All right, I’ve been lazy, but as my aunt reminded me, I have a story to finish.
The bar in Finisterra shut down, and the boys still hadn’t come to find us. We moseyed on back up to the pension house and found our note in the street...somehow it had come off the door handle. No sign of the boys. We tried to call up through the windows in case they’d gone in, but there was no response. Christa mentioned that some guy earlier in the trip had scaled his way onto the balcony when he was locked out of a place...yeah, RIGHT...there was NO scaling this building, either side. I checked. (I had already thought of that, but McGyver I ain’t, and our only Chuck Norris relative was one of the missing boys.)
So we waited. It was about 1:30 at this point. There was a dumpster across the street from the pension, and someone had very thoughtfully decided to dispose of a sofa right next to it. So we sat down and waited. Had a butterscotch. Waited some more. I decided to go cruise the harborfront again, in case we’d missed them, and told Christa I’d be back in ten minutes. No joy. The cafes were all shut down and the only people on the harbor were locals. As I climbed back up the hill to the pension, I could hear voices coming down the hill.
2am and the boys were back. Ricardo seemed fine, but Skip must’ve added about another 5k to his walk back by weaving back and forth across the street...he was blitzed. Once again, red wine had done in the kangaroo (turns out that was the story back in Villafranca, the day before he climbed to O Ceb, too). Their beach had been on the OTHER SIDE of the cape...no chance we would’ve ever found them. They’d had a blast, and we weren’t to the point where we were pissed off yet (we meaning me, since Christa NEVER gets pissed off), so after being obnoxious in the streets for another five minutes or so and waking up our pension owner on the third floor (something we’d been trying NOT to do, which is why we didn’t just buzz her to let us in), we all just went inside to crash.
I started getting my stuff ready for the morning, which was coming in five hours. We had a room with two twin beds, and when we got into our beds, Christa didn’t turn out the light. It was funny...we both just laid there and looked at each other for a while...it was our last night together and I knew how much I was going to miss her. After I got on that bus, our Camino would be at an end. I think she was thinking the same thing. We went back over a few of our stories and giggled a lot. She was one of the best gifts the Camino gave me, and she said the same thing to me. It was humbling...I’d thought of her as a gift for weeks, but it was hard to imagine that I’d been the same for her. What an incredibly good friend she’d been.
The alarm went off early...I stumbled to the shower and packed up the rucksack one more time. She got dressed to walk to the bus stop with me. We were too late for coffee, but we got one last picture and watched the sun come up over the harbor. We sang her sun song one more time...she taught it to me in German and said she sings it every morning, and also at school when it’s a child’s birthday (forgot to mention, apparently, that Christa is an elementary school teacher and has the same 30 kids from 1st grade through 4th before starting over again with a new crop). The song in translation is:
Light from heaven
Light for your heart
Light for all creatures, and
May light be on your way.
When the bus pulled away, she stood on tiptoe and waved with both arms high over her head till we were out of sight. I assume she waved till we were out of sight...by then, I couldn’t see through my tears.
I couldn’t concentrate on that for long, though, for a couple reasons. 1) The bus driver apparently wanted to give all his passengers a taste of what it’s like to be a passenger in a bus doing a NASCAR road course at full speed, and 2) we were driving along some truly gorgeous coastline at sunrise, and I’d missed a lot of it by walking through rain and fog to get there. After a while, I managed to fall asleep.
I was supposed to have two and a half hours in Santiago before I had to make it to the train station at 2, so I was pretty excited when we pulled into the bus station at 10:30, after only 2 hours and ten minutes. So I took my time getting back to the cathedral. Unfortunately, it was still only 10:30 when I reached the cathedral. Uh oh. Watch stopped. After a moment of panic, I got the time, and was back to my former time limit. I wandered the square, looking for Hank or Al or Mimi and Jocelyn...anyone familiar. No one. The familiar faces that had resurfaced time and again on the Camino, friends or acquaintances or just faces, had all cycled through, and this crop had been behind us. It felt really strange to be on my own.
A bit of last-day shopping. Hit the little Thai-incense-thrift store again from a few days ago, where I’d gotten the gorgeous blue scarf that Christa had loved so much and that I left stuffed in the bottom of her rucksack for her to find after I’d gone. Picked up a few for me and one for my mom. Had a spot of coffee, did some thinking about how strange it would be to leave the Camino and the realm of the yellow arrows for good, and headed to the train station.
The wait for the train was uneventful. But like in Paris a month ago, I got everything else wrong as soon as I got on. I got the car right but got the seat wrong, and the conductor had to move me, which was frustrating. No one got into my old seat, and I fumed about it for a little while till the man next to me with the walrus moustache explained in Spanish that there would be stops along the way and someone would eventually occupy my seat.
He was looking at sheet music. I asked him what he played. Mandolin. Samba music. He was an auto shop teacher and was traveling with his two little daughters, about 5 and 8. He was very kind, spoke NO English, and it was very touching to watch him with his girls. And he wanted to talk about EVERYTHING. I’m sure it was clear from my botched Spanish and my ubiquitous present-tense verbs (I NEVER got the hang of verb tenses in Spanish class, either in middle school OR college) that my ability in the language was limited, but that didn’t stop him from wanting to discuss everything from Spanish literature to the history of the Camino to philosophy to the economy to gas consumption in Europe to the American presidential race. I managed to hold my end of a 20/80 conversation and he seemed satisfied with that, taking my pen and writing words I couldn’t understand in my Sudoku book when I got stuck in the conversation. He wrote his email address, too. Told me he lived in Madrid but didn’t like big cities so he visited his brother a lot in Santiago. He had another in Beijing. VERY nice man. Also rescued me from the intercar pneumatic doors once, which, unlike most automatic doors and windows and things in the States, do NOT reopen when something (me) gets stuck in them, but keep pressing firmly closed with bone-crunching force. That man was a saint.
The train arrived in Madrid after 7 hours and it took me a good 20 minutes to find out how to get onto the Metro system, and another 10 to understand how to buy a ticket to Dawn’s stop. Made it and followed her directions to her apartment and buzzed her just before 10pm. She had a couple friends already there and we headed out for dinner. We found a sidewalk cafe (several, actually, all in a row) with music playing and pretty good food...talked a lot about this and that. We hung it up about 12:15, which I hated to initiate, but I was going to be up at 5:30 for another full day of travel after my second 4-hour night in a row.
It was nice to be in a room by myself, but it felt strange to sort through the pack for one last night routine. I got a decent amount of sleep and dragged myself out of bed before dawn for a shower and my trip to the airport.
The flights passed in a blur. I vaguely noted how inefficient Travelocity had been to route me through Frankfurt on a trip from Madrid to DC. The Frankfurt leg had me in an exit row, YAY, and the gate attendant had promised me another for the leg to DC, which would’ve made the whole day a piece of cake. HAH.
Not to be. I was wedged into a middle seat between IndiaNoDeoderant and SnoresWhileAwake. I seriously considered faking a panic attack due to claustrophobia in order to get myself a bulkhead seat, even if it was going to be next to the screeching 2 year old in the row ahead of us...hey, it worked for the guy who had a Pekingese in a carrier. But decided against it. Tried to practice some of Christa’s serenity. She’d gone on a 10-day SILENT Buddhist retreat, and I imagine that must’ve been where she got her infallible sense of placid acceptance. I turned on Life of Pi, timed the 90 minutes it took for the flight attendants to clear away our lunch trays (which would’ve had any American Airlines FA in fits) and tried to just close my eyes and make 8 hours and 5 minutes pass as quickly as possible.
They did. Customs, baggage claim, exit, and there was my dad. It was SO GOOD to see his face. Strange to get in the truck. Didn’t want my bag in the truck bed; it looked like rain, but the rain never came. Was THRILLED to see gas prices had dropped a good $0.40 since I’d been gone (ha ha, thrilled to see $3.60 gas??). Home, Mom, my brother, and pizza...good, honest-to-God American Domino’s pizza. Bliss.
After something like the Camino, you re-enter your life like you’re getting into an ice-cold swimming pool...one toe at a time. You’re torn between the joy of being home in your own country, and the fear that everything you’ve just gone through will melt away like smoke on the wind. It’s all too much, and you want to wrap the past month around you like a blanket, to insulate you from life-as-normal. It’s disorienting. Driving a car again. I didn’t want to turn on my phone...afraid it would erupt into texts and voice mails and rule my life again. I wanted to tell everyone everything I’d thought and seen and done, and yet it felt like giving it away, like if I talked about it too much, it wouldn’t be mine anymore, there would be none left for me.
The last thing I want is for someone to ask, “So, what did you learn?” Not ready for that yet. Won’t be for a while. The lessons will keep coming for months, maybe years.
I told my friend Trinity today that what makes the Camino such a living metaphor for life is the fact that it’s a linear walk. It’s not some place in the Blue Ridge you drive to, then go hiking, and then come back to the car, back to where you started. Like life, you walk in one direction. You leave one place and arrive at another place far away, with little stops along the way, and people who may be with you for moments or weeks, and there’s no way to tell which it will be when you meet. All you can do is make the most of every encounter, soak in every stunning vista, and be as solidly in the moment as you can be, without longing for company you once had or a tomorrow you hope will go a certain way. The moment is all you have, the piece of earth you’re standing on that moment...nothing else can be predicted. People may reappear when you least expect it...like with Christa in San Juan de Ortega, or when you hope they will, like the German boys at O Cebriero, or far after you’d expected, like Skip in Santiago. But there’s nothing you can do about someone else’s pace, and to try to match yours with someone else’s is always a mistake. You just have to walk your own walk, open your eyes, and look around you, as aware of the here and now as you can be. Like the woman in the candlelit breakfast cafe said, “Aqui y ahora,” here and now, no more.
One day back, and I went to the supermarket. Bought tomatoes and Philly cream cheese, will probably buy a baguette at Panera to make one of Skip’s bocadillos. Lingered long in the lotion aisle. Made a special trip to CVS for its trail mix, the kind I’d brought at the beginning of the trip, and thought of the Pyrenees and Zubiri while I crunched mouthfuls of nuts and raisins and M&Ms. Strange to buy things irrespective of their weight, strange to not have immediately on hand everything I needed (in the car: where’s my hand lotion?), strange to drive 100 miles of errands today and think, that’s about a week’s worth of walking.... Picked up a clothesline and wooden clothespins...thinking of diminishing my dryer use (doubt Virginia’s summer rains will cooperate, but that doesn’t bother me). Brought my cat home from the folks’ house.
Haven’t unpacked the rucksack yet...not ready yet.
Hit the Starbucks and gave the capsule of Finisterra sand to the gal who asked me to bring her back soil from Spain...told her this was one better and she’d know I didn’t just scoop it out of my backyard. She gave me my Grande Raspberry Mocha on the house, and OH it was sweet.
Finally got some Michael Phelps swimming commentary in English...he just won the butterfly...HELL yeah. It’s been tough to miss Olympic swimming, though I feel silly for thinking about it in the face of the experience I’ve had.
The girls are demanding I come out. I’m hoping their jaws will hit the floor and they’ll tell me how great I look, but so far, no one’s commented much beyond my father saying my knees are skinnier. Ha ha. (He said I looked healthy and happy and bright and wonderful.)
I lost a grand total of TWO POUNDS. TWO. One kilo.
Apparently, my body has declared that we will be THIS SIZE. PERIOD. I’m cool with that. A bit blown that I can walk 500 miles in 30 days and not change much, but I choose to believe I was just in awesome shape to start with. Ha ha haaaa. =)
My keyboard is hard to get used to again. I was lucky to have QWERTYs every day past the first day, but the symbols and things were elsewhere and I keep going for them in the wrong places.
And that’s about it. I gotta go see the girls. This will have to do for my initial postmortem report. I’ll keep posting. Keep reading if you wish. I plan to integrate pictures into my daily posts...we’ll see how that goes over the next couple days. I’ll post an announcement if I do.
All for now. Buen Camino.
Friday, August 15, 2008
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Finisterra in the Moonlight
Aaaaaaand...Christa and I are locked out. Ha ha ha. This will be quick, because I only have 13 minutes and am killing time.
Skip made an AMAZING dinner...rizotto. I´ve never eaten any one thing before with so many different flavors going on at once. It was fabulous. He also made a hot German potato salad. Christa had brought ice cream, we had red and white wine, and I brought two little boxes of truffles. It was faboooooo....
After dinner, Christa and I collapsed onto the couches in pre-food-coma mode. Ricardo, the Italian staying with us, had heard about some kind of beach party...buncha peregrinos having a get-together on the beach. The boys were keen to go, but Christa and I wanted to just chill out and maybe take a walk. So off they went.
It wasn´t long before Christa and I decided to take a walk, maybe find the boys, and just take it easy around the town. So we got ready to go...and no key.
THE BOYS HAVE BOTH SETS OF KEYS.
No prob...we´ll just go to the beach to find them.
Uh. Which beach?
NO idea. We thought they´d be at the little one towards the lighthouse, only a 5 minute walk away. Nope.
In the other direction is a much bigger beach, so we headed off that way...I knew the way since I´d walked in and had gone back and forth between the center of town and the sports hall yesterday to get my pack. So we hit the beach. Which was DARK. But quiet and peaceful and moonlit and waves crashing and soft sand. Christa picked up a thousand shells along the way. I made a plastic cup full of the white wine from dinner last longer than anyone else I know could have. We saw flashlights and headed towards them, but it was just Esteban, the unicycle guy (who, I forgot to report, made it to Santiago and then to Finisterra) and four girls who were setting up a tent with him. Apparently they´re sleeping on the beach tonight, which is cool. They hadn´t seen Skip and Ricardo. So we went further. Dodged some fishermen in the dark, picked up more shells, stopped and lay on our backs for a while, looking at the stars and the moon and listening to the little waves crashing. I thought about how, almost exactly a year ago, I was doing the exact same thing with a bonfire near Pebble Beach in CA, listening to the Pacific crashing on the shore nearby, and here I was now, on a beach at the end of the world in Spain, listening to the Atlantic crashing on the shore nearby. It was about 6pm back home by this time, and I put my hands in the water and wondered if my lil nephew was in the waves on the other side of the ocean at that moment....
No boys. Aaaaaaand then it started to rain. So we walked back to the town (a little quicker this time, but not to quick to enjoy how the moon looked on the water) and laughed about how, if the boys hadn´t found their party, then they were just two dudes walking on a moonlit beach, and how uptight two American guys would be about that. Haha.
So here we are in a deserted bar, waiting for them to come find us, watching the Olympic reviews, and thinking about how I´m on that bus in less than 7 hours now and GOD only knows when an Italian and an Australian with two bottles of red wine with them and countless beautiful European peregrinas in town will decide to mosey on back home. Neither one of us wants to buzz Ursula...she´s been wonderful and we don´t want to incur her wrath....
So hope this cider lasts long enough...and that they come home soon. The alarm is set, so I should make it onto the bus. Just hope the boys come back before morning so it can be WITH MY STUFF....
SIGH.
If you´re just checking in, I posted about the day below...this is just a little something extra for the evening....
WHAT is everyone CRYING about???? lol =)
Skip made an AMAZING dinner...rizotto. I´ve never eaten any one thing before with so many different flavors going on at once. It was fabulous. He also made a hot German potato salad. Christa had brought ice cream, we had red and white wine, and I brought two little boxes of truffles. It was faboooooo....
After dinner, Christa and I collapsed onto the couches in pre-food-coma mode. Ricardo, the Italian staying with us, had heard about some kind of beach party...buncha peregrinos having a get-together on the beach. The boys were keen to go, but Christa and I wanted to just chill out and maybe take a walk. So off they went.
It wasn´t long before Christa and I decided to take a walk, maybe find the boys, and just take it easy around the town. So we got ready to go...and no key.
THE BOYS HAVE BOTH SETS OF KEYS.
No prob...we´ll just go to the beach to find them.
Uh. Which beach?
NO idea. We thought they´d be at the little one towards the lighthouse, only a 5 minute walk away. Nope.
In the other direction is a much bigger beach, so we headed off that way...I knew the way since I´d walked in and had gone back and forth between the center of town and the sports hall yesterday to get my pack. So we hit the beach. Which was DARK. But quiet and peaceful and moonlit and waves crashing and soft sand. Christa picked up a thousand shells along the way. I made a plastic cup full of the white wine from dinner last longer than anyone else I know could have. We saw flashlights and headed towards them, but it was just Esteban, the unicycle guy (who, I forgot to report, made it to Santiago and then to Finisterra) and four girls who were setting up a tent with him. Apparently they´re sleeping on the beach tonight, which is cool. They hadn´t seen Skip and Ricardo. So we went further. Dodged some fishermen in the dark, picked up more shells, stopped and lay on our backs for a while, looking at the stars and the moon and listening to the little waves crashing. I thought about how, almost exactly a year ago, I was doing the exact same thing with a bonfire near Pebble Beach in CA, listening to the Pacific crashing on the shore nearby, and here I was now, on a beach at the end of the world in Spain, listening to the Atlantic crashing on the shore nearby. It was about 6pm back home by this time, and I put my hands in the water and wondered if my lil nephew was in the waves on the other side of the ocean at that moment....
