One of the first things John and I have done as we have reached each new destination on our trip is get a couple maps. Generally, we’d look for a walking map of Centro, as they called it in Spain, or Center Ville, as they called it in France. In Madrid, Barcelona, and Paris, we’d also pick up Metro maps to see how the different lines in each metro area’s underground transport system connected. As travelers, we had a simple philosophy for getting around: Get a hotel near Centro; walk when you can (i.e. almost always because you don’t want to miss some perfect tavern or café); and if your morning walk landed you in a faraway part of town, take the tube home.

John seemed to look forward to the map ritual. I think it grounded him and prepared him for adventure. By the end of our two or three days in a location, the colorful “plans” would practically be disintegrating from being folded and unfolded so many times. For the most part, as long as there appeared to be a reasonable route between where we where and where we called home base for our short stay, all was right with the world. When the maps lacked detail, or did not cover a portion of the city where we wanted to visit, John’s generally upbeat mood could turn sour and, even though I was less avid a map reader, my confidence about getting around without a good command of the language would buckle.

We rented cars for seeing the white (hilltop) towns of Andalusia and the Luberon area of Provence. For these excursions, we opted to get GPS systems. Programmed to deliver instructions in British accented vs. American English, we nicknamed our disembodied voice Emily. At times, she was our best friend (like when she led us back to the highway from the top of a narrow cliff-hugging road), and at other times she was our worst enemy. On the way to Arco de Frontera, she sent us in a loop several times, instructing us to turn left when she meant right, then, after the system could tell we were heading in the wrong direction having us backtrack and make the same mistake. It took us several loops to recognize she had a bug in her program.

Of course, maps couldn’t tell you everything you wanted to know about a city. After we checked into the San Gil, our hotel in Seville, we decided to walk to Centro, check out the monster cathedral (the third largest in all of Europe) and scope out places to spend New Year’s Eve. Unfortunately, we chose a route to town center where we saw nothing but a few old churches, forgettable tapas bars and colorful banners of the baby Jesus hanging from balconies. As it turned out, if we simply went a different route, we would have wandered down the Alameda de Hercules and experienced a wonderland of streetlife.

On our second day in Seville, we walked towards Centro following the narrowest, meandering set of roads. One street in Santa Cruz, still open to car traffic, was so narrow, a well-dressed businesswoman got out of her late-model German car to move café tables and chairs closer to the buildings on either side so she could pass.

And I had to marvel at the situation. Most of these tiny streets were actually on our map. These were the very alleyways legendary Don Juan, ‘The Seducer of Seville,” took refuge in as he dashed from one liaison to another. Yes, most of them were on our map. And our map allowed us to navigate a path to Palacio Lebrija or the Catedral back to the San Gil. I wanted to say, “Thank you, thank you, thank you” to all the cartographers who ever lived. Their nitpicking personalities probably drove their mates crazy, but they sure made my life easier. Maps, I had to conclude, were blessings of the highest magnitude.

Seeing where you are on your path is no small thing.