Spells for Travelers - The Spells

The Encyclopedia of 5000 Spells - Judika Illes 2009

Spells for Travelers
The Spells

Travelers have traditionally been perceived as a vulnerable group of people and in need of protection against all manner of dangers along the way.

Celestial Travel Guide Spells

That old saintly stand-by, Saint Christopher, has been removed from the official registry of saints. However other spirits provide protection for travelers.

Travel Guides (1) Archangel Raphael

Archangel Raphael is the patron and protector of travelers. In the apocryphal Book of Tobit, Raphael is the angel who accompanies the hero on his journey. Request that he accompany you as well. Raphael is summoned by his emblem, a fish.

Charge a white candle with your desire and burn it.

Place a fish charm next to the candle.

When the candle has burned completely out, wear the charm or carry it in a charm bag. Use it to feel the archangel’s presence in times of danger, stress, or need.

Travel Guides (2) Ganesha

Ganesha, the Hindu elephant-headed spirit, is traditionally invoked before beginning every substantial journey. Request his guidance and protection, and that he open the roads for smooth, happy traveling. Make an offering of peanuts, golden raisins, or candy to Ganesha prior to setting out on a journey.

Travel Guides (3) Hermes

Hermes rules tricks, travelers and communication. The messenger spirit of the Greek pantheon, he always knows the right direction. Hermes offers a special oracle if you’re traveling and find yourself lost.

Pull over in a safe spot if driving. Plug up your ears if walking.

Make your petition.

The very first words you hear are your directions. If you’re in the car, turn on the radio. Children’s words are especially significant.

Travel Guides (4)

Jizo is the Japanese Buddhist Guardian of the Roads. To take advantage of his protection post his image wherever the road threatens danger. Keep another image of Jizo in your home or on your property. Whenever your journeys safely conclude, place a stone near one of Jizo’s images.

Travel Guides (5) Odin

Odin, the All-Father, patriarch of the Norse and Teutonic spirits, is a great traveler. He may be petitioned for safe, smooth travel and happy, insightful adventures. Offer him a glass of mead or aquavit. He’s also pleased with less tangible offerings: compose a poem as a petition to him: if a crow or wolf-like dog appears, your petition has been heard.

Baggage Handling and Return Spell

Tuck a bit of comfrey root into luggage to ensure its safety and arrival at your destination.

Basil Sweet Journey Spell

Basil is laid in the grave to assist the soul’s journey after death, but it also benefits living travelers. Charge a small basil plant or sprig of leaves with your love and blessings. Give it to guests as they depart so that further journeys are safe and happy.

Come Home Safe Spell

To bring a lover home safely, burn aloes wood and frankincense daily.

Don’t Leave Spell

To prevent someone in your household from embarking on a long journey, collect seven small stones from seven different roads, one rock from each road. Put them at the threshold outside the front door to your home.

Feverfew Travel Spell

Feverfew is popularly used to treat migraine headaches; it’s magically used to treat other headaches, like overbooked hotels, lost luggage, and missing reservations. Feverfew protects travelers from mishaps on the road. Place dried or fresh blossoms in charm bags and sachets. Carry one on your person; tuck others into luggage, glove compartments or anything else you can think of.

Moonstone Travel Charm

Charge a moonstone with your blessings, love, and best magic wishes and than activate it by exposing it to moonbeams overnight. Give it to someone you love as protection while they travel.

Mugwort Happy Trails Spell

Mugwort is an ancient traveler’s talisman. Roman foot soldiers placed sprigs of mugwort in their shoes. Allegedly this forestalls foot problems on long walks as well as providing protection and good fortune. Try wearing it pinned inside your clothing or in a charm bag.

Protection Spell (1) Hazel

Bind or wrap hazel branches around a staff or walking cane for protection during journeys, spiritual as well as physical.

Protection Spell (2) Henna

A ball of henna paste pushed into a man’s palm by a woman provides protection, and promotes his fidelity during separation.

Psalm Protection

Recite Psalm 121 aloud seven times for safe travel alone at night.

Scarlet Pimpernel Spell

Wear or carry scarlet pimpernel wildflowers to prevent mishaps and unpleasant surprises while traveling.

Swallow’s Blood Powder

No swallows need be harmed for this spell. The powder’s red color derives from botanicals alone. Swallows are famous for their lengthy migrations. They are grand travelers among birds. Their power is invoked in the name of this powder to provide protection for you.

Grind dragon’s blood resin, red sandalwood powder, red rose petals, and orrisroot.

Sprinkle powder on charcoal and fumigate yourself, your vehicle, your traveling clothes, and your luggage.

