on the way
663
1.0
- idiom
:
de camino
- But we're on the way home right now.
- on the way home
- on the way back
- a step on the way
So we I was on the way to Cornwall.
- So we I was on the way to Cornwall.
- Oh man, you don't even breathe on the way there because you're bracing.
- And I was on the way to the hospital myself.
- And you know, he's already on the way to the the appointment.
- I remember that part of it on the way to work the the next shift.
- So I'm now on the way to Pentonville.
- And there is indeed a dragon on the way, as we're going to find out.
- A lot of things on the way and yeah.
Examples
-
A funny thing happened to me on the way to the Board of Trustees library meeting.
Fiction book (1990) -
We're in the taxi on the way to the airport.
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And I was on the way to the hospital myself.
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Tony, the driver, he died on the way to the hospital.
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Help is on the way.
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I am sitting in the car on the way to the church.
Academic text (1995) -
And a difficult thing happened to me on the way to my lesson.
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It's nowhere special, but it's on the way to everywhere special.
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Santa Claus got lost on the way to my house.
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We're in the taxi on the way to the airport.
Synonyms
144
3.7
While traveling to a place
How Close
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'travelling towards or en route' is directly derivable from 'on' (indicating position/location) combined with 'way' (a route or path), so the phrase simply indicates being 'on a route' to somewhere. This is a common, compositional English prepositional phrase with close equivalents in other languages (e.g. Spanish 'de camino', French 'en route'), making it immediately comprehensible to a B1 learner who knows the constituents.
Etymology
On the way comes from the simple image of someone moving along a road or path toward a place, where on shows they are on that path and the way means the road or route. So when someone says they are on the way, it means they are 'travelling to' a place or 'in the process of arriving'.