tired and sore, you're tempted to quit. His Camino hike holds real lessons for your own life's journey.

    Before sisters Sue and Linda inherit a village house in the hills they have little interest in Spain, but on travelling out to see their new possession they begin to warm to the idea of spending time there with their husbands Paul and Bill. After an enjoyable summer holiday the prospect of living in the village becomes irresistible and this book describes their transition from visitors to residents and the diverse selection of people they meet along the way. This amusing and informative memoir is an ideal read for those interested in the possibilities of expat life in rural Spain.

    With little money and even even less nautical experience they leave their small-town home in Arkansas to embark on an adventure they hope will last for a year or two but which evolves into a quarter-century voyage of discovery spanning half the world. Come along with Randy and Cheryl as they cruise their small boat to intriguing destinations that you won’t find in any tourist brochure. Along the way they discover the best and worst the sailing life has to offer as they visit twenty-nine countries in the Caribbean, Central and South America and the South Pacific. Their adventures and misadventures include encounters with hurricanes, thieves, drug smugglers and a disastrous tsunami as well as lasting new friendships formed with local people and fellow sailors all along their route. Cruising under sail is a lifestyle like no other and though there are sometimes hardships, those who take the plunge will be rewarded with a life of adventure and freedom that may be impossible to find any other way in the modern world.

    The story of High-Ranking Mormon leader Hans Mattsson seeking sincere answers from his church but instead finding contempt, fear, doubt...and eventually peace