Sweet Return Spell

Charge a candle with your desire, and keep it burning in the window to ensure a loved one’s safe return. Before the candle burns out, if the person hasn’t returned, charge and light another one.

Traveler’s Home Protection Spell

Should the person perceived as the chief-protector of the household go on a journey, this spell may be cast to protect those left behind. The protector performs the spell.

Three days before departure, gather seven small stones.

Spit on each one.

Place them outside the house: one at each of the home’s four corners, one on either side of the entrance door and one over the door.

Take some salt in the palm of your hand and from the outside, facing the house, blow it at the house.

Traveler’s Mirror Charm

When sleeping in an unprotected room, crush and peel a single clove of garlic. Rub this against a small mirror and place this mirror face up underneath your bed.

Traveler’s Protective Charm

Shape a piece of red flannel into something roughly the shape of a finger. Stuff it with crossroads dirt, coal dust, or antimony powder (kohl). Add a small piece of real silver. Sew up the charm and carry it with you to keep from getting lost.

Traveler’s Totem

The mountain lion (cougar) is the guardian of travelers. Carry a carved animal fetish of a cougar to accompany you on your journeys.

Walking Stick Spells

A very fine line exists between a walking stick and a magical staff. Is it coincidental that wandering magicians from Merlin to Gandalf are so frequently depicted leaning on their staffs? Travel with one for magical protective purposes.

Blackthorn Travel Stick

Carve a walking stick/magic staff from blackthorn. Walk with it to preserve you from harm.

Elder Stick

Carve a staff or walking stick from elder wood to guard against the inherent dangers of the road. For maximum enchantment, hollow out the wood and stuff it with magical herbs.

Rowan Stick

A magic staff carved from rowan wood masquerades as a walking stick. Rowan is a preferred wood for divination because it sharpens the powers of perception, clairvoyance, and discrimination. The traveler with this staff is believed less likely to get lost in every sense of the word, or to venture into danger.

Automobile Travel Spells

Accident Prevention Bath

The following protects against accidents, particularly if one is feared because of a curse or a hex cast with iron.

Pour boiling water over the herb feverfew to create an infusion.

Add the infusion to your bath prior to the journey.

For extra benefit, carry feverfew in the car.

Appease the Spirits Spell

Destructive spirits that cause car collisions cluster at roadside intersections, the proverbial crowd at the crossroads. These spirits aren’t necessarily evil but they are frustrated, resentful and angry, allegedly because they’re homeless and have no positive contact with the living.

To some extent this is a development of modern life; people used to perform rituals at crossroads. Now we just drive through. This is aggravated at crowded intersections, where there are complicated turning maneuvers and palpable human feelings of tension and resentment. Spirits and humans feed off each other’s feelings, worsening the situation. These spirits signal their presence through:

Clusters of collisions at one spot

Inexplicable collisions occurring consistently at one spot

In some places, rural mountainous Thailand for instance, collisions, in general, are perceived as being the work of frustrated, angry spirits. So is this one more thing to be anxious about? No. Magical remedial actions may be taken.

Build the spirits a home. All they require is a little house, bird-house or doll’s-house size, atop a post, near the intersection. This house does not have to be at the center but may be tucked safely along the side. Also, greet the spirits as you pass: salute; honk; shout “hi!” This keeps them content and happy, and may even turn them into amiable, helpful spirits.

Ash Leaf Safety Spell

Keep at least one whole dried ash leaf in your car for magical safety and protection.

Automobile Protection Oil

Dab Protection Oil onto the seatbelts, steering wheel, tires, and whatever else you perceive as vulnerable.

Braided Sweetgrass Safety Spell

Maintain a braid of sweetgrass in the car. Replace it annually or following an accident, burning or burying the old one.

Cat’s Claw Spell

“Cat’s claws” are thorns that resemble real cat’s claws from a botanical species native to South America. Place a few in a conjure bag, and keep it in your glove compartment for safety.

Durga and Kali Auto Safety Spell

Limes are believed able to remove evil, particularly that caused by low-level malevolent entities. Limes remove the entities as well. This charm may be consecrated to Durga and/or Kali, spiritual matrons of professional drivers.

This spell requires three limes, two long, hot red peppers (the type shaped like a sword rather than a lantern), plus a sharp needle with wire or cord strong enough to support the limes (thin thread will break).

Pierce the limes vertically, the peppers horizontally.

First pierce one lime, then a pepper, a lime, a pepper and finally a lime.

Attach this to your rear-view mirror or it place on the dashboard.

Make a new one each Saturday.

Dispose of the old amulet either by burning or by placing in Earth and allowing it to deteriorate naturally. Do not eat the limes or peppers. The wire may be re-used indefinitely.

Eye of the Tiger

Keep tiger’s eye gemstones in the car to prevent accidents.

Fairy Tears

“Fairy tears” are the nickname for the crystal gemstone staurolite, also known as “cross stone.” Twinned crystals form into a cross or an X. Fairy tears allegedly protect against car accidents: keep them in the glove compartment, or wear one as a traveler’s charm.

Glove Compartment Conjure Bag

Place the following inside a red conjure bag: salt, a small red horn charm, a tiny knife, sword, or scissors.

Add any or all of the following: wormwood, High John the Conqueror root, or a piece of palm blessed on Palm Sunday.

Add one drop of Holy Water and place it in your glove compartment.

Anoint with one drop of Holy Water once a week or whenever the bag has offered protection.

If you normally carry cloth handkerchiefs, substitute one for the red bag. Wrap the items in the handkerchief, tying the magical bundle up with a red ribbon.

Glove Compartment Shrine

The unofficial saint, Dr. Jose Gregorio Hernandez, died in a traffic accident while bringing medicine to a patient. He now uses his powers to prevent similar experiences from happening to others. Keep Dr. Jose Gregorio’s votive image inside vehicles for protection.

Green Kelp Safety Spell

Place powdered kelp inside a green bag. Keep it in the glove compartment for auto safety.

Nervous on the Road Spell

Whether you’ve had bad experiences and have thus developed fear or whether you possess inexplicable phobias about driving, apples can help you overcome your fear, making driving a calmer, if not necessarily more pleasurable, experience.

Eat apples as much as possible, in any form: fresh apples, baked apples, apple pastry or whatever you can conceive.

Drive with a bag of apples beside you in the car.

Eventually your fear will pass.

Ogun’s Protection Spells

Because Ogun is the spirit of metal, and because automobiles are crafted from metal, Ogun is the patron of those who travel by car. The connection is deeper, however. According to legend, Ogun cleared the very first road, freeing space with his machete. Ogun created the roads that made automobile travel possible. In West Africa, to say that the road was hungry is to indicate that a fatal accident occurred. Papa Ogun determines who has accidents and who does not, who survives accidents and who does not. Thus his protection is extremely valuable.

Ogun Protection Spell (1) Knife

Ogun’s charm knife protects against accidents.

Completely cover a red ribbon with black and red seed beads. Beads may be glued on, however for added power, sew each bead, focusing on your desire for protection and blessings of safe travel.

Wrap this ribbon tightly around the handle of a small knife. (This may be a real knife or a ritual knife.)

Light a black and red double-action candle, making an invocation requesting protection.

Dip the knife blade into a glass of dark rum seven times.

Light a cigar and pass the knife through its smoke seven times.

Place the knife beside the double-action candle.

Surround the large candle and knife, with seven smaller red and black candles and burn them.

When all the candles have burned down, place the knife in your glove compartment or carry it in a conjure bag.

For added intensification, repeat the spell, beginning at Step 3, either three or seven times.

Ogun Protection Spell (2) Steak

A traditional offering is made to invoke auto safety. This is most appropriately performed on a Wednesday. Dress in red and/or black while performing ritual.

Buy the best cut of steak you can afford.

Pour a libation of rum for Ogun.

Rub the raw steak all over the car, tires and bumpers, concentrating on your petition for safety and protection.

Leave it on for a while before washing the car.

Dispose of the steak, do not eat it. Should a dog unexpectedly show up and if it’s appropriate, give the dog the steak. Dogs are Ogun’s sacred animals.

Plantain Auto Safety Spell

This spell refers to plantain the herb rather than the plantain that resembles a banana. Carry plantain leaves in your car to prevent malicious spirits from entering and attempting to co-pilot.

Snake Head Protection Spell

Keep a snake head root in the glove compartment for protection.

Spirit Valet Parking Spell

Should you require a parking space in an area where they are rare, begin this spell before you arrive at your destination.

Request assistance from whomever you perceive as your spiritual, magical patron. If their identity is unclear to you, request assistance from your guardian angel, fairy godmother, or ancestral spirit.

Tell them what you need; then make up a little rhyme or chant, something like:

I need a safe spot close to home,

It’s getting late; I don’t want to roam.

Murmur this repeatedly until your space is found.

Wormwood Spell

Place wormwood in a small drawstring bag and hang it from the rearview mirror for magical accident prevention.

Travel By Water

Amulets For Travel Over the Waters

This charm protects whether traveling by boat, flying over the water, or driving in a tunnel under the water. Wear or carry any of the items below to provide protection and safe journeying:

Aquamarine

Beryl

Coral

Holed stones (these are particularly beneficial during storms at sea)

Pearls

Bladderwrack Spelt (1)

Bladderwrack is a seaweed that also goes by the name sea spirit—not to be confused with that other seaweed known as sea spirit that also goes by the name agar-agar! Carry bladderwrack for protection when traveling over the water, whether by boat or plane.

Bladderturack Spell (1)

When traveling by boat, carry extra bladderwrack. Should you run into a storm at sea, make a petition to mermaids and other sea spirits and throw a bit of bladderwrack into the waves.

Boat Protection Spell Eye

Paint eyes on boats, so that they can see where they’re going. If yours is a new or particularly valuable boat, this is extra beneficial: these eyes deflect the Evil Eye.

Boat Protection Spell Rope

Pass the entire boat through a rope circle for safety and protection.

Drowning Protection Spell

Various beans (known as St Mary’s beans) float across the seas from the tropics of the Western hemisphere to the shores of the Orkney and Hebrides islands. Carrying one of these beans allegedly protects you from drowning.

Dulse Water Spell

Sprinkle dulse onto the waves to calm the sea.

Hazel Cap

Create a cap from hazel leaves and twigs for luck and safety while journeying at sea. Wear it if you will, but at least keep it with you.

Ma Zu’s Protection

Ma Zu, the Lady of Sailors and Fishermen, began her career as a pious young woman, devoted to Kwan Tin, with whom she still shares altar space. The historic Ma Zu came from a seafaring merchant family and was born in 960 CE on Meizhou Island off Putian in Fujien.

Ma Zu began demonstrating her powers in childhood, demonstrating the ability to rescue people while she lay in a shamanic trance, resembling a coma. Those saved had a vision of a little girl. In life, she was able to send out her spirit to rescue those in danger of drowning at sea. After death, she continues performing miracles. Ma Zu calms typhoons and rescues people from storms and pirates.

Burn red candles in Ma Zu’s honor before beginning your journey.

Invoke her name during an emergency.

Should she perform a genuine miracle for you, a vow to visit one of her shrines in China, Taiwan, or Singapore may be in order.

Ocean Safety Mojo Hand

Place three garlic cloves, three pine needles or pine nuts and a pinch of rosemary in a mojo bag, together with a silver charm in the shape of an anchor.

Playing Cards Water Spell

To calm a storm at sea, or at least to provide individual safety, toss a pack of playing cards into the waves as Christopher Columbus allegedly once did.

Rosemary Spell

Rosemary derives its name from rosmarinus, which means “dew of the sea.” Carry it with you for safe travel on the ocean.

Shipwreck Spell (1)

Among the charges most frequently leveled against European witches was that of causing shipwrecks. Hang garlic from boats to protect against malevolent enchantment.

Shipwreck Spell (2)

Hanging garlic from boats is all well and good if it’s your own boat, but what if you’re only a worried passenger? In this case, try packing garlic with you to prevent shipwreck. If it’s a day trip or ferry ride, stick three cloves in your pocket.

Smooth Sailing Spell

To ensure smooth sailing and sunny skies while aboard ship, exploit an old nautical superstition.

Should you find a coin on deck, toss it into the wind before sailing to buy favorable weather.

Although not as effective as a genuine surprise find, you can, of course, arrange to find a coin in order to fulfill the ritual.

Otherwise, make ritual offerings prior to sailing.

Smooth Sailing Talisman

An ancient Coptic talisman invokes Poseidon’s blessings of protection while at sea.

The required image depicts Poseidon brandishing his trident, with one foot on a dolphin.

Draw this on parchment paper (artistic ability not required) and carry in a charm bag.

For maximum power, have the image engraved on aquamarine or beryl, the stones that Poseidon holds sacred.

Charge and consecrate the talisman before putting out to sea.

Ti Plant Safety Spell

The first Hawaiians traveled from Tahiti via outrigger canoes, so they knew something about water travel safety. Carry ti leaves on your journey. According to Hawaiian tradition, ti plant leaves protect vessels from harm and individuals from drowning.

Tobacco Safety Spell

In South American tradition—and many others—no journey over the water was initiated without an offering to water spirits requesting safe passage. Tobacco is a sacred plant indigenous to the Western hemisphere; use the actual botanical in this spell, not the contents of cigar or cigarette.

Throw real tobacco plant leaves into the water before the start of your journey to receive spiritual protection.

Wormwood Water Safety Spell

Carry wormwood on your journey over water. It allegedly offers magical protection from sea serpents and other creatures of the deep.