No boys. Aaaaaaand then it started to rain. So we walked back to the town (a little quicker this time, but not to quick to enjoy how the moon looked on the water) and laughed about how, if the boys hadn´t found their party, then they were just two dudes walking on a moonlit beach, and how uptight two American guys would be about that. Haha.
So here we are in a deserted bar, waiting for them to come find us, watching the Olympic reviews, and thinking about how I´m on that bus in less than 7 hours now and GOD only knows when an Italian and an Australian with two bottles of red wine with them and countless beautiful European peregrinas in town will decide to mosey on back home. Neither one of us wants to buzz Ursula...she´s been wonderful and we don´t want to incur her wrath....
So hope this cider lasts long enough...and that they come home soon. The alarm is set, so I should make it onto the bus. Just hope the boys come back before morning so it can be WITH MY STUFF....
SIGH.
If you´re just checking in, I posted about the day below...this is just a little something extra for the evening....
WHAT is everyone CRYING about???? lol =)
Finisterra in the Sunshine
Yes, we got it...the sunshine today!!! =) All your sunny thoughts must have helped, because we had a gorgeous day today.
Skip and I nearly strangled our wonderful German hospitaleros last night. They started telling me I needed to get off the computer because they thought I was just going to check email and didn´t realize I needed some time to write a blog. There wasn´t a timer running, and I didn´t have to pay, and when they started harassing me, I told them I would be happy to pay if they wanted me to, but if not, they needed to leave me alone and I´d be done when I was done. What did they want me to get off so quickly for? So they could watch more idiotic German stand-up comedy on YouTube. WHICH THEY DID UNTIL 2:30 AM. Laughing loudly the whole time, never mind the fact that their guests had paid €10 to SLEEP that night. What a bunch of complete CENSORED...you can fill in the blank with your own word. Skip and I were livid. Complete jerks. Can´t believe it after having met so many wonderful Germans on this trip. We try to remind ourselves that 95% of the people and the hospitaleros we´ve met have been simply awesome. However, my next Camino will NOT include Galicia at all. It is a beautiful, beautiful part of the country, but the high-time Camino traffic and the problems associated with it make it totally not worth it.
ANYWAY...woke up this morning to SUNSHINE!!! We resisted our urges to trash the sleeping area and make obscene gestures to the hospitaleros, and headed down to the portside for coffee and breakfast. Which was no longer being served. But we did get the coffee and had some nice quiet morning time. I couldn´t believe it was my last full day with Christa. I´m going to miss her so much. Five different countries were represented for breakfast...Anna from Sweden (whom we met in Foncebadón), Ricardo from Italy (the guitar player from Villar de Mazarife, the night they were singing Proud Mary and all the American classics till late in the night), Christa from Austria, Brad from Australia, and lil´ol´ me from America. Kinda cool when you think about it. We´re missing a lot of the Olympics, but then again, we´re having our own little international party here anyway.
SOOooo...next order of business was to move our bags to the pension house we got for tonight, which is a DREAM. It´s run by a lovely German woman named Ursula, who claims she´s more French than German because she spent some 50 years living in France. Now she runs this pension house with two doubles and some extra-bed space. It´s lovely inside, and the sunshine made it more beautiful, as did the kitchen and the washing machine. None of us needed a full load, but we all threw something in, so I no longer have to ration underwear for my last couple days. It has French windows that open onto a balcony over the street and a view of the Finisterra harbor. Skip says we´re lucky the guys last night were such assholes, or we would´ve stayed there and missed this. I´m glad I didn´t have to spend my last two nights in the sports hall...they haven´t been free like the sports hall would´ve been, but I need Christa´s alarm tomorrow morning to catch the 8:20 bus back to Santiago. If I miss it, I´m screwwwwwwwwed....
Anyway...Skip just walked by this cafe with a HUGE load of ingredients for the masterpiece he´ll be whipping up for us for dinner tonight. I´m hoping for some more of those mashed potatoes he made in Azofra. There are upsides to travelling with a chef.
So after we got settled in at the pension house and got laundry put in, we decided it was time for the Cape and the lighthouse. The sun was out but the sky showed potential for turning dark. So off we went, carrying the things we´d decided we´d burn when we got there. I´d spent some of our coffee time this morning writing a list of a lot of the concerns that have plagued me over the past few weeks and past few YEARS...jotting down insights I´d gained to deal with them...and wound up hating to burn it because I needed to remember the insights. Brad said send ´em out and they´d come back. I had my list, my Mae West hat (battered and bent and coming unwoven and totally wrecked) and the shirt I wore yesterday for my last walk (GOD did it stink...as does my bag...next week I´ll wonder how in the hell I´ve put up with this smell for so long, but right now I barely notice it).
The lighthouse was about 3km away, and we walked along this narrow two-way road that did NOT have room for foot traffic, despite the fact that nearly every pilgrim who walks the Camino and goes to Finisterre heads up this path to the lighthouse. Along the way there was another bronze statue of a pilgrim, like the one at San Roque, leaning into the wind on an eternal journey to the end of the earth and destined never to make it. I got some great shots of the harbor and the lighthouse and the statue and the cross and EVERYTHING.
When we got to the lighthouse, we took some time to wander around and look at things before we headed to the firepit. We all took pictures of ourselves holding the things we´d burn. Brad and Christa both had pairs of socks, and Brad had a bunch of dried sage he´d picked off the roadside back in Frómista and tied to an old hemp bracelet he´d broken. One by one, we put our things in the firepit and watched as they burned. Brad went off on a big rock with his sage and did this Indian sage-burning thing he´s been talking about doing for weeks. Christa paced around the fire and spit into it several times...haven´t asked her what that was all about. I tossed my hat in, watched it start to flame, and was suddenly terrified it was going to catch the wind and blow back out, flaming, onto us (Headline: Wildfire Started in Pilgrim Ritual by Idiotic American Peregrina). Tossed the shirt on top of it and tucked the paper in the corner and watched it all burn.
We won´t catch the sunset at the lighthouse, and we didn´t swim, but hopefully our rituals will work and I´ll get better at keeping some of those concerns from ruling my life anymore. I certainly don´t feel like a new person, but maybe some of that feeling will come later.
We had a beer at the End of the World before we headed back to town, and we shared some music with one another. Christa gave me a beautiful snail shell she found along the path back in La Rioja, and gave Brad a necklace she´d bought back in Manjarin and had been wearing for a couple weeks. It was very touching. I shared some music I found poignant for each of them, based upon things they´d said to me along the way.
We got some shots of ourselves at the stone cross and the 0.0km marker stone...
...and the Camino is over. We´ve done everything we needed to do. As they say, it´s all over but the cryin´.
I´ll get a little teary tomorrow when I have to say goodbye to Christa and get on the bus and start the long trek to Madrid and home, but it´ll feel good to be back, I think.
My brother commented yesterday and said he told Eric to wave to me from the Outer Banks today. Funny. We sat there with our beers, and I was pointing West and telling my friends that in 48 hours, I´d be almost home. I wonder if I was waving west when Eric was waving east. =)
I finally found some beautiful conchilla shells for framing. Good thing I was down to about €5 up on the cape, because they were €1 each and I would´ve bought a million if I could´ve. Can´t wait to see what my mom does with the shells.
And that´s pretty much it, I guess...dunno if I´ll post tomorrow. It´ll be the bus to Santiago, about 2.5 hours to get to the train station across town. I´ll go back through the old town on the way and see if I can find Al or Hank or Mimi and Jocelyn at the cathedral...we figure they might be there by tomorrow. Head back out of town to the train station...catch the train at 2pm, arrive in Madrid at 9...hopefully Dawn will find me at the Metro station she told me to go to, and we´ll hang out and kick around till it´s time for me to leave for the airport at 6am. It´s 6pm now...in 49 hours, I´ll be getting in my dad´s truck and I cannot WAIT.
Been a heckuva trip.
If I don´t post tomorrow, don´t go away forever. I´m sure there will be some postmortem musings.
All for now. Love you all and as always, thanks for reading.
Skip and I nearly strangled our wonderful German hospitaleros last night. They started telling me I needed to get off the computer because they thought I was just going to check email and didn´t realize I needed some time to write a blog. There wasn´t a timer running, and I didn´t have to pay, and when they started harassing me, I told them I would be happy to pay if they wanted me to, but if not, they needed to leave me alone and I´d be done when I was done. What did they want me to get off so quickly for? So they could watch more idiotic German stand-up comedy on YouTube. WHICH THEY DID UNTIL 2:30 AM. Laughing loudly the whole time, never mind the fact that their guests had paid €10 to SLEEP that night. What a bunch of complete CENSORED...you can fill in the blank with your own word. Skip and I were livid. Complete jerks. Can´t believe it after having met so many wonderful Germans on this trip. We try to remind ourselves that 95% of the people and the hospitaleros we´ve met have been simply awesome. However, my next Camino will NOT include Galicia at all. It is a beautiful, beautiful part of the country, but the high-time Camino traffic and the problems associated with it make it totally not worth it.
ANYWAY...woke up this morning to SUNSHINE!!! We resisted our urges to trash the sleeping area and make obscene gestures to the hospitaleros, and headed down to the portside for coffee and breakfast. Which was no longer being served. But we did get the coffee and had some nice quiet morning time. I couldn´t believe it was my last full day with Christa. I´m going to miss her so much. Five different countries were represented for breakfast...Anna from Sweden (whom we met in Foncebadón), Ricardo from Italy (the guitar player from Villar de Mazarife, the night they were singing Proud Mary and all the American classics till late in the night), Christa from Austria, Brad from Australia, and lil´ol´ me from America. Kinda cool when you think about it. We´re missing a lot of the Olympics, but then again, we´re having our own little international party here anyway.
SOOooo...next order of business was to move our bags to the pension house we got for tonight, which is a DREAM. It´s run by a lovely German woman named Ursula, who claims she´s more French than German because she spent some 50 years living in France. Now she runs this pension house with two doubles and some extra-bed space. It´s lovely inside, and the sunshine made it more beautiful, as did the kitchen and the washing machine. None of us needed a full load, but we all threw something in, so I no longer have to ration underwear for my last couple days. It has French windows that open onto a balcony over the street and a view of the Finisterra harbor. Skip says we´re lucky the guys last night were such assholes, or we would´ve stayed there and missed this. I´m glad I didn´t have to spend my last two nights in the sports hall...they haven´t been free like the sports hall would´ve been, but I need Christa´s alarm tomorrow morning to catch the 8:20 bus back to Santiago. If I miss it, I´m screwwwwwwwwed....
Anyway...Skip just walked by this cafe with a HUGE load of ingredients for the masterpiece he´ll be whipping up for us for dinner tonight. I´m hoping for some more of those mashed potatoes he made in Azofra. There are upsides to travelling with a chef.
So after we got settled in at the pension house and got laundry put in, we decided it was time for the Cape and the lighthouse. The sun was out but the sky showed potential for turning dark. So off we went, carrying the things we´d decided we´d burn when we got there. I´d spent some of our coffee time this morning writing a list of a lot of the concerns that have plagued me over the past few weeks and past few YEARS...jotting down insights I´d gained to deal with them...and wound up hating to burn it because I needed to remember the insights. Brad said send ´em out and they´d come back. I had my list, my Mae West hat (battered and bent and coming unwoven and totally wrecked) and the shirt I wore yesterday for my last walk (GOD did it stink...as does my bag...next week I´ll wonder how in the hell I´ve put up with this smell for so long, but right now I barely notice it).
The lighthouse was about 3km away, and we walked along this narrow two-way road that did NOT have room for foot traffic, despite the fact that nearly every pilgrim who walks the Camino and goes to Finisterre heads up this path to the lighthouse. Along the way there was another bronze statue of a pilgrim, like the one at San Roque, leaning into the wind on an eternal journey to the end of the earth and destined never to make it. I got some great shots of the harbor and the lighthouse and the statue and the cross and EVERYTHING.
When we got to the lighthouse, we took some time to wander around and look at things before we headed to the firepit. We all took pictures of ourselves holding the things we´d burn. Brad and Christa both had pairs of socks, and Brad had a bunch of dried sage he´d picked off the roadside back in Frómista and tied to an old hemp bracelet he´d broken. One by one, we put our things in the firepit and watched as they burned. Brad went off on a big rock with his sage and did this Indian sage-burning thing he´s been talking about doing for weeks. Christa paced around the fire and spit into it several times...haven´t asked her what that was all about. I tossed my hat in, watched it start to flame, and was suddenly terrified it was going to catch the wind and blow back out, flaming, onto us (Headline: Wildfire Started in Pilgrim Ritual by Idiotic American Peregrina). Tossed the shirt on top of it and tucked the paper in the corner and watched it all burn.
We won´t catch the sunset at the lighthouse, and we didn´t swim, but hopefully our rituals will work and I´ll get better at keeping some of those concerns from ruling my life anymore. I certainly don´t feel like a new person, but maybe some of that feeling will come later.
We had a beer at the End of the World before we headed back to town, and we shared some music with one another. Christa gave me a beautiful snail shell she found along the path back in La Rioja, and gave Brad a necklace she´d bought back in Manjarin and had been wearing for a couple weeks. It was very touching. I shared some music I found poignant for each of them, based upon things they´d said to me along the way.
We got some shots of ourselves at the stone cross and the 0.0km marker stone...
...and the Camino is over. We´ve done everything we needed to do. As they say, it´s all over but the cryin´.
I´ll get a little teary tomorrow when I have to say goodbye to Christa and get on the bus and start the long trek to Madrid and home, but it´ll feel good to be back, I think.
My brother commented yesterday and said he told Eric to wave to me from the Outer Banks today. Funny. We sat there with our beers, and I was pointing West and telling my friends that in 48 hours, I´d be almost home. I wonder if I was waving west when Eric was waving east. =)
I finally found some beautiful conchilla shells for framing. Good thing I was down to about €5 up on the cape, because they were €1 each and I would´ve bought a million if I could´ve. Can´t wait to see what my mom does with the shells.
And that´s pretty much it, I guess...dunno if I´ll post tomorrow. It´ll be the bus to Santiago, about 2.5 hours to get to the train station across town. I´ll go back through the old town on the way and see if I can find Al or Hank or Mimi and Jocelyn at the cathedral...we figure they might be there by tomorrow. Head back out of town to the train station...catch the train at 2pm, arrive in Madrid at 9...hopefully Dawn will find me at the Metro station she told me to go to, and we´ll hang out and kick around till it´s time for me to leave for the airport at 6am. It´s 6pm now...in 49 hours, I´ll be getting in my dad´s truck and I cannot WAIT.
Been a heckuva trip.
If I don´t post tomorrow, don´t go away forever. I´m sure there will be some postmortem musings.
All for now. Love you all and as always, thanks for reading.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Santiago de Compostela to Finisterra
Well, I´m here, at the end of the world, and like I´d wanted, I came upon the ocean on my feet, in my boots, with the pack. No blisters, no Compeed, no company. It was beautiful, despite the rain and fog.
We got up and packed this morning, hit breakfast and the post office. I am KICKING myself. I was hoping to get a flat photo-type envelope, cardboard, to send the watercolor in, but they didn´t have any hard ones and I couldn´t make him understand that I wanted something that wouldn´t bend. That was too hard for him. So he came up with a box that fit the picture if I cut it out of the mat it came on. So I did, and put it in the bottom. UNPROTECTED. AND THEN PUT STUFF ON TOP OF IT. WHAT WAS I THINKING?????
SIGH. The other thing I´m kicking myself for is that this box was HALF as heavy as the one I sent home from Puenta la Reina, and cost TWICE as much. FIGURE THAT!!! I should´ve just carried it, but the rain made me too nervous and it would´ve had to be in my hands. Or I could´ve left it somewhere, but I didn´t want to be tied to return to a place in Santiago since I´ll have about an hour and a half to cross town from bus station to train station on Wednesday. Grrrr. Hassle. So I´ll get home and some of the best stuff I got will be there in a week...when it´s not as exciting to show everyone. And GOD PLEASE one more miracle, that the watercolor doesn´t get messed up...I´m such an idiot. Sigh. Christa says let it go, it´s gone, it´s done, forget about it. I´m SOOOO good at that, you know....
Anyway, left the Correos and headed to the bus station...got a return from Finisterra with an open date and time (I´ll go at 8:20am on Wednesday), and the bus took off. RAIN. Not really rain, just drizzle the whole way, and LOTS of fog. Our maps in our Camino books are limited, so we had no idea where we were, but somehow we ended up on a coastal route, and saw lots of beautiful fishing villages and misty seascapes. I went into the iPod...spent so much time downloading and arranging playlists, but I should´ve just come with Loreena McKennitt´s ¨An Ancient Muse¨ album...it´s been my Camino album (keep wanting to mention that and forgetting). My Camino theme song has been Caravanserai, and the two before and after it are my camel-plodding-evenly-up-very-steep-incline songs...stride songs...meditation songs. Give it a listen...it´s very moving and great walking music...great for thinking and escaping into your head. PERFECT Camino music.
Midway to Cée, Christa declared she didn´t want to walk in the rain. I am very proud of myself for not adjusting my plans for the sake of staying in company...I told her I wanted to walk and I´d walk come hell or high water. So she and Brad stayed on the bus and I got off...about 14km to Finisterra. Walked alone. It rained, and then it drizzled, and then it stopped, and then it rained again. The rain only lasted about 5 or 10 minutes when it came...guess Dad´s magic raincoat is running out of magic a bit. Ha ha.
A lot of the walk was coastal, and some of it led up over hills and through towns. There was a stretch of eucalyptus forest and then it opened up onto the sea and it was gorgeous...and then it started to rain again. Figures. Hey, with our luck, I´ll take it.
It felt good to walk, and to walk alone, and to walk the last 14 to the sea. At one point, my bag suddenly felt twice as heavy...dunno why, but even that was good to feel, since there were so many times I was plagued with a heavy pack AND a hot sun AND blisters AND 30-plus-km days. The mist and drizzle was nice...it was cool but not quite cold, and really, it was nice.
When I got into Finisterra, I ran into some Germans heading back the other way. I asked if the albergue was ahead. Get this. It´s CLOSED for five days due to water damage. But there´s another sports hall. So I turned around and backtracked a km or so with them...hit the sports hall, got a shower (which was actually not that cold) and headed out to find Christa and Skip.
They pulled me off the street from this burger joint where they had decent burgers, Olympic coverage, and a VERY intolerant barman. We got to watch the men´s 400m free relay!!! AMERICA!!! =) Hope someone at home decides to DVR some swimming for me....
We sat and watched the rain for a while, then wandered out onto the pier, then got rained on, had coffee, watched the rain some more...decided to wait till tomorrow for the lighthouse. You´re supposed to swim in the ocean, burn the clothes you´ve walked in, and watch the sunset from the lighthouse, and the idea is that you wake the next morning a new person. Well...it´s too cold to swim and I don´t have a swimsuit. I can burn a shirt, but the other stuff I have to wear home, and it was expensive, and isn´t wrecked. And the weather will determine whether we get a sunset. Hope it breaks and we get some sun tomorrow.
Christa and Brad had gotten me a bed at another albergue. I was torn. The sports hall sucks, but it´s free, and it´s fine for me. The albergue was another €10. I need dirt cheap and free right now...I´m SO broke, but Christa finally said she´d cover me, so I went and got my bag and now we´re here. I don´t feel right about her paying for my bed...but I can´t keep taking out cash, not right here at the end. Dunno what to do yet. They also want to move to a hotel tomorrow that will run us €15 for the night. Dunno, dunno, dunno.... We´ll see how it plays out.
We went back to the burger joint for dinner. The Olympics were on...men´s tennis between Spain and Italy. We made the mistake of cheering for Spain and ticked off the barman again. Skip wants me to put in here that he nearly came to blows with the guy. He was very rude and yelled at us...Brad was livid and gave him hell right back. Can´t believe how rude some of the barmen and hospitaleros can be when pilgrims are their bread and butter. Some of them forget that the root of their title is ¨hospitality.¨
No peace yet in Finisterra, and these lovely hospitaleros are hassling me to get off so they can get back on, which just exacerbates my feeling that I just want to go home. I was hoping Finisterra would involve some peaceful reflection, but the weather is limiting my ability to disappear and go sit on the beach, or at the lighthouse, so right now, this side-trip has been more hassle than anything else. I am ready to come home. I´m Spained out. It´s been nice, but it´s time to go home, and I wish it was tomorrow instead of Wednesday and Thursday. I guess it´s just the weather.
Anyway. Off to bed. Pray for some sunshine for me. I WANNA GO HOME!! =)
We got up and packed this morning, hit breakfast and the post office. I am KICKING myself. I was hoping to get a flat photo-type envelope, cardboard, to send the watercolor in, but they didn´t have any hard ones and I couldn´t make him understand that I wanted something that wouldn´t bend. That was too hard for him. So he came up with a box that fit the picture if I cut it out of the mat it came on. So I did, and put it in the bottom. UNPROTECTED. AND THEN PUT STUFF ON TOP OF IT. WHAT WAS I THINKING?????
SIGH. The other thing I´m kicking myself for is that this box was HALF as heavy as the one I sent home from Puenta la Reina, and cost TWICE as much. FIGURE THAT!!! I should´ve just carried it, but the rain made me too nervous and it would´ve had to be in my hands. Or I could´ve left it somewhere, but I didn´t want to be tied to return to a place in Santiago since I´ll have about an hour and a half to cross town from bus station to train station on Wednesday. Grrrr. Hassle. So I´ll get home and some of the best stuff I got will be there in a week...when it´s not as exciting to show everyone. And GOD PLEASE one more miracle, that the watercolor doesn´t get messed up...I´m such an idiot. Sigh. Christa says let it go, it´s gone, it´s done, forget about it. I´m SOOOO good at that, you know....
Anyway, left the Correos and headed to the bus station...got a return from Finisterra with an open date and time (I´ll go at 8:20am on Wednesday), and the bus took off. RAIN. Not really rain, just drizzle the whole way, and LOTS of fog. Our maps in our Camino books are limited, so we had no idea where we were, but somehow we ended up on a coastal route, and saw lots of beautiful fishing villages and misty seascapes. I went into the iPod...spent so much time downloading and arranging playlists, but I should´ve just come with Loreena McKennitt´s ¨An Ancient Muse¨ album...it´s been my Camino album (keep wanting to mention that and forgetting). My Camino theme song has been Caravanserai, and the two before and after it are my camel-plodding-evenly-up-very-steep-incline songs...stride songs...meditation songs. Give it a listen...it´s very moving and great walking music...great for thinking and escaping into your head. PERFECT Camino music.
Midway to Cée, Christa declared she didn´t want to walk in the rain. I am very proud of myself for not adjusting my plans for the sake of staying in company...I told her I wanted to walk and I´d walk come hell or high water. So she and Brad stayed on the bus and I got off...about 14km to Finisterra. Walked alone. It rained, and then it drizzled, and then it stopped, and then it rained again. The rain only lasted about 5 or 10 minutes when it came...guess Dad´s magic raincoat is running out of magic a bit. Ha ha.
A lot of the walk was coastal, and some of it led up over hills and through towns. There was a stretch of eucalyptus forest and then it opened up onto the sea and it was gorgeous...and then it started to rain again. Figures. Hey, with our luck, I´ll take it.
It felt good to walk, and to walk alone, and to walk the last 14 to the sea. At one point, my bag suddenly felt twice as heavy...dunno why, but even that was good to feel, since there were so many times I was plagued with a heavy pack AND a hot sun AND blisters AND 30-plus-km days. The mist and drizzle was nice...it was cool but not quite cold, and really, it was nice.
When I got into Finisterra, I ran into some Germans heading back the other way. I asked if the albergue was ahead. Get this. It´s CLOSED for five days due to water damage. But there´s another sports hall. So I turned around and backtracked a km or so with them...hit the sports hall, got a shower (which was actually not that cold) and headed out to find Christa and Skip.
They pulled me off the street from this burger joint where they had decent burgers, Olympic coverage, and a VERY intolerant barman. We got to watch the men´s 400m free relay!!! AMERICA!!! =) Hope someone at home decides to DVR some swimming for me....
We sat and watched the rain for a while, then wandered out onto the pier, then got rained on, had coffee, watched the rain some more...decided to wait till tomorrow for the lighthouse. You´re supposed to swim in the ocean, burn the clothes you´ve walked in, and watch the sunset from the lighthouse, and the idea is that you wake the next morning a new person. Well...it´s too cold to swim and I don´t have a swimsuit. I can burn a shirt, but the other stuff I have to wear home, and it was expensive, and isn´t wrecked. And the weather will determine whether we get a sunset. Hope it breaks and we get some sun tomorrow.
Christa and Brad had gotten me a bed at another albergue. I was torn. The sports hall sucks, but it´s free, and it´s fine for me. The albergue was another €10. I need dirt cheap and free right now...I´m SO broke, but Christa finally said she´d cover me, so I went and got my bag and now we´re here. I don´t feel right about her paying for my bed...but I can´t keep taking out cash, not right here at the end. Dunno what to do yet. They also want to move to a hotel tomorrow that will run us €15 for the night. Dunno, dunno, dunno.... We´ll see how it plays out.
We went back to the burger joint for dinner. The Olympics were on...men´s tennis between Spain and Italy. We made the mistake of cheering for Spain and ticked off the barman again. Skip wants me to put in here that he nearly came to blows with the guy. He was very rude and yelled at us...Brad was livid and gave him hell right back. Can´t believe how rude some of the barmen and hospitaleros can be when pilgrims are their bread and butter. Some of them forget that the root of their title is ¨hospitality.¨
No peace yet in Finisterra, and these lovely hospitaleros are hassling me to get off so they can get back on, which just exacerbates my feeling that I just want to go home. I was hoping Finisterra would involve some peaceful reflection, but the weather is limiting my ability to disappear and go sit on the beach, or at the lighthouse, so right now, this side-trip has been more hassle than anything else. I am ready to come home. I´m Spained out. It´s been nice, but it´s time to go home, and I wish it was tomorrow instead of Wednesday and Thursday. I guess it´s just the weather.
Anyway. Off to bed. Pray for some sunshine for me. I WANNA GO HOME!! =)
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Santiago - Day Two
Well, this will have to be fast, as I am late for dinner.
Day Two in Santiago has been both relaxing and strange. It´s the first time I´ve spent more than one day in one place for over a month. Did some souvenir shopping today and am finding it impossible to buy anything for people because a) I am SOOOO out of money, and b) not much here would have meaning for anyone who hasn´t been here and had this Camino experience. If you´re a loved one, please know that I´ve been thinking of you all along, but will probably not be bringing home anything for you...Dad, I know I´ll be getting a reply ORDERING me not to bring you anything, ha ha. However, my Best Aunt in the World badge will be revoked if I can´t come up with SOMETHING to bring my neph. The only things I´ve found are things he would LOVE, but his mom and dad would HATE. (Actually, the fact that his dad would hate them is actually appealing, as I have scores to settle from 20 years ago, but I like his mom and would like to stay friends with her, so I´ll try to resist the slingshot and the godawful child´s Galician bagpipe we´ve been treated to in the streets for two days....) =)
Finally went into the church. We went to mass today at noon...well, tried. It was PACKED. Pilgrims and rucksacks EVERYWHERE. Wanted to ask one of the priests in the confessionals for a blessing, but don´t know how to say it in Spanish and didn´t want him to think I was trying to confess anything. (Ha ha, LOVE not being Catholic....) Didn´t find much for me in the mass, but when I started slowly pacing laps around the entire place, that was much more enjoyable, because I could listen and still hear the singing but got to walk, and after the month I´ve had, nothing feels better than walking...slowly...without weight on my back....
I got in the line to hug St. James and it was a strange experience. It took up most of the mass service, and the statue is a gold one, not a stone one like I´d expected. It makes up part of the big display behind the altar (don´t know the word for it), so behind the service, the audience can see pilgrims ascending steps, embracing the apostle from behind, and descending again. You hug him over the back of his shoulders and it really does feel kind of silly. I kissed the shell on the back of his shoulderpiece and moved on. Down below was the crypt with his bones, and I knelt for a while and said a prayer that I´ll be able to use this experience for good for many years to come. It was pretty emotional.
The main entrance is blocked off, as is the pillar we´re supposed to touch with the stone statue of St. James at the top. Behind the statue is Maestro Mateo, whose forehead you´re supposed to bump with yours to get a bit of his wisdom, and you can´t get to him either. So we filed past and symbolically bumped heads with a quick, curt bow towards him. I need all the wisdom I can get, so I did it twice.
Other than that, we´ve just been wandering and eating and shopping a bit. I had made a mental list of the things I wanted, so as to minimize CRAP I´d come home with, and everything I bought has some meaning. I´m most pleased with the gold shell charm I bought...it might replace my Torii gate I´ve been wearing for years. I also got a shell tile and an arrow tile to put near my front doorstep and maybe on my deck or in my classroom. Got the obligatory cheesey Camino T.shirt with the names of all the places on the Camino Frances. Also bought some artsy postcards for framing and a beautiful little watercolor that I´m really excited about.
Jury´s out on sending things home. If there´s a safe place to leave a shopping bag while we´re in Finisterre, and it´s not too much trouble to get back to it on Wednesday as I pass back through, I´ll just carry it. Otherwise, I´ve just added about 5 pounds back onto my back.
Booked the train from Santiago to Madrid. Working out Wednesday night details. Pain in the butt since I´ll be in Madrid for 12 hours and 2 minutes, but the overnight bus was too close for comfort on time, and the overnight train was worse. Don´t want to take the chance.
Did laundry. Thank GOD. Last time for that in Spain. Can´t wait to get back to my own washing machine and clothes that aren´t stained and stinky.
Better go now...the gang is either waiting for me or has moved on, and either way, I´m famished. Tomorrow we´ll catch a bus at 9am to Cée and walk about 10-12km to the ¨end of the world.¨ I´m really excited about one more day of walking with the pack, and about walking into sight of the ocean. Already, I feel like my pilgrim status has been revoked, and our days of walking feel weeks behind us. CANNOT believe we only arrived yesterday. Sigh.
All for now. Love you all and thanks again for reading.
Day Two in Santiago has been both relaxing and strange. It´s the first time I´ve spent more than one day in one place for over a month. Did some souvenir shopping today and am finding it impossible to buy anything for people because a) I am SOOOO out of money, and b) not much here would have meaning for anyone who hasn´t been here and had this Camino experience. If you´re a loved one, please know that I´ve been thinking of you all along, but will probably not be bringing home anything for you...Dad, I know I´ll be getting a reply ORDERING me not to bring you anything, ha ha. However, my Best Aunt in the World badge will be revoked if I can´t come up with SOMETHING to bring my neph. The only things I´ve found are things he would LOVE, but his mom and dad would HATE. (Actually, the fact that his dad would hate them is actually appealing, as I have scores to settle from 20 years ago, but I like his mom and would like to stay friends with her, so I´ll try to resist the slingshot and the godawful child´s Galician bagpipe we´ve been treated to in the streets for two days....) =)
Finally went into the church. We went to mass today at noon...well, tried. It was PACKED. Pilgrims and rucksacks EVERYWHERE. Wanted to ask one of the priests in the confessionals for a blessing, but don´t know how to say it in Spanish and didn´t want him to think I was trying to confess anything. (Ha ha, LOVE not being Catholic....) Didn´t find much for me in the mass, but when I started slowly pacing laps around the entire place, that was much more enjoyable, because I could listen and still hear the singing but got to walk, and after the month I´ve had, nothing feels better than walking...slowly...without weight on my back....
I got in the line to hug St. James and it was a strange experience. It took up most of the mass service, and the statue is a gold one, not a stone one like I´d expected. It makes up part of the big display behind the altar (don´t know the word for it), so behind the service, the audience can see pilgrims ascending steps, embracing the apostle from behind, and descending again. You hug him over the back of his shoulders and it really does feel kind of silly. I kissed the shell on the back of his shoulderpiece and moved on. Down below was the crypt with his bones, and I knelt for a while and said a prayer that I´ll be able to use this experience for good for many years to come. It was pretty emotional.
The main entrance is blocked off, as is the pillar we´re supposed to touch with the stone statue of St. James at the top. Behind the statue is Maestro Mateo, whose forehead you´re supposed to bump with yours to get a bit of his wisdom, and you can´t get to him either. So we filed past and symbolically bumped heads with a quick, curt bow towards him. I need all the wisdom I can get, so I did it twice.
Other than that, we´ve just been wandering and eating and shopping a bit. I had made a mental list of the things I wanted, so as to minimize CRAP I´d come home with, and everything I bought has some meaning. I´m most pleased with the gold shell charm I bought...it might replace my Torii gate I´ve been wearing for years. I also got a shell tile and an arrow tile to put near my front doorstep and maybe on my deck or in my classroom. Got the obligatory cheesey Camino T.shirt with the names of all the places on the Camino Frances. Also bought some artsy postcards for framing and a beautiful little watercolor that I´m really excited about.
Jury´s out on sending things home. If there´s a safe place to leave a shopping bag while we´re in Finisterre, and it´s not too much trouble to get back to it on Wednesday as I pass back through, I´ll just carry it. Otherwise, I´ve just added about 5 pounds back onto my back.
Booked the train from Santiago to Madrid. Working out Wednesday night details. Pain in the butt since I´ll be in Madrid for 12 hours and 2 minutes, but the overnight bus was too close for comfort on time, and the overnight train was worse. Don´t want to take the chance.
Did laundry. Thank GOD. Last time for that in Spain. Can´t wait to get back to my own washing machine and clothes that aren´t stained and stinky.
Better go now...the gang is either waiting for me or has moved on, and either way, I´m famished. Tomorrow we´ll catch a bus at 9am to Cée and walk about 10-12km to the ¨end of the world.¨ I´m really excited about one more day of walking with the pack, and about walking into sight of the ocean. Already, I feel like my pilgrim status has been revoked, and our days of walking feel weeks behind us. CANNOT believe we only arrived yesterday. Sigh.
All for now. Love you all and thanks again for reading.
Saturday, August 9, 2008
Santiago de Compostela
We´re here. =)
It´s so hard to go all the way back to this morning, YEARS ago, and try to tell the story of our arrival. There´s not much to tell, it seems. It was our last day walking and we were very quiet. Julia came with us at first, but then walked ahead...far ahead...and got here long before we did. So Christa and I were able to do a lot of thinking and a lot of reminiscing. She said she was going back to the day she left her apartment and try to remember each night and each thing that happened, so she was very quiet for a long time. I tried to do the same, but found my thoughts too jumpy, and after all, I have my BLOG!!! So I´ll do the trek back when I get home and can have some peace and quiet for a little while.
(Peace and quiet...and solitude...OH how I crave it....)
Last night, on the way back to the gym, we suddenly heard symphony music! It was 11:30pm and we thought we were passing a late concert. We could see instruments (THREE FRENCH HORNS! YAY! [my instrument from childhood]) and I finally was able to figure out the song was Music of the Night from Phantom of the Opera...then we realized the players were CHILDREN. They looked about 12. At almost MIDNIGHT, they were having a band practice!! I don´t get this country. This was after we passed a family with small children having dinner at the same time of night. And we see that all the time. Weird country. But I digress.
When we got back to the gym, it was PITCH black and hard not to step on people...we could see the rows of sleeping bags when someone opened a door to the bathroom for a moment or two. When I went to brush my teeth, I knew we were one row up from the bathrooms, and could see Christa waving her phone for me to get back to our mats, but couldn´t see the people and was afraid to step on someone!! There must have been something like 250 people...and you should have SEEN the MASSIVE TANGLE of cell phone charging cords on the power strips!! My brother the electrician would have gone into fits. You can´t imagine how many phones.
We got up this morning in the gym after what was a decent night´s sleep. The Thermarest mattress was worth every penny, as has been the sleeping bag. Anyway...slept, woke up slow to the rummaging of countless pilgrims anxious to get on the way. I was not. Christa and I (again) were among the last to leave...big surprise, huh? Had breakfast with Julia and hit the road. Like I said, quiet morning and we walked SLOW. I didn´t want the Camino to end, I think...I really kinda dragged it out today. We had 21km to go. There isn´t a whole lot to say that´s different from the previous several days in Galicia, except today we had to walk around an airport runway in Lavacolla. It was SO jarring and strange to hear a plane taking off and to watch it rise above the eucalyptus trees.
Road choked with pilgrims today, several of them on bicycles. (I want to start a Camino rule that states that the leader of a bike pack needs to call out the number in the group as he passes people, and the last person calls out ¨Ultimo!¨ or something so you know when they´ve all passed. I´ve spent four weeks in constant fear of being run over by bikers.) Several others have been in large groups with matching shirts...something I thanked God for today, not making me part of a pilgrim group with matching shirts. Sigh.
We had a sort of brunch just before Monte de Gozo and dragged that out, too...for about an hour. When we finally ambled our way to Monte de Gozo, I was keen to be the ¨pilgrim king¨ of the two of us...the first person to spot the spires of the Santiago cathedral. I got to the top of Monte de Gozo first, but Christa was the one to point out the one spire we could see...very difficult to spot behind a ridgeline of pines far in the distance. Monte de Gozo is a pretty cool spot, with a huge monument commemorating the Pope´s visit in 2002(?).
We descended and headed into the city, stopping to take pictures by the road signs announcing SANTIAGO. We kept looking at each other with excited smiles as we walked into the city, and I had butterflies in my stomach, but it was still a very pensive experience. We saw spires at one point within the city, but then it took forever to actually find the part of the city where the cathedral is located.
We were almost there...had just left the Plaza de Cervantes with its tall pillar with the bust of Miguel de Cervantes (Don Quixote author) when we got accosted by a tiny little old lady asking us if we needed a place to stay. It was a bit strange. She gave us a price of €35 for the both of us, and it seemed as though she was saying she didn´t mind if we stayed one night or two for that price. The conversation got complicated, and we were around the corner from the cathedral...a very sensitive moment for a pilgrim who has just completed an 800km trek...so we disentangled ourselves and walked on, hand in hand, waiting for the view....
And there it was. We´d come from behind, so we had the view of the back of the facade first. When we came around the corner, it was just like I´d imagined. We stood and stared and just breathed. We´ve been waiting 30 days...30 long, hard, blister-filled, sore, exhausting days to see this sight. To me, it felt like I´d been looking at this cathedral every day of my life. Strange.
I was scanning the square for familiar faces, but saw none...and then this battle cry rang out and I didn´t even have to turn around. Skip came charging across the square towards me and we collided...it was awesome. He told us later he´d given us about four or five minutes before he pounced, but saw me looking for him and had to come out of hiding. It was great to see him again. He´d arrived yesterday at 8am on 8/8/08 and said he cried like a baby. Julia was with him, waiting for her mother.
I took the last three pictures of the 1000 on my 1G card in the square in front of the Cathedral...then took off the medical tape, put in a new one, taped it back down, and kept firing off. =)
I couldn´t really take it all in. Seeing Brad again after a week or so of being apart...I forgot how much energy he had, what a social butterfly he is. It was a bit overwhelming. I kept trying to catch my breath and look at the cathedral, but there was so much noise and motion, it took a while for me to start taking in details.
There were busquers near the walls...dressed up as pilgrims or saints or Jesus or witches...and I haven´t really gotten a good look at the figures on the facade yet. That´s for tomorrow.
We went and had a beer and waited for the woman who owns Skip´s hotel to come back...he wasn´t sure if the reservation he´d made for us was still good. It turns out it wasn´t, so we got a different room around the corner from the cathedral...it´s not very nice, but it´s a bed, and tomorrow morning we´ll find a different place for tomorrow night.
I went to get my compostela, and stood in line with one of the Canadian ladies for about two hours as the line crawled forward. When we finally reached the top, I presented my credencials, and the guy scanned them carefully and then began to write my name on my compostela. He said it had to be written in its Latin form...so it says ¨Christinam Mariam Engelen.¨ The date is 8/9/08...30 days from when we started. It´s beautiful. I paid him €1 for a donation and another for a tube to put it in, and walked out feeling like I´d just been handed my firstborn child. (And it might well be...the labor was certainly long enough!!)
We started running into people everywhere. The Napoli boys, the Hungarians, Gregor from Poland, José from Barcelona, Agnes from Hungary...we kept hoping to catch sight of Al or Hank or Mimi and Jocelyn, but they´re probably still a few days out. No sight of the German boys...I think they must have gone home, which makes me sad. We spent so much time together on the Camino, it would´ve been perfect to be here with them for at least a few hours.
I still have not gone inside the cathedral...just put my hand on its wall when we arrived and again about an hour ago, as we walked back from dinner. (It´s past midnight now.) I put my forehead against the limestone wall and thought about how far I had walked just to experience that moment. It was powerful and I finally was near tears. As we walked back down through the arch to the front of the facade, a street busquer with a guitar and a harmonica was singing ¨Knockin´ on Heaven´s Door¨ by GNR...I gave him some of my best ¨Ay, ay, ay-ay-ay¨ Axl Rose backup as I passed. Knocking on heaven´s door, indeed.
But I think more of that is coming tomorrow. Skip was collecting people all evening, making a big group of people to have dinner and drink with, and I found it a bit much, so I´m looking forward to vanishing a bit tomorrow and carving out some quiet time for myself in front of the cathedral. We´re going to mass together at noon, and I´ll finally get a chance to finish my pilgrimage...do all the rituals...hug and kiss St. James, hit my head against Maestro Mateo´s head (to get a bit of his genius) and touch the column (if they still let us...the book said they might not anymore). I want to go to the pilgrim´s museum and see what that´s like. I got to do a little bit of shopping tonight, to find a dress to wear to mass. I have one, and I like it, but it´s not my long flowy white one I was so hoping for. I had to get a pashmina to cover my shoulders, too!! But it was late in the evening and shops were closing and I was afraid I wouldn´t have time in the morning...and I was not setting foot in that cathedral without a new dress to wear.
So there´s a lot we left for tomorrow. I believe the plan is to stay tomorrow night in Santiago, then leave Monday morning for the coast. We´ll stop about 10km from Finisterre, hike up the packs, and walk to the ocean for one last Camino day. We´ll be there Monday and Tuesday, and then Wednesday will be about getting back to Madrid (for me, at least).
Part of me wishes I were going to Finisterre on my own, that the others had other plans. I love them all, but it´s been really hard on me to be surrounded by people and sound and motion and plans for 30 straight days. I need some solitude, and BAD, and when I imagine sitting on the beach in Finisterre by myself, just thinking, it sounds like the perfect capstone to my trip. Especially since Skip is talking about MASSES of people he knows in Finisterre right now. I told him not to be surprised if I vanish quite a bit while we´re there...it´ll have to be done.
It feels so strange not to have anywhere to walk to tomorrow. I don´t quite know what to do with myself.
And nothing is clean. Not even me. Ha ha. Tomorrow.
I think that´s the best I can do right now. I have to go back and meet Christa with the hotel room key, and this keyboard is kinda gummy anyway. So I will hopefully have more to say tomorrow. I will be doing some shopping with the two nickels I have left in my cash supply (ha ha), and hopefully getting a lot of time to myself.
So, we made it. =)
It feels good.
It´s so hard to go all the way back to this morning, YEARS ago, and try to tell the story of our arrival. There´s not much to tell, it seems. It was our last day walking and we were very quiet. Julia came with us at first, but then walked ahead...far ahead...and got here long before we did. So Christa and I were able to do a lot of thinking and a lot of reminiscing. She said she was going back to the day she left her apartment and try to remember each night and each thing that happened, so she was very quiet for a long time. I tried to do the same, but found my thoughts too jumpy, and after all, I have my BLOG!!! So I´ll do the trek back when I get home and can have some peace and quiet for a little while.
(Peace and quiet...and solitude...OH how I crave it....)
Last night, on the way back to the gym, we suddenly heard symphony music! It was 11:30pm and we thought we were passing a late concert. We could see instruments (THREE FRENCH HORNS! YAY! [my instrument from childhood]) and I finally was able to figure out the song was Music of the Night from Phantom of the Opera...then we realized the players were CHILDREN. They looked about 12. At almost MIDNIGHT, they were having a band practice!! I don´t get this country. This was after we passed a family with small children having dinner at the same time of night. And we see that all the time. Weird country. But I digress.
When we got back to the gym, it was PITCH black and hard not to step on people...we could see the rows of sleeping bags when someone opened a door to the bathroom for a moment or two. When I went to brush my teeth, I knew we were one row up from the bathrooms, and could see Christa waving her phone for me to get back to our mats, but couldn´t see the people and was afraid to step on someone!! There must have been something like 250 people...and you should have SEEN the MASSIVE TANGLE of cell phone charging cords on the power strips!! My brother the electrician would have gone into fits. You can´t imagine how many phones.
We got up this morning in the gym after what was a decent night´s sleep. The Thermarest mattress was worth every penny, as has been the sleeping bag. Anyway...slept, woke up slow to the rummaging of countless pilgrims anxious to get on the way. I was not. Christa and I (again) were among the last to leave...big surprise, huh? Had breakfast with Julia and hit the road. Like I said, quiet morning and we walked SLOW. I didn´t want the Camino to end, I think...I really kinda dragged it out today. We had 21km to go. There isn´t a whole lot to say that´s different from the previous several days in Galicia, except today we had to walk around an airport runway in Lavacolla. It was SO jarring and strange to hear a plane taking off and to watch it rise above the eucalyptus trees.
Road choked with pilgrims today, several of them on bicycles. (I want to start a Camino rule that states that the leader of a bike pack needs to call out the number in the group as he passes people, and the last person calls out ¨Ultimo!¨ or something so you know when they´ve all passed. I´ve spent four weeks in constant fear of being run over by bikers.) Several others have been in large groups with matching shirts...something I thanked God for today, not making me part of a pilgrim group with matching shirts. Sigh.
We had a sort of brunch just before Monte de Gozo and dragged that out, too...for about an hour. When we finally ambled our way to Monte de Gozo, I was keen to be the ¨pilgrim king¨ of the two of us...the first person to spot the spires of the Santiago cathedral. I got to the top of Monte de Gozo first, but Christa was the one to point out the one spire we could see...very difficult to spot behind a ridgeline of pines far in the distance. Monte de Gozo is a pretty cool spot, with a huge monument commemorating the Pope´s visit in 2002(?).
We descended and headed into the city, stopping to take pictures by the road signs announcing SANTIAGO. We kept looking at each other with excited smiles as we walked into the city, and I had butterflies in my stomach, but it was still a very pensive experience. We saw spires at one point within the city, but then it took forever to actually find the part of the city where the cathedral is located.
We were almost there...had just left the Plaza de Cervantes with its tall pillar with the bust of Miguel de Cervantes (Don Quixote author) when we got accosted by a tiny little old lady asking us if we needed a place to stay. It was a bit strange. She gave us a price of €35 for the both of us, and it seemed as though she was saying she didn´t mind if we stayed one night or two for that price. The conversation got complicated, and we were around the corner from the cathedral...a very sensitive moment for a pilgrim who has just completed an 800km trek...so we disentangled ourselves and walked on, hand in hand, waiting for the view....
And there it was. We´d come from behind, so we had the view of the back of the facade first. When we came around the corner, it was just like I´d imagined. We stood and stared and just breathed. We´ve been waiting 30 days...30 long, hard, blister-filled, sore, exhausting days to see this sight. To me, it felt like I´d been looking at this cathedral every day of my life. Strange.
I was scanning the square for familiar faces, but saw none...and then this battle cry rang out and I didn´t even have to turn around. Skip came charging across the square towards me and we collided...it was awesome. He told us later he´d given us about four or five minutes before he pounced, but saw me looking for him and had to come out of hiding. It was great to see him again. He´d arrived yesterday at 8am on 8/8/08 and said he cried like a baby. Julia was with him, waiting for her mother.
I took the last three pictures of the 1000 on my 1G card in the square in front of the Cathedral...then took off the medical tape, put in a new one, taped it back down, and kept firing off. =)
I couldn´t really take it all in. Seeing Brad again after a week or so of being apart...I forgot how much energy he had, what a social butterfly he is. It was a bit overwhelming. I kept trying to catch my breath and look at the cathedral, but there was so much noise and motion, it took a while for me to start taking in details.
There were busquers near the walls...dressed up as pilgrims or saints or Jesus or witches...and I haven´t really gotten a good look at the figures on the facade yet. That´s for tomorrow.
We went and had a beer and waited for the woman who owns Skip´s hotel to come back...he wasn´t sure if the reservation he´d made for us was still good. It turns out it wasn´t, so we got a different room around the corner from the cathedral...it´s not very nice, but it´s a bed, and tomorrow morning we´ll find a different place for tomorrow night.
I went to get my compostela, and stood in line with one of the Canadian ladies for about two hours as the line crawled forward. When we finally reached the top, I presented my credencials, and the guy scanned them carefully and then began to write my name on my compostela. He said it had to be written in its Latin form...so it says ¨Christinam Mariam Engelen.¨ The date is 8/9/08...30 days from when we started. It´s beautiful. I paid him €1 for a donation and another for a tube to put it in, and walked out feeling like I´d just been handed my firstborn child. (And it might well be...the labor was certainly long enough!!)
We started running into people everywhere. The Napoli boys, the Hungarians, Gregor from Poland, José from Barcelona, Agnes from Hungary...we kept hoping to catch sight of Al or Hank or Mimi and Jocelyn, but they´re probably still a few days out. No sight of the German boys...I think they must have gone home, which makes me sad. We spent so much time together on the Camino, it would´ve been perfect to be here with them for at least a few hours.
I still have not gone inside the cathedral...just put my hand on its wall when we arrived and again about an hour ago, as we walked back from dinner. (It´s past midnight now.) I put my forehead against the limestone wall and thought about how far I had walked just to experience that moment. It was powerful and I finally was near tears. As we walked back down through the arch to the front of the facade, a street busquer with a guitar and a harmonica was singing ¨Knockin´ on Heaven´s Door¨ by GNR...I gave him some of my best ¨Ay, ay, ay-ay-ay¨ Axl Rose backup as I passed. Knocking on heaven´s door, indeed.
But I think more of that is coming tomorrow. Skip was collecting people all evening, making a big group of people to have dinner and drink with, and I found it a bit much, so I´m looking forward to vanishing a bit tomorrow and carving out some quiet time for myself in front of the cathedral. We´re going to mass together at noon, and I´ll finally get a chance to finish my pilgrimage...do all the rituals...hug and kiss St. James, hit my head against Maestro Mateo´s head (to get a bit of his genius) and touch the column (if they still let us...the book said they might not anymore). I want to go to the pilgrim´s museum and see what that´s like. I got to do a little bit of shopping tonight, to find a dress to wear to mass. I have one, and I like it, but it´s not my long flowy white one I was so hoping for. I had to get a pashmina to cover my shoulders, too!! But it was late in the evening and shops were closing and I was afraid I wouldn´t have time in the morning...and I was not setting foot in that cathedral without a new dress to wear.
So there´s a lot we left for tomorrow. I believe the plan is to stay tomorrow night in Santiago, then leave Monday morning for the coast. We´ll stop about 10km from Finisterre, hike up the packs, and walk to the ocean for one last Camino day. We´ll be there Monday and Tuesday, and then Wednesday will be about getting back to Madrid (for me, at least).
Part of me wishes I were going to Finisterre on my own, that the others had other plans. I love them all, but it´s been really hard on me to be surrounded by people and sound and motion and plans for 30 straight days. I need some solitude, and BAD, and when I imagine sitting on the beach in Finisterre by myself, just thinking, it sounds like the perfect capstone to my trip. Especially since Skip is talking about MASSES of people he knows in Finisterre right now. I told him not to be surprised if I vanish quite a bit while we´re there...it´ll have to be done.
It feels so strange not to have anywhere to walk to tomorrow. I don´t quite know what to do with myself.
And nothing is clean. Not even me. Ha ha. Tomorrow.
I think that´s the best I can do right now. I have to go back and meet Christa with the hotel room key, and this keyboard is kinda gummy anyway. So I will hopefully have more to say tomorrow. I will be doing some shopping with the two nickels I have left in my cash supply (ha ha), and hopefully getting a lot of time to myself.
So, we made it. =)
It feels good.
Friday, August 8, 2008
Mélide to Pedrouzo
Please don´t expect this blog to make linear sense like the others might, because today is all scattered up in my head and I doubt it´s going to be very coherent. But it´s the last night before Santiago, so maybe that´s how it´s supposed to be.
Well, we survived the gym floor. My nail-biter last night was wondering if the school door would still be open when we made it back there at 11pm, and it was. And though there were only about a dozen people in there, they were LOUD. For a LONG TIME. Christa lent me some earplugs...I rolled out my mattress and pulled out my (BEAUTIFUL NEW black and teal) sleeping bag and tried to go to sleep. The mattress worked very well (Go Thermarest people, and John for recommending them). The loud folks finally went to sleep (oh, did I mention they decided to SMOKE in the gym?? Yay.) and so did we. It was much better than the cot in Ligonde, I must say.
Up early (well, for us). We headed back to the albergue to pick up Julia...the German teenager who was crying by the roadside before we reached Triacastela. The plan we´d made last night was that her mom (who has a totally screwed up foot for some reason...not blisters, something else) was going to take a taxi to the next stop 35km away, and Julia would walk with us. Christa´s and my rucksacks would go in the taxi with Regina. She would get us all hotel rooms, either two doubles or a quad, provided they didn´t cost us more than €20 apiece (last night in the gym was free, of course). Good plan. She has our stuff, we have her daughter. Ha ha. Turns out Julia is a pretty good fencer (Sarah, are you reading?). And QUITE a talker. Ha ha.
So off we went, and our mochillas (rucksacks) stayed behind. FINALLY, a day without the packs, and all parts working properly. No leg issues today, and the boots felt like a dream for the first 20km. No new notes in the scenery...rolling hills, stone fences, cows, a few horses, rabbits (!!!) and some GORGEOUS flowers. We walked through some pretty pricey house neighborhoods on the way today, and several of them had mind-blowing flower gardens and high grape arbors (which I am totally in love with. I plan to start growing my grape arbors and ivy house-coverings immediately upon return. Landlord, take note).
Today´s major catastrophe: my camera quit. TWO DAYS before Santiago, and the camera goes kaput. I was livid. It wasn´t just NOT working...it was HALF working SOME of the time. I can deal with working, I can deal with NOT working...but don´t give me this maybe-I-will-maybe-I-won´t crap, because that just drives me batty. Okay. We´ve got a town coming up. Arzúa has 8000 people. There will be a camera shop. The last thing I want to do is buy a new digital camera IN EUROPE TWO DAYS before I finish the Camino, but dammit, I did not walk 800km to NOT get a picture of Santiago.
So we walked on. I was far ahead of Christa and Julia (because I was fuming about my camera, and as many of you know, I am not fit for human company when I am fuming...stop laughing, Mom, Dan, Maria, and Joe). I ran into Wim and stopped for coffee and an eclair, and when Christa and Julia showed up, we headed into town. There was this huge market going on...lots of clothes and belts and things. LOTS of people. I saw at least five different skirts, tops, and dresses that would have been perfect Santiago outfits. But we pressed on...walked right through, which is good (if you buy it, you have to carry it, and we´re not QUITE there yet, and to top it off, we had no packs). Hit one camera shop. Large Samoan looking fellow, found out he spoke English after I spent three or four minutes doing terrible things to the Spanish language. He could fix cameras, but didn´t have time at the moment. Pointed me somewhere else. Found that place. Didn´t fix cameras, but had plenty. They ranged from disposables for €8 to digitals for €345. GASP. What to do, what to do.... Danced in indecision for 10 minutes between the disposables and the €21 film cameras (wasn´t touching the digitals) and walked out with 2 disposables. So I was suddenly roadkill...a technological saucer critter. More fuming.
Got back on the path and we all split up and walked alone to re-center. Me to become human again, Christa to shake off the city and noise and people, and Julia...dunno about Julia. I wound up walking with Julia while Christa recovered, and she talked A LOT. It was fun, though...she has very good English and we talked about Harry Potter and Titanic and school and all kinds of things.
We stopped in a place called Calle after about 20km (which seemed to melt under us) and they were playing the Olympic opening ceremonies!! They were wonderful. We must have stayed an hour and a half. I´m so glad we got to see them. I knew today was 8/8/08 and I was hoping we´d see something.
What killed me was that just before Calle, we hit a marker stone that said 29.5. TWENTY-NINE POINT FIVE. Christa and I hit marker stone 765 back in the Pyrenees and now we were under THIRTY. No wonder the boys did the last 117 in one go. The farther you get, the smaller the numbers get, and you want to go forever, and at that moment, I thought we could do it all today. No matter that we´d done over twenty at that point...another thirty seemed like NOTHING. Pick up the packs in Pedruozo and just book it. Hit Santiago by nightfall. Blew my mind.
But like always, the cider and the patatas fritas and the sitting did us in, and we started getting slow again. More picturesque towns, and vóila, my camera started working again. GRRRRRRRRRRRR. I have to push up on the battery and in on the card, but the sucker friggin´ works again. So be it. A quote comes to mind...Oscar Wilde? ¨I have had a great many worries in life, and most of them never happened.¨ Someone correct me...who said that?
By the time I hit Santa Irene, far ahead of the others, my feet were going to crap again. I got REALLY slow. There was no way in HELL I had another 20k in the tank. All day, we´d had partly cloudy skies, and by afternoon we were hot for the first time since Portomarín. No sign of rain today (of course, because I had Dad´s magic raincoat with me). So it got pretty hot, and I was pretty tired, and I just kept thinking about how nice it would be to have a bed for the first time in three nights, and a nice refreshing shower...it drove me onward. Nice thought.
I was passing a beautiful hotel B&B and this guy José came running out to flag me down. He and Veronica were inside...the lovely young couple from Barcelona who were with us in Ruitelán. We hadn´t seen them since Portomarín. Their English is about as limited as my Spanish, so our conversations are a hodgepodge of English, Spanish, Spanglish, and Gesture. But it´s always fun. So I chatted with them for a few minutes and we pushed on.
Not long after, right about the time that my dogs were REALLY barkin´, we hit Pedrouzo and found Regina. There was a lot of conversation in German and Christa started looking a bit grave. Finally, she translated for me. No beds. No room in the albergue (no surprise), and NO HOTEL ROOMS. Regina had waited till 11 to take the taxi from Mélide and though the taxi took her to several hotels, nothing was available. Since she was injured, the albergue had offered her a massage bed to sleep on, and Julia could sleep on the floor. But she couldn´t get us beds because she didn´t have our credentials with her (of course...we didn´t think about that, and because of the stamps on the way, I wouldn´t have wanted to give mine up anyway, and besides, we were expecting a hotel room).
SO. Options? Another gym.
So we are in a gym again. A sports hall this time. The gym is huge.
AND FILLED WITH PEOPLE.
We have room, of course...but I´m talking 200 people in this gym. Now stop. Close your eyes and imagine the smell of 200 pilgrims, their shoes, their socks, their bodies, and a hot, enclosed gym.
Pleasant, right?
HAH.
But this is the Camino. We survived last night, and I am fine with the gym. Last night went fine, I have my mat and my sleeping bag (as long as no one´s stolen them when we get back, HA HA), and earplugs, and we had another brisk Arctic shower, and we found a restaurant to gorge ourselves into a food coma in. And I still have some Tylenol PM. And who cares anyway, tomorrow is SANTIAGO!!!!!
Can´t believe a week ago, I paid a thousand dollars in rent, and for four nights I´ve been sleeping in garages and gyms. Ha ha.
Okay. Some Camino notes. Snapshots of the pilgrim´s life.
Churches have NOTHING on pharmacies. When you are a pilgrim, you absolutely DO NOT pass the neon green cross sign outside a pharmacy without at least LOOKING in. Pharmacies are magical places, where miracles happen, and the shelves are stocked with lovely things like Compeed and baby wipes and foot creams and things that make pain go away. Pharmacists are angels. If the neon green cross sign is NOT lit, you stand outside, looking longingly through the window at all the potions and magic things inside, or stare at the signs in the window, trying to determine when the doors will open again and the magic will recommence. Hitting a pharmacy in the late afternoon, when feet hurt the most, and it´s siesta time, is TORMENT. Neon green plus sign. Take notes. Forget the churches. Visit every pharmacy.
Similar joy and ecstasy occur in supermarkets, especially in the shampoo aisle, though this is more tormentous than the pharmacy because the things in the markets are usually too big to carry. We linger long in the shampoo aisles, gazing at Garnier Fructis and Herbal Essences and Dove. Giant bottles of lotion throw us into fits. We stand and sigh and dream of home, where (at least for me) a huge shower awaits with GIANT bottles of shampoo and CONDITIONER and HAIR PRODUCTS and LOTS AND LOTS of hot water and PRIVACY. It´s a beautiful dream. And then we leave.
Sports stores. Hiking boots in the window, hiking clothes, walking sticks, socks. Christa and I stand outside and look in, crying out ¨OOH!! THINGS! THINGS! WE WANT THEM ALL!!¨ We sound kind of like the seagulls in Finding Nemo. Like the shampoo and lotion in the market, we stare longingly, sigh, look sadly at each other, and trudge on.
CHILDREN. Grrrrrrrrr. I visited my friend Trinity before I left. She has two small boys, 1 and 2, and wants to walk the Camino BAD. She was wondering how old her boys have to be before they can go. I SAY SIXTEEN. Not a DAY less. I can´t quite make you understand how it feels to come off of 35km like we did today, and sit in the hot sun outside the albergue with the COMPLETO sign in the window, and watch 8 children under the age of 13 burst happily out of the albergue. But it´s something like murder. Today on the Camino, there was a family with a stroller and a four-year-old. I love my nephew, and I want him to have wonderful experiences, but the Camino is serious business to those of us who have been walking for a month. We don´t walk for 30 days to get to an albergue and see a bed taken up by a 6-year-old, or some obnoxious teenager who has no concept of what this pilgrimage really means. This may sound harsh, and I´m sorry. But I don´t think it´s fair that the available beds in an albergue can be decimated by a family with three or four children who started 40km ago and are ¨just out for a cheap walking holiday,¨ as Christa put it. It really sucks for us, and it doesn´t seem right. I´m not saying they should be sleeping in a gym like us, but we´re doing this thing for REAL, and the least we ask for is a bed. Kids don´t get this. We do. It´s been almost 800km. Give us the beds. Go to a hotel room with your family. Or wait until they´re old enough to appreciate this walk. Leave the albergues to the pilgrims.
Like I said, that may be harsh, but until you´ve walked 800km in my boots, please don´t judge me.
What else...bottles of water. I´ve said this before, but they´re like gold. We snatch them up in the stores, the 1.5 liter bottles, and pour them into our Camelbacks and it´s like ambrosia of the gods. When the waiters carry them to other tables, we can´t take our eyes off them. We stare at them covetously.
New blisters can happen even on day 29. Christa has one. And her grape continues to breed and weep and bleed. She´s been wearing my red sandal shoes for three days, and has decided that the most important question you can ask when you meet someone and are thinking of making a friend is ¨What size shoe do you wear?¨ The cold rainy days we´ve had lately, she calls ¨red sofa days,¨ and I know exactly what she means, and my red shoes have had to be her red sofas. She is very happy with them. She promises I will get them BACK. Ha ha. Lucky for me, my boots are great now (just like you said, Mike and Drew)...at least for the first 25km.
It´s really hard to sit here in this café, knowing that Santiago lies glittering just 21km from here. That´s about FIFTEEN MILES. If we were men, we would´ve charged and gone for it. But we´re women, and we absorb the Camino (and life) in a different way. We are not our German boys. We love them, but thankfully, we are women and we will wait for tomorrow.
Julia has called. Her mom has gone to the hospital and can she walk with us to Santiago tomorrow? Hmmm. We started this thing together, and honestly, we want to finish it together. Peacefully. In the way we walk, together or separate, but mostly silent. Meditatively. Christa and I walk well together. We don´t mind Julia, but tomorrow cannot be endless prattle and the clatter of her two long walking sticks hitting the ground with every step. Tomorrow is big. We want our bubble. But we can´t say no, and Christa went to talk to her and will tell her that tomorrow will be mostly silent, introspective, and very important to us. I´m sure she will understand, and we hope she doesn´t feel bad in the process. We will take her, but it´s still our Camino, each of us...and one thing you learn on this trip is to claim the right to walk your Camino your way. You also learn to allow other people to walk their Camino in their way. Politeness will not steal this from us on the last day.
We´ve talked some about what we think it will be like tomorrow. I have a picture in my head of cresting a hill on a cobblestone street, with the cathedral lying below us, spires stretching to the side, and my pack is on the ground behind me, and my stick is to the side, and I am on my knees, arms raised. It´s pretty dramatic. But in fact, we decided we have no idea what it will be like. It might be, like my dad suggested, totally anticlimactic. Or it might be very emotional. We don´t know.
But one thing is clear. Santiago is a very different thing from the Camino. The Camino is itself. The journey truly has been the destination, as we reminded ourselves the other night in Ligonde. The arrival in Santiago truly has no bearing on what the Camino has meant to us, or the things we´ve learned on it. Likewise, its end has no bearing on the lessons we´ve learned...they will not end simply because the Camino has. I feel strongly that my Camino will go on for months...that in moments of stress or peace or simplicity, I´ll be back on this road and thinking of things in a different way.
In the beginning, I thought that Santiago was the goal. The picture on the right of this blog says the view of the spires is the goal. It´s not. The goal has been accomplished. (The goal, actually, was accomplished on Day Two when Day One did not read: Day One, Camino over, broken ankle. Coming home.) The walk has been a life-changing experience. I have made friends for life in Vienna, Australia, Germany, and several other places. I´ve managed to digest and swallow fears I´ve been chewing on for months...YEARS. I don´t have all the answers, but I´ve learned a lot about myself. I´ve walked nearly 800 kilometers. I´ve been under extreme physical, mental, and emotional stress every day for 29 days now (add financial stress in these last days, ha ha). But there was never any question in my mind that I could handle it...I simply wanted to DO IT. I don´t regret a second of the time I´ve spent in cafés and bars writing these blogs, either...the idea that I´ve inspired people or made people proud or given people glimpses of what their own impending Caminos may hold for them has given my walk a purpose beyond the challenge it held for me myself.
Even my body...I know I see me every day and probably can´t tell, but it seems to me that my body has not changed a bit. I didn´t need it to, I´m fine with my body, but I¨m amazed that I can walk 15-20 miles a day for a month and see such little change. But even that has been a revelation. Maintenance from here on out...no more bothering with trying to get back to my high school weight (which was only a 15lb difference anyway). CLEARLY, if I can come off this month the same size I started it, my body wants to be THIS SIZE and no smaller. So that is laid to rest as well.
All these things have NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with Santiago or anything that happens tomorrow. It will be a great capstone, a feeling of completion, a dessert for the feast...but like most feasts, I am full long before dessert comes, and a taste is all I can handle. Santiago is a rich chocolate mousse, nothing more. The sustenance has lasted for 30 days, and I have never been so healthy and strong.
People told me this at the beginning, but of course, I had to find out for myself. I will be back here one day, and it will be a totally different experience. I will walk only as far as I want, the parts I want, and stay where I feel it pulling me, no matter how far I´ve gone that day. Next time, there will truly be no destination. The journey will truly be the destination, so much more so than it was this time.
At the beginning of this trip, I was amazed by people who did the Camino multiple times. HOW on EARTH could you do this AGAIN, once you know how hard it is??? All that kept me going the first week, ESPECIALLY the first day, was the ignorance of the path ahead, the constant self-delusion that this hill was the last, that tomorrow would be an easy day, that the pack would get lighter.
But that is such a small part of this experience. The evenings, the views, the sunsets, the brisk early morning air, the forest paths in dappled shade, the old men walking the cows to the fields, the dogs sleeping in the shade, the bottomless bottles of wine, the laughter, the soaring cathedral ceilings, the cloister walks, the simple country churches, the view of a spire on a hillside after a long walk without a building, the views from the mountaintops, the monuments to the pilgrimage, a bronze statue of a pilgrim leaning into the wind, my nephew´s picture on the pillar of an iron cross, the goats grazing in the vegetation grown up through a building that´s been standing for 600 years or more, the kindness of the hospitaleros, the joy of a cold footbath, the ecstasy of mentholated foot cream, the sweat coating your skin as you climb a mountain, the cool breeze like a breath from God, the world falling away below you as you descend into a mountain village, the tangy bubbles of a cold cider, a mouthful of bread, the turning of a hawk´s tail as it soars.
THIS is the Camino, and it is a drug, and there is no kicking the habit.
I´ve seen a good bit of the world in my 30 years. For a lot of it, I was just a teenager, too absorbed in myself and a teenager´s problems to really open my eyes and look around. I understand now why many of my fellow pilgrims are older than I am, rather than college kids...it takes some maturity to really appreciate this. I feel so fortunate, not just to have this experience, but to feel as though I grasp at least some of what it has to offer.
It´s been an amazing trip.
I can hardly believe it´s almost over. Santiago, and Finisterre, and Madrid, and home. I´m ready to be home. But this will be one of those experiences I´ll come back to in my mind for years to come. Wow.
Probably better end this for now. Again, for the hundredth time, thanks for reading, and for your comments, and for your emails. The support has meant so much. I wish you could all be here.
merlintoes@hotmail.com
(Think happy hotel thoughts for me for tomorrow...pray I´ll have a real bed!!!)
Well, we survived the gym floor. My nail-biter last night was wondering if the school door would still be open when we made it back there at 11pm, and it was. And though there were only about a dozen people in there, they were LOUD. For a LONG TIME. Christa lent me some earplugs...I rolled out my mattress and pulled out my (BEAUTIFUL NEW black and teal) sleeping bag and tried to go to sleep. The mattress worked very well (Go Thermarest people, and John for recommending them). The loud folks finally went to sleep (oh, did I mention they decided to SMOKE in the gym?? Yay.) and so did we. It was much better than the cot in Ligonde, I must say.
Up early (well, for us). We headed back to the albergue to pick up Julia...the German teenager who was crying by the roadside before we reached Triacastela. The plan we´d made last night was that her mom (who has a totally screwed up foot for some reason...not blisters, something else) was going to take a taxi to the next stop 35km away, and Julia would walk with us. Christa´s and my rucksacks would go in the taxi with Regina. She would get us all hotel rooms, either two doubles or a quad, provided they didn´t cost us more than €20 apiece (last night in the gym was free, of course). Good plan. She has our stuff, we have her daughter. Ha ha. Turns out Julia is a pretty good fencer (Sarah, are you reading?). And QUITE a talker. Ha ha.
So off we went, and our mochillas (rucksacks) stayed behind. FINALLY, a day without the packs, and all parts working properly. No leg issues today, and the boots felt like a dream for the first 20km. No new notes in the scenery...rolling hills, stone fences, cows, a few horses, rabbits (!!!) and some GORGEOUS flowers. We walked through some pretty pricey house neighborhoods on the way today, and several of them had mind-blowing flower gardens and high grape arbors (which I am totally in love with. I plan to start growing my grape arbors and ivy house-coverings immediately upon return. Landlord, take note).
Today´s major catastrophe: my camera quit. TWO DAYS before Santiago, and the camera goes kaput. I was livid. It wasn´t just NOT working...it was HALF working SOME of the time. I can deal with working, I can deal with NOT working...but don´t give me this maybe-I-will-maybe-I-won´t crap, because that just drives me batty. Okay. We´ve got a town coming up. Arzúa has 8000 people. There will be a camera shop. The last thing I want to do is buy a new digital camera IN EUROPE TWO DAYS before I finish the Camino, but dammit, I did not walk 800km to NOT get a picture of Santiago.
So we walked on. I was far ahead of Christa and Julia (because I was fuming about my camera, and as many of you know, I am not fit for human company when I am fuming...stop laughing, Mom, Dan, Maria, and Joe). I ran into Wim and stopped for coffee and an eclair, and when Christa and Julia showed up, we headed into town. There was this huge market going on...lots of clothes and belts and things. LOTS of people. I saw at least five different skirts, tops, and dresses that would have been perfect Santiago outfits. But we pressed on...walked right through, which is good (if you buy it, you have to carry it, and we´re not QUITE there yet, and to top it off, we had no packs). Hit one camera shop. Large Samoan looking fellow, found out he spoke English after I spent three or four minutes doing terrible things to the Spanish language. He could fix cameras, but didn´t have time at the moment. Pointed me somewhere else. Found that place. Didn´t fix cameras, but had plenty. They ranged from disposables for €8 to digitals for €345. GASP. What to do, what to do.... Danced in indecision for 10 minutes between the disposables and the €21 film cameras (wasn´t touching the digitals) and walked out with 2 disposables. So I was suddenly roadkill...a technological saucer critter. More fuming.
Got back on the path and we all split up and walked alone to re-center. Me to become human again, Christa to shake off the city and noise and people, and Julia...dunno about Julia. I wound up walking with Julia while Christa recovered, and she talked A LOT. It was fun, though...she has very good English and we talked about Harry Potter and Titanic and school and all kinds of things.
We stopped in a place called Calle after about 20km (which seemed to melt under us) and they were playing the Olympic opening ceremonies!! They were wonderful. We must have stayed an hour and a half. I´m so glad we got to see them. I knew today was 8/8/08 and I was hoping we´d see something.
What killed me was that just before Calle, we hit a marker stone that said 29.5. TWENTY-NINE POINT FIVE. Christa and I hit marker stone 765 back in the Pyrenees and now we were under THIRTY. No wonder the boys did the last 117 in one go. The farther you get, the smaller the numbers get, and you want to go forever, and at that moment, I thought we could do it all today. No matter that we´d done over twenty at that point...another thirty seemed like NOTHING. Pick up the packs in Pedruozo and just book it. Hit Santiago by nightfall. Blew my mind.
But like always, the cider and the patatas fritas and the sitting did us in, and we started getting slow again. More picturesque towns, and vóila, my camera started working again. GRRRRRRRRRRRR. I have to push up on the battery and in on the card, but the sucker friggin´ works again. So be it. A quote comes to mind...Oscar Wilde? ¨I have had a great many worries in life, and most of them never happened.¨ Someone correct me...who said that?
By the time I hit Santa Irene, far ahead of the others, my feet were going to crap again. I got REALLY slow. There was no way in HELL I had another 20k in the tank. All day, we´d had partly cloudy skies, and by afternoon we were hot for the first time since Portomarín. No sign of rain today (of course, because I had Dad´s magic raincoat with me). So it got pretty hot, and I was pretty tired, and I just kept thinking about how nice it would be to have a bed for the first time in three nights, and a nice refreshing shower...it drove me onward. Nice thought.
I was passing a beautiful hotel B&B and this guy José came running out to flag me down. He and Veronica were inside...the lovely young couple from Barcelona who were with us in Ruitelán. We hadn´t seen them since Portomarín. Their English is about as limited as my Spanish, so our conversations are a hodgepodge of English, Spanish, Spanglish, and Gesture. But it´s always fun. So I chatted with them for a few minutes and we pushed on.
Not long after, right about the time that my dogs were REALLY barkin´, we hit Pedrouzo and found Regina. There was a lot of conversation in German and Christa started looking a bit grave. Finally, she translated for me. No beds. No room in the albergue (no surprise), and NO HOTEL ROOMS. Regina had waited till 11 to take the taxi from Mélide and though the taxi took her to several hotels, nothing was available. Since she was injured, the albergue had offered her a massage bed to sleep on, and Julia could sleep on the floor. But she couldn´t get us beds because she didn´t have our credentials with her (of course...we didn´t think about that, and because of the stamps on the way, I wouldn´t have wanted to give mine up anyway, and besides, we were expecting a hotel room).
SO. Options? Another gym.
So we are in a gym again. A sports hall this time. The gym is huge.
AND FILLED WITH PEOPLE.
We have room, of course...but I´m talking 200 people in this gym. Now stop. Close your eyes and imagine the smell of 200 pilgrims, their shoes, their socks, their bodies, and a hot, enclosed gym.
Pleasant, right?
HAH.
But this is the Camino. We survived last night, and I am fine with the gym. Last night went fine, I have my mat and my sleeping bag (as long as no one´s stolen them when we get back, HA HA), and earplugs, and we had another brisk Arctic shower, and we found a restaurant to gorge ourselves into a food coma in. And I still have some Tylenol PM. And who cares anyway, tomorrow is SANTIAGO!!!!!
Can´t believe a week ago, I paid a thousand dollars in rent, and for four nights I´ve been sleeping in garages and gyms. Ha ha.
Okay. Some Camino notes. Snapshots of the pilgrim´s life.
Churches have NOTHING on pharmacies. When you are a pilgrim, you absolutely DO NOT pass the neon green cross sign outside a pharmacy without at least LOOKING in. Pharmacies are magical places, where miracles happen, and the shelves are stocked with lovely things like Compeed and baby wipes and foot creams and things that make pain go away. Pharmacists are angels. If the neon green cross sign is NOT lit, you stand outside, looking longingly through the window at all the potions and magic things inside, or stare at the signs in the window, trying to determine when the doors will open again and the magic will recommence. Hitting a pharmacy in the late afternoon, when feet hurt the most, and it´s siesta time, is TORMENT. Neon green plus sign. Take notes. Forget the churches. Visit every pharmacy.
Similar joy and ecstasy occur in supermarkets, especially in the shampoo aisle, though this is more tormentous than the pharmacy because the things in the markets are usually too big to carry. We linger long in the shampoo aisles, gazing at Garnier Fructis and Herbal Essences and Dove. Giant bottles of lotion throw us into fits. We stand and sigh and dream of home, where (at least for me) a huge shower awaits with GIANT bottles of shampoo and CONDITIONER and HAIR PRODUCTS and LOTS AND LOTS of hot water and PRIVACY. It´s a beautiful dream. And then we leave.
Sports stores. Hiking boots in the window, hiking clothes, walking sticks, socks. Christa and I stand outside and look in, crying out ¨OOH!! THINGS! THINGS! WE WANT THEM ALL!!¨ We sound kind of like the seagulls in Finding Nemo. Like the shampoo and lotion in the market, we stare longingly, sigh, look sadly at each other, and trudge on.
CHILDREN. Grrrrrrrrr. I visited my friend Trinity before I left. She has two small boys, 1 and 2, and wants to walk the Camino BAD. She was wondering how old her boys have to be before they can go. I SAY SIXTEEN. Not a DAY less. I can´t quite make you understand how it feels to come off of 35km like we did today, and sit in the hot sun outside the albergue with the COMPLETO sign in the window, and watch 8 children under the age of 13 burst happily out of the albergue. But it´s something like murder. Today on the Camino, there was a family with a stroller and a four-year-old. I love my nephew, and I want him to have wonderful experiences, but the Camino is serious business to those of us who have been walking for a month. We don´t walk for 30 days to get to an albergue and see a bed taken up by a 6-year-old, or some obnoxious teenager who has no concept of what this pilgrimage really means. This may sound harsh, and I´m sorry. But I don´t think it´s fair that the available beds in an albergue can be decimated by a family with three or four children who started 40km ago and are ¨just out for a cheap walking holiday,¨ as Christa put it. It really sucks for us, and it doesn´t seem right. I´m not saying they should be sleeping in a gym like us, but we´re doing this thing for REAL, and the least we ask for is a bed. Kids don´t get this. We do. It´s been almost 800km. Give us the beds. Go to a hotel room with your family. Or wait until they´re old enough to appreciate this walk. Leave the albergues to the pilgrims.
Like I said, that may be harsh, but until you´ve walked 800km in my boots, please don´t judge me.
What else...bottles of water. I´ve said this before, but they´re like gold. We snatch them up in the stores, the 1.5 liter bottles, and pour them into our Camelbacks and it´s like ambrosia of the gods. When the waiters carry them to other tables, we can´t take our eyes off them. We stare at them covetously.
New blisters can happen even on day 29. Christa has one. And her grape continues to breed and weep and bleed. She´s been wearing my red sandal shoes for three days, and has decided that the most important question you can ask when you meet someone and are thinking of making a friend is ¨What size shoe do you wear?¨ The cold rainy days we´ve had lately, she calls ¨red sofa days,¨ and I know exactly what she means, and my red shoes have had to be her red sofas. She is very happy with them. She promises I will get them BACK. Ha ha. Lucky for me, my boots are great now (just like you said, Mike and Drew)...at least for the first 25km.
It´s really hard to sit here in this café, knowing that Santiago lies glittering just 21km from here. That´s about FIFTEEN MILES. If we were men, we would´ve charged and gone for it. But we´re women, and we absorb the Camino (and life) in a different way. We are not our German boys. We love them, but thankfully, we are women and we will wait for tomorrow.
Julia has called. Her mom has gone to the hospital and can she walk with us to Santiago tomorrow? Hmmm. We started this thing together, and honestly, we want to finish it together. Peacefully. In the way we walk, together or separate, but mostly silent. Meditatively. Christa and I walk well together. We don´t mind Julia, but tomorrow cannot be endless prattle and the clatter of her two long walking sticks hitting the ground with every step. Tomorrow is big. We want our bubble. But we can´t say no, and Christa went to talk to her and will tell her that tomorrow will be mostly silent, introspective, and very important to us. I´m sure she will understand, and we hope she doesn´t feel bad in the process. We will take her, but it´s still our Camino, each of us...and one thing you learn on this trip is to claim the right to walk your Camino your way. You also learn to allow other people to walk their Camino in their way. Politeness will not steal this from us on the last day.
We´ve talked some about what we think it will be like tomorrow. I have a picture in my head of cresting a hill on a cobblestone street, with the cathedral lying below us, spires stretching to the side, and my pack is on the ground behind me, and my stick is to the side, and I am on my knees, arms raised. It´s pretty dramatic. But in fact, we decided we have no idea what it will be like. It might be, like my dad suggested, totally anticlimactic. Or it might be very emotional. We don´t know.
But one thing is clear. Santiago is a very different thing from the Camino. The Camino is itself. The journey truly has been the destination, as we reminded ourselves the other night in Ligonde. The arrival in Santiago truly has no bearing on what the Camino has meant to us, or the things we´ve learned on it. Likewise, its end has no bearing on the lessons we´ve learned...they will not end simply because the Camino has. I feel strongly that my Camino will go on for months...that in moments of stress or peace or simplicity, I´ll be back on this road and thinking of things in a different way.
In the beginning, I thought that Santiago was the goal. The picture on the right of this blog says the view of the spires is the goal. It´s not. The goal has been accomplished. (The goal, actually, was accomplished on Day Two when Day One did not read: Day One, Camino over, broken ankle. Coming home.) The walk has been a life-changing experience. I have made friends for life in Vienna, Australia, Germany, and several other places. I´ve managed to digest and swallow fears I´ve been chewing on for months...YEARS. I don´t have all the answers, but I´ve learned a lot about myself. I´ve walked nearly 800 kilometers. I´ve been under extreme physical, mental, and emotional stress every day for 29 days now (add financial stress in these last days, ha ha). But there was never any question in my mind that I could handle it...I simply wanted to DO IT. I don´t regret a second of the time I´ve spent in cafés and bars writing these blogs, either...the idea that I´ve inspired people or made people proud or given people glimpses of what their own impending Caminos may hold for them has given my walk a purpose beyond the challenge it held for me myself.
Even my body...I know I see me every day and probably can´t tell, but it seems to me that my body has not changed a bit. I didn´t need it to, I´m fine with my body, but I¨m amazed that I can walk 15-20 miles a day for a month and see such little change. But even that has been a revelation. Maintenance from here on out...no more bothering with trying to get back to my high school weight (which was only a 15lb difference anyway). CLEARLY, if I can come off this month the same size I started it, my body wants to be THIS SIZE and no smaller. So that is laid to rest as well.
All these things have NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with Santiago or anything that happens tomorrow. It will be a great capstone, a feeling of completion, a dessert for the feast...but like most feasts, I am full long before dessert comes, and a taste is all I can handle. Santiago is a rich chocolate mousse, nothing more. The sustenance has lasted for 30 days, and I have never been so healthy and strong.
People told me this at the beginning, but of course, I had to find out for myself. I will be back here one day, and it will be a totally different experience. I will walk only as far as I want, the parts I want, and stay where I feel it pulling me, no matter how far I´ve gone that day. Next time, there will truly be no destination. The journey will truly be the destination, so much more so than it was this time.
At the beginning of this trip, I was amazed by people who did the Camino multiple times. HOW on EARTH could you do this AGAIN, once you know how hard it is??? All that kept me going the first week, ESPECIALLY the first day, was the ignorance of the path ahead, the constant self-delusion that this hill was the last, that tomorrow would be an easy day, that the pack would get lighter.
But that is such a small part of this experience. The evenings, the views, the sunsets, the brisk early morning air, the forest paths in dappled shade, the old men walking the cows to the fields, the dogs sleeping in the shade, the bottomless bottles of wine, the laughter, the soaring cathedral ceilings, the cloister walks, the simple country churches, the view of a spire on a hillside after a long walk without a building, the views from the mountaintops, the monuments to the pilgrimage, a bronze statue of a pilgrim leaning into the wind, my nephew´s picture on the pillar of an iron cross, the goats grazing in the vegetation grown up through a building that´s been standing for 600 years or more, the kindness of the hospitaleros, the joy of a cold footbath, the ecstasy of mentholated foot cream, the sweat coating your skin as you climb a mountain, the cool breeze like a breath from God, the world falling away below you as you descend into a mountain village, the tangy bubbles of a cold cider, a mouthful of bread, the turning of a hawk´s tail as it soars.
THIS is the Camino, and it is a drug, and there is no kicking the habit.
I´ve seen a good bit of the world in my 30 years. For a lot of it, I was just a teenager, too absorbed in myself and a teenager´s problems to really open my eyes and look around. I understand now why many of my fellow pilgrims are older than I am, rather than college kids...it takes some maturity to really appreciate this. I feel so fortunate, not just to have this experience, but to feel as though I grasp at least some of what it has to offer.
It´s been an amazing trip.
I can hardly believe it´s almost over. Santiago, and Finisterre, and Madrid, and home. I´m ready to be home. But this will be one of those experiences I´ll come back to in my mind for years to come. Wow.
Probably better end this for now. Again, for the hundredth time, thanks for reading, and for your comments, and for your emails. The support has meant so much. I wish you could all be here.
merlintoes@hotmail.com
(Think happy hotel thoughts for me for tomorrow...pray I´ll have a real bed!!!)
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Portomarín to Ligonde to Mélide
Well, if it looks like we haven´t covered much ground in the past two days, it´s because we haven´t. But it´s a decent story why.
I posted two days ago from Portomarín, before we went to dinner. If you´re on the Camino, a good rule of thumb is to eat dinner or have drinks in a sidewalk cafe on the town square, or the closest thing the town has to a square. There´s almost always a big open space in front of the biggest church in town, and generally, that´s where most pilgrims run into each other in the evening hours. Christa and I make a practice of it, just because we know the habits of the people we´ve travelled with and we´re always hoping to see familiar faces now that they are fewer and farther between. I mean, we have NEW familiar faces, but the ones from the beginning of the trip are the ones we hope most to see, and so we go to the plazas.
That night in Portomarín we sat and had dinner and a few drinks and watched people do the ¨pilgrim walk.¨ Christa gets a real kick out of this. That night we decided to rate them on a scale of one to ten, and it cracks us up. (We feel we´re entitled to laugh because we´ve been there and we do the walk too.) We saw this one guy in a red shirt, hobbling across the plaza to the church doors. He was leaning heavily on a tall wooden stick and one leg was wrapped in gauze, and he was walking so badly that we decided he was going to the church in the hopes that, once he got inside, he would simply die. We called him Stickman. Christa took pictures of him. He was so pathetic looking...poor guy. We didn´t see him come out, but we saw him cross the plaza back and forth to and from the church a few times, so we decided the people inside must have told him he had to go die somewhere else, but his heart was set on the church.... OH the pilgrim walk....
The Hungarians have resurfaced...the pirate and his entourage. They´ve walked the whole way, which sucks for my ego, but oh well. They waited around at our albergue till 6pm and were able to nab three beds on a reservation that hadn´t shown up. Grrr. He asked about Bradley James. I hope Skip reads this, because if he hears that the Hungarian pirate called him Bradley James, he´ll pull a Chuck Norris on Hungary and roundhouse the whole country. =)
We couldn´t figure out all the people in our albergue. For one thing, there were 160 beds...a huge warehouse room with about 40 bunked beds in a partitioned area, then a curtain, and then 40 more, and again, and AGAIN. And some people HAD SUITCASES. HUGE, SAMSONITE, HARD-SHELLED SUITCASES. WHAT are they doing??? We later surmised that they must be sending them ahead every day. But it´s ridiculous. Pilgrims with LUGGAGE. Christ on a crutch. More Spaniards now, and teenagers, and children. Christa is disgusted with the newbies who collapse, mid-afternoon, on their beds and lie there ¨like dead flies,¨ she says. We´re such snobs....
The snoring that night was INTENSE. Particularly from the bunk next to ours. I remember vaguely that at one point in the night I woke up and he sounded like a freight train, and I couldn´t help myself, I snapped, ¨ROLL OVER!!¨ to the guy, even though I doubt he spoke English and wasn´t awake to hear me anyway, even if he did. But surprisingly, it kinda worked...at least till I went back to sleep.
Yesterday, I decided I must have blown a fuse on the mad dash to Portomarín, because I was DEAD. NO energy. Christa and I were both snails. Furthermore, we decided not to play Galician Gallop in any way, shape, or form. We just decided to walk and enjoy ourselves (sluggish though we were) and see what the Camino had to offer. We decided to shoot for about 24km and figure something out when we got there. The thing is...it´s not a competition for beds. Competition implies that we can bring something to the fight. And we can´t. We´re not fast enough, we don´t leave early enough, and even if we tried, we can´t cover the kind of mileage we need by 10am, when places are filling up. So what´s the point?? Our elevation is dropping, we´re nearing the coast, and we decided that a field would be fine for the night. Get our night under the stars. I have a sleeping bag now, so I´m no longer worried...so we decided just to focus on the walk and what we came here to do.
Rain on and off. Galicia. Very much like the Pac Northwest, I think. Very cloudy all the time, sometimes the sun breaks through, and the rain is never that hard, just misty-sprinkly. Dad´s Gore-tex raincoat he gave me before I left is magic. I put it on, and the rain stops. Never fails. As soon as my rain gear is on, the rain is over. Magic.
Speaking of magic...since there´s not much else to say about the walk yesterday; it was pretty and green and misty and that´s about it...we came upon a table with some people behind it, and they were offering free coffee, tea, and magic tricks! It was a tiny little albergue in a tiny little cow town called Ligonde, run by folks from the Agape Fellowship. There were a few Americans working there...mostly expats in Spain and France who were part of this group, and they were there for a couple weeks working in the albergue. We´d gone about 17km at this point. We stopped for coffee, and a woman named Lisa offered us beds...there were a few still free. It was about 2pm.
I said thank you, but no, I hate to turn down a bed since I doubt I´ll have one tonight, but we have to walk farther for the day. She said all right, and said her sons did card tricks and we were welcome to have a break and sit for a while before we carried on.
I turned to Christa and we talked about how much we liked the place, and I said, ¨Gee, I´d really love to stay here...it´s so peaceful, but we have to walk farther.¨
And she said, ¨Why?¨
Why?
Why, indeed. It was a beautiful spot. There were tents set up in a small field across the street. The people were nice, and though I wanted nothing to do with Americans earlier in my trip, it was nice now to have effortless conversation without feeling like I was putting upon someone to speak a different language than their own. They had a large pavilion style tent in which they had all just had lunch. There was a dog in the street with an old man who said she had just had TEN puppies. Lisa´s kids were incredibly charming. It was the first breath of true Esprit du Chemin that we´d had for several DAYS. Why did we have to walk further? Because we´d said some arbitrary number earlier in the day? We had no guarantee for a bed later down the road, and stopping now or in another 7km would have no bearing on reaching Santiago on Saturday.
And the Camino is about more than just walking, and more than just Santiago. It´s about the experiences we have along the way, and the best ones happen in places like this with people like this.
Why not?
So we let go of our ¨plan¨ for the day and decided to see what the Camino had to offer us in this place. We said we´d stay. Well...we´d taken too long to decide. Only one bed available now; some people had come while we were sitting there dithering. I asked what other option there was for me. They told me there was a cot in the garage-type area. I said okay. I asked how much. FREE. Donation, of course, but free.
So we stopped.
It was lovely. We saw Malek not too long after; he´d stopped because his foot hurt again and was in another albergue around the corner. (He said the boys didn´t walk yesterday...he thought they were taking the bus, despite the compostela, which says you HAVE to walk the last 100km.) We got a text from Brad, from someone´s phone, that said he was going to Arzúa (FAR ahead) and was hoping for Santiago the next day.
While we sat, some guy showed up on a UNICYCLE. He had a long red hat, like a jester´s hat with one prong, and multicolored striped cotton overalls like a circus bodysuit type thing, and he had a stick with a jester´s head on it and a horn like a clown´s car. He´s friggin´ crazy but he´s hysterical to see. He´s doing the whole Camino (SOMEHOW) on a unicycle. Malek said he escaped from the circus. I said the circus is probably chasing him down to get him back. I got a picture or two.
Not too long after, I got MY reason why we decided to stay. A wonderful girl from Missouri named Dawn lives in Madrid and will be back there on Monday. I got her phone number and email address and she has offered to let me stay with her Wednesday night...the night before my plane leaves. YAY!! Madrid no longer up in the air...just how to get there!!
The people were wonderful at the Fuente del Peregrino albergue and we had a wonderful time. They made us a huge pasta dinner and held a lovely prayer service in the pavilion tent, where they read Paslm 23 in four different languages and offered up a few prayers for pilgrims we´d all met along the way who have specific challenges they´re facing (or just all the pilgrims in general). It was beautiful. Neat to hear such a well-known psalm in Spanish, French, and German as well as English. No chance of internet in a place that small, so that´s why I´m just catching up now.
Anyway...my cot...SIGH. There were six or seven of us in cots in the garage area, and outside, there were dogs barking ALL NIGHT LONG. And the cot was a bit less than comfortable. Not flat like a military cot...curved so you had to lay on your back, which is hard on your knees and on tender heels covered with callouses. I eventually did get to sleep. Christa said her bed was wonderful...grr. We´d flipped for it that afternoon, and I won, but I said she could have it anyway.
So this morning, up and outta there. Breakfast, goodbyes, thank yous...such a lovely place. Glad we stayed there. And we both had our strength back, so today was a good power day.
It´s been uneventful today. Saw the unicycle guy again, ha ha. Lots more clouds and rain off and on. We managed to miss the rain in the morning because we left around 9am again. Then we stopped for breakfast around 11am and it started again. Got our raingear on. It worked again...the rain stopped as soon as we left the bar. We walked through a farmer´s market in Palas de Rei and some old woman tried to sell me a wheel of cheese that I swear weighed a pound. More beautiful countryside, more cows, more stone fences, more corridor-like paths, beautiful forests, eucalyptus now (bet Skip´s loving that), and quaint little towns. Stopped at half-past-Magnum in a little town called O Coto and the man practically demanded I come sit down and rest when he saw me standing by the road with my ice cream. I told him I was waiting for my friend to catch up with me, and he was very pleased when we both came in and sat down. Once Christa arrived, an ice cream became an ice cream, patatas fritas, and a beer or two. (Hey, my pants are getting too big.) It was beautiful. We got ready to leave, and the rain started again. Stayed a bit longer. It stopped.
When we finally got to Mélide, we had to make a decision. Stay and try the nationally-famous pulpo (octopus), or go another 12km to the next town that had an albergue. At this point it was 4pm. We wanted to push on and have a big day to make up for yesterday, but we just couldn´t do it. So we went to the albergue. The woman sitting behind the desk, despite our most positive smiles, kept her ¨completo¨ look on and referred us to a nearby school.
Off we went. The school was empty...no one apparently in charge...but there was a sign-up sheet and one rucksack in the corner of the gym and the shower was going. So we put our stuff down. A few more people arrived. We got a shower before anyone else got there...it was ARCTIC. And it´s not too warm outside here either. Galicia is COLD!!! But basically, we´re fine and I will FINALLY use my mat and my sleeping bag tonight, I suppose. I´m not happy about a gym floor, but the only double room we found is €50 and the gym is free, and so we´re gonna get some Camino experience. I actually miss the garage in Triacastela!!!
News from the boys...the people from whose phone Skip texted us yesterday have told us that he was hoping to get as close as possible to Santiago today but his foot is really bad. We don´t know how it´s bad...but we´re worried. Today was his goal and we hope he made it. Felix JUST wrote me from Santiago and said they did 117km in 30 hours in a madcap stretch that I can hardly believe, given how sick Kasey was the other day. They got there YESTERDAY. How, I have no idea. But they´re there and we hope we´ll see them Saturday afternoon...which is the DAY AFTER TOMORROW.
We´re set up for 33.5 tomorrow and might send the packs ahead one last time. After that, 24km on Saturday and Santiago that afternoon...I was hoping for the morning, but it is not to be. The hard part has been a couple of long stretches with no albergues. Like today...either stay where we were or push out another 12 at 4pm. Which would´ve had us getting there at 7pm. No go, not with intermittent rain. Tomorrow, we´ll get to Santa Irene, I think, and that´s at the end of another long stretch with nowhere to stay...like 18km. Tough to plan with stretches like that.
But we´ll make it there. We can´t believe it´s almost over. There´s been so much to think about...so many life experiences are now in a new light. The hardship has been good for us, and even the gym floor experience tonight will be a good thing, I think.
Many people have written and said they don´t know what they´ll read with their coffee each morning once I´m off the Camino. I have a feeling I´ll keep writing things the Camino reveals to me even after I come home. I think that´s when the real lessons will start to become clear. So stay tuned.
Tomorrow, Santa Irene. Wish us luck.
I posted two days ago from Portomarín, before we went to dinner. If you´re on the Camino, a good rule of thumb is to eat dinner or have drinks in a sidewalk cafe on the town square, or the closest thing the town has to a square. There´s almost always a big open space in front of the biggest church in town, and generally, that´s where most pilgrims run into each other in the evening hours. Christa and I make a practice of it, just because we know the habits of the people we´ve travelled with and we´re always hoping to see familiar faces now that they are fewer and farther between. I mean, we have NEW familiar faces, but the ones from the beginning of the trip are the ones we hope most to see, and so we go to the plazas.
That night in Portomarín we sat and had dinner and a few drinks and watched people do the ¨pilgrim walk.¨ Christa gets a real kick out of this. That night we decided to rate them on a scale of one to ten, and it cracks us up. (We feel we´re entitled to laugh because we´ve been there and we do the walk too.) We saw this one guy in a red shirt, hobbling across the plaza to the church doors. He was leaning heavily on a tall wooden stick and one leg was wrapped in gauze, and he was walking so badly that we decided he was going to the church in the hopes that, once he got inside, he would simply die. We called him Stickman. Christa took pictures of him. He was so pathetic looking...poor guy. We didn´t see him come out, but we saw him cross the plaza back and forth to and from the church a few times, so we decided the people inside must have told him he had to go die somewhere else, but his heart was set on the church.... OH the pilgrim walk....
The Hungarians have resurfaced...the pirate and his entourage. They´ve walked the whole way, which sucks for my ego, but oh well. They waited around at our albergue till 6pm and were able to nab three beds on a reservation that hadn´t shown up. Grrr. He asked about Bradley James. I hope Skip reads this, because if he hears that the Hungarian pirate called him Bradley James, he´ll pull a Chuck Norris on Hungary and roundhouse the whole country. =)
We couldn´t figure out all the people in our albergue. For one thing, there were 160 beds...a huge warehouse room with about 40 bunked beds in a partitioned area, then a curtain, and then 40 more, and again, and AGAIN. And some people HAD SUITCASES. HUGE, SAMSONITE, HARD-SHELLED SUITCASES. WHAT are they doing??? We later surmised that they must be sending them ahead every day. But it´s ridiculous. Pilgrims with LUGGAGE. Christ on a crutch. More Spaniards now, and teenagers, and children. Christa is disgusted with the newbies who collapse, mid-afternoon, on their beds and lie there ¨like dead flies,¨ she says. We´re such snobs....
The snoring that night was INTENSE. Particularly from the bunk next to ours. I remember vaguely that at one point in the night I woke up and he sounded like a freight train, and I couldn´t help myself, I snapped, ¨ROLL OVER!!¨ to the guy, even though I doubt he spoke English and wasn´t awake to hear me anyway, even if he did. But surprisingly, it kinda worked...at least till I went back to sleep.
Yesterday, I decided I must have blown a fuse on the mad dash to Portomarín, because I was DEAD. NO energy. Christa and I were both snails. Furthermore, we decided not to play Galician Gallop in any way, shape, or form. We just decided to walk and enjoy ourselves (sluggish though we were) and see what the Camino had to offer. We decided to shoot for about 24km and figure something out when we got there. The thing is...it´s not a competition for beds. Competition implies that we can bring something to the fight. And we can´t. We´re not fast enough, we don´t leave early enough, and even if we tried, we can´t cover the kind of mileage we need by 10am, when places are filling up. So what´s the point?? Our elevation is dropping, we´re nearing the coast, and we decided that a field would be fine for the night. Get our night under the stars. I have a sleeping bag now, so I´m no longer worried...so we decided just to focus on the walk and what we came here to do.
Rain on and off. Galicia. Very much like the Pac Northwest, I think. Very cloudy all the time, sometimes the sun breaks through, and the rain is never that hard, just misty-sprinkly. Dad´s Gore-tex raincoat he gave me before I left is magic. I put it on, and the rain stops. Never fails. As soon as my rain gear is on, the rain is over. Magic.
Speaking of magic...since there´s not much else to say about the walk yesterday; it was pretty and green and misty and that´s about it...we came upon a table with some people behind it, and they were offering free coffee, tea, and magic tricks! It was a tiny little albergue in a tiny little cow town called Ligonde, run by folks from the Agape Fellowship. There were a few Americans working there...mostly expats in Spain and France who were part of this group, and they were there for a couple weeks working in the albergue. We´d gone about 17km at this point. We stopped for coffee, and a woman named Lisa offered us beds...there were a few still free. It was about 2pm.
I said thank you, but no, I hate to turn down a bed since I doubt I´ll have one tonight, but we have to walk farther for the day. She said all right, and said her sons did card tricks and we were welcome to have a break and sit for a while before we carried on.
I turned to Christa and we talked about how much we liked the place, and I said, ¨Gee, I´d really love to stay here...it´s so peaceful, but we have to walk farther.¨
And she said, ¨Why?¨
Why?
Why, indeed. It was a beautiful spot. There were tents set up in a small field across the street. The people were nice, and though I wanted nothing to do with Americans earlier in my trip, it was nice now to have effortless conversation without feeling like I was putting upon someone to speak a different language than their own. They had a large pavilion style tent in which they had all just had lunch. There was a dog in the street with an old man who said she had just had TEN puppies. Lisa´s kids were incredibly charming. It was the first breath of true Esprit du Chemin that we´d had for several DAYS. Why did we have to walk further? Because we´d said some arbitrary number earlier in the day? We had no guarantee for a bed later down the road, and stopping now or in another 7km would have no bearing on reaching Santiago on Saturday.
And the Camino is about more than just walking, and more than just Santiago. It´s about the experiences we have along the way, and the best ones happen in places like this with people like this.
Why not?
So we let go of our ¨plan¨ for the day and decided to see what the Camino had to offer us in this place. We said we´d stay. Well...we´d taken too long to decide. Only one bed available now; some people had come while we were sitting there dithering. I asked what other option there was for me. They told me there was a cot in the garage-type area. I said okay. I asked how much. FREE. Donation, of course, but free.
So we stopped.
It was lovely. We saw Malek not too long after; he´d stopped because his foot hurt again and was in another albergue around the corner. (He said the boys didn´t walk yesterday...he thought they were taking the bus, despite the compostela, which says you HAVE to walk the last 100km.) We got a text from Brad, from someone´s phone, that said he was going to Arzúa (FAR ahead) and was hoping for Santiago the next day.
While we sat, some guy showed up on a UNICYCLE. He had a long red hat, like a jester´s hat with one prong, and multicolored striped cotton overalls like a circus bodysuit type thing, and he had a stick with a jester´s head on it and a horn like a clown´s car. He´s friggin´ crazy but he´s hysterical to see. He´s doing the whole Camino (SOMEHOW) on a unicycle. Malek said he escaped from the circus. I said the circus is probably chasing him down to get him back. I got a picture or two.
Not too long after, I got MY reason why we decided to stay. A wonderful girl from Missouri named Dawn lives in Madrid and will be back there on Monday. I got her phone number and email address and she has offered to let me stay with her Wednesday night...the night before my plane leaves. YAY!! Madrid no longer up in the air...just how to get there!!
The people were wonderful at the Fuente del Peregrino albergue and we had a wonderful time. They made us a huge pasta dinner and held a lovely prayer service in the pavilion tent, where they read Paslm 23 in four different languages and offered up a few prayers for pilgrims we´d all met along the way who have specific challenges they´re facing (or just all the pilgrims in general). It was beautiful. Neat to hear such a well-known psalm in Spanish, French, and German as well as English. No chance of internet in a place that small, so that´s why I´m just catching up now.
Anyway...my cot...SIGH. There were six or seven of us in cots in the garage area, and outside, there were dogs barking ALL NIGHT LONG. And the cot was a bit less than comfortable. Not flat like a military cot...curved so you had to lay on your back, which is hard on your knees and on tender heels covered with callouses. I eventually did get to sleep. Christa said her bed was wonderful...grr. We´d flipped for it that afternoon, and I won, but I said she could have it anyway.
So this morning, up and outta there. Breakfast, goodbyes, thank yous...such a lovely place. Glad we stayed there. And we both had our strength back, so today was a good power day.
It´s been uneventful today. Saw the unicycle guy again, ha ha. Lots more clouds and rain off and on. We managed to miss the rain in the morning because we left around 9am again. Then we stopped for breakfast around 11am and it started again. Got our raingear on. It worked again...the rain stopped as soon as we left the bar. We walked through a farmer´s market in Palas de Rei and some old woman tried to sell me a wheel of cheese that I swear weighed a pound. More beautiful countryside, more cows, more stone fences, more corridor-like paths, beautiful forests, eucalyptus now (bet Skip´s loving that), and quaint little towns. Stopped at half-past-Magnum in a little town called O Coto and the man practically demanded I come sit down and rest when he saw me standing by the road with my ice cream. I told him I was waiting for my friend to catch up with me, and he was very pleased when we both came in and sat down. Once Christa arrived, an ice cream became an ice cream, patatas fritas, and a beer or two. (Hey, my pants are getting too big.) It was beautiful. We got ready to leave, and the rain started again. Stayed a bit longer. It stopped.
When we finally got to Mélide, we had to make a decision. Stay and try the nationally-famous pulpo (octopus), or go another 12km to the next town that had an albergue. At this point it was 4pm. We wanted to push on and have a big day to make up for yesterday, but we just couldn´t do it. So we went to the albergue. The woman sitting behind the desk, despite our most positive smiles, kept her ¨completo¨ look on and referred us to a nearby school.
Off we went. The school was empty...no one apparently in charge...but there was a sign-up sheet and one rucksack in the corner of the gym and the shower was going. So we put our stuff down. A few more people arrived. We got a shower before anyone else got there...it was ARCTIC. And it´s not too warm outside here either. Galicia is COLD!!! But basically, we´re fine and I will FINALLY use my mat and my sleeping bag tonight, I suppose. I´m not happy about a gym floor, but the only double room we found is €50 and the gym is free, and so we´re gonna get some Camino experience. I actually miss the garage in Triacastela!!!
News from the boys...the people from whose phone Skip texted us yesterday have told us that he was hoping to get as close as possible to Santiago today but his foot is really bad. We don´t know how it´s bad...but we´re worried. Today was his goal and we hope he made it. Felix JUST wrote me from Santiago and said they did 117km in 30 hours in a madcap stretch that I can hardly believe, given how sick Kasey was the other day. They got there YESTERDAY. How, I have no idea. But they´re there and we hope we´ll see them Saturday afternoon...which is the DAY AFTER TOMORROW.
We´re set up for 33.5 tomorrow and might send the packs ahead one last time. After that, 24km on Saturday and Santiago that afternoon...I was hoping for the morning, but it is not to be. The hard part has been a couple of long stretches with no albergues. Like today...either stay where we were or push out another 12 at 4pm. Which would´ve had us getting there at 7pm. No go, not with intermittent rain. Tomorrow, we´ll get to Santa Irene, I think, and that´s at the end of another long stretch with nowhere to stay...like 18km. Tough to plan with stretches like that.
But we´ll make it there. We can´t believe it´s almost over. There´s been so much to think about...so many life experiences are now in a new light. The hardship has been good for us, and even the gym floor experience tonight will be a good thing, I think.
Many people have written and said they don´t know what they´ll read with their coffee each morning once I´m off the Camino. I have a feeling I´ll keep writing things the Camino reveals to me even after I come home. I think that´s when the real lessons will start to become clear. So stay tuned.
Tomorrow, Santa Irene. Wish us luck.
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Sarria to Portomarín
The Camino has spent two days biting us, and today we bit back. =)
Yesterday turned out pretty good. First of all, I bought a sleeping bag. It´s warm and it rolls up small into a little bag and it wasn´t that expensive...grr...and I guess it´s probably about a pound, maybe less. But I´m happy to trade weight on my shoulders for weight on my mind. I am no longer worried about sleeping outside, if it comes to that, and that peace of mind is worth the money and the weight.
We went back up to the boys´ albergue to eat dinner, but they didn´t show, and today we don´t know where they are...ahead of us or here in town...don´t even know if they walked, or how Kasey´s temp turns out. If you guys are reading this, I hope KK is okay and we´ll see you in Santiago on the 10th.
Dinner was lame. I´ve decided my digestive issues are due to the TONS of oil and grease all our food seems to come with. So I decided today to go back to the good ol´ straightforward bocadillo sandwiches and try to avoid the grease. The food here is so hit-or-miss...in Triacastela I had AWESOME spaghetti...but yesterday´s was like soapy noodles in grease.
At one point the waiter came out carrying two tall bottles of water, the liter-and-a-half kind, taking them to another table, and they gleamed like bags of gold, and that´s how bad I wanted them. Did I mention that walking out of the field in Triacastela, back to the garage, I saw a shooting star? Usually I think of something huge to wish for, but when I thought about it, all I really wanted was a good night´s sleep. The Camino reduces your wishes to such simple things...it´s amazing. Water. Sleep. A cool morning. Strong legs and arms and lungs and back. Bread. A little meat, a cold beer. Fruit. A shower. A place in the sun, or a place in the shade, depending. So, so simple.
Anyway...got an awesome night´s sleep...too well, actually...we didn´t wake up till nearly 8, and it was almost 9am when we finished a quick breakfast in the hotel restaurant. (We shared the room with Yasmeen and a Dutchman [not a flying one] named Wem...so the cost was pretty manageable.) Before we left the hotel we decided to ask the receptionist if she´d help us try to make a reservation in an albergue in Portomarín. We weren´t sure they´d take one, but we may as well try. She made the call for us and asked for two beds, and was told that they´d hold them for us till 3pm. It was now 9am-ish and she claimed that Portomarín was a 4-hour walk. Uh...it´s 22km. Four hours for 22km is doable, but awful fast.... Anyway, no matter, we had six hours. No prob.
But then we looked out the window. RAIN!!! Dammiiiiiiit...back into the bags, rain gear, wrap my pack in my poncho, shift electronics into the raincoat pockets, cover Christa´s bag with the super-cool bag cover that came with hers (grr), and then on the road around 9:30am.
Well, turns out it wasn´t really raining. It was sort of a drizzle that quickly became nothing more than the mist, but it hung around till noon. I love mornings like this anyway, but when we´re walking, they´re PERFECT, as long as they´re not impeding some awesome mountain vista, which today they weren´t. But the cold misty mornings make everything look kind of magical, and when you get a forest path through farming villages, and your body temp stays down and you don´t have to suck a whole lot of water...well, the k´s go by pretty fast.
And let me tell you, I was FAST today. I don´t think I´ve ever felt so strong in my entire life. We had a lot of uphill this morning, and I seemed to devour every single hill. I´m amazed at how strong my legs are now, and I didn´t even have any foot issues (my pinkie toe was a dried crust this morning and you don´t even want me to describe it any further than that). I was unstoppable. I was passing newbies left and right, and even ran into the three Canadian women from Cacabelos...looking much healthier and in less pain.
We get cow traffic that early. At one intersection I passed a farmer driving a cow with a long stick...then I saw the calf. He looked wet. There was a car coming up the road, and suddenly the mama cow came hustling back down the road to bunt the calf out of the way, and after that, it seemed like the farmer had a hard time getting them both to go in the direction he wanted. I was going to pass right by, but when I saw how protective she was of her baby, I hestitated for a minute...do cows charge you if they think their babies are threatened?? Sigh...things my dad hasn´t told me about cattle farming yet....
The second time, I came up behind a farmer driving several cows up the road, and ended up in a rather one-sided conversation with him for several minutes (his side, and he didn´t seem to mind the monopoly). It was just cool to follow all these little roads and dirt tracks between stone fences and under tree canopies, past fields of cattle and crops, everything disappearing into the mist...I could´ve been in Ireland or Scotland or anywhere in the world.
I had left Christa far behind and my book said the 100km stone marker was coming up, so I found a place to stop and wait for her...which took about 8 or 10 minutes I guess. (Told you I was fast today.) I wanted to get a picture with her next to it because I knew it would have been a great experience when we saw it.
We didn´t see it. Somehow we missed it. I don´t know how. But when we stopped for a quick bottle of water, the marker stone said 99.5. I was pissed, but I wasn´t going back a whole half kilometer to see it. There had been a big group of people stopped on the path about that distance back, and I´d said as we came upon them, it must be up there...but as we passed them, I didn´t see anything. It had to be there. Sigh. So we got a picture next to 99.5.
In the bar where we got the bottle of water, we got news from Australia!! The bar book said ¨Skippy Norris was here today...4-8-08.¨ So Brad is probably a whole day ahead of us by now. We signed below him and hustled on. It was past noon by now.
We spent most of the day having no idea where we were, which was frustrating, and looking at the watch, which was more like a challenge than a hassle. We made lunch as quick as possible in Ferrerios and Christa left before I did, since she´s slower.
It took me about 15 minutes to catch her once I left. We had about 9km to go from our lunch spot and had 1:45 to do it in. Tough.
The road is covered in newbies. They are soft and pale and doughy...their feet hurt, their bags are uncomfortable or matching, their knees and thighs and ankles untrustworthy, they are loud, sometimes you see a woman walking with no bag next to a man with two. Today we declared them chum. Christa and I are sleek and dark and fast, with 700km in our strong thighs...our knees no longer betray us, and we can take the downhills fast with footing like mountain goats. We overtake them, devour them, leave them in our dust. It is a powerful feeling and we exalted in it.
It was a steep downhill and we could see Portomarín. 2.5k to go and 15 minutes. We´ll never make it. But the downhill was asphalt alternating with flat dirt and good footing. We charged. It´s not really a run, but we jog down them, packs tight against us, thighs and knees stronger than they ever were in the first weeks, and MAN we´re fast. Hit the bottom...uphill...cross the bridge and the albergue should be right on the other side. Ten minutes to go at the start of the bridge. Bridge takes 5 minutes and at the end are STAIRS. CRAP. Give me all the uphills you can throw at me, but NOT STAIRS. I charge. Christa is way behind me. I hit the top step of perhaps 40 and nearly die. A moment to rest, look behind, she is applauding from the bridge and laughing. Three minutes to go. Up more stairs. Signs pointing left, onward, down. Arrive, soaked with sweat and hotter than hell, out of breath and sucking water. 2:59. Lobby full of smelly pilgrims, laughing and joking with the hospitaleras. Soaking up our time. Christa arrives behind me. One of them finally looks at us. We give her name. It´s not in the book. They holler to someone else. The answer comes back... ¨Sí.¨ We´ve made it.
So tonight we have two bunk beds in an albergue with probably 160 beds, and no one without a reservation is being accepted. Todo completo. So THIS is the game. So be it, we´ll play it.
I wasn´t worried about getting a bed tonight. I was worried about all my clothes being dirty. I had to go two days in one shirt, which is much more of a problem than with pants. But everything´s clean now and hanging on the line...we´re waiting on her laundry, and then we´ll go find something to eat, or perhaps just throw ourselves into the river for a long-awaited swim.
Tomorrow, there is an albergue in our book in San Xiao (Still Spain or will I be in China tomorrow?) that claims to accept reservations. Hopefully we´ll go there...it´s a good goal, about 26km or so. Laundry should be good till right before Santiago on Friday. Can´t believe there´s so little time left, that we´ve come so far. 700km. Wow.
My German lessons continue. Today I got the days of the week and a song about the sunrise that Christa sings every morning. I know greetings, I´m hungry/thirsty, and ¨I have a cat,¨ which I resort to every time one of them says something to me I don´t understand...it´s my way of saying I have no idea, that´s all I got, and it cracks them up. Last night Yasmeen gave me her Spanish-German phrasebook...I was looking at Spanish phrases, trying to remember what they meant in English, and then trying to figure out how to pronounce them in German. It was pretty funny. At one point, Yasmeen said to the others in German, ¨Wow, give her something to study and suddenly the loud American is quiet.¨ Christa and Wem made her translate and she turned about six shades of pink, but it was funny.
All for now...so glad we get to relax a bit tonight instead of worrying about where we´re going to sleep and shower and wash clothes. Wish we knew where the boys were, but practicing being in the moment...here and now. Trying not even to think about where we go tomorrow till the morning...which is hard.
Catch you tomorrow, if I can...thanks for all the support in the comments, by the way, and love you all.
Yesterday turned out pretty good. First of all, I bought a sleeping bag. It´s warm and it rolls up small into a little bag and it wasn´t that expensive...grr...and I guess it´s probably about a pound, maybe less. But I´m happy to trade weight on my shoulders for weight on my mind. I am no longer worried about sleeping outside, if it comes to that, and that peace of mind is worth the money and the weight.
We went back up to the boys´ albergue to eat dinner, but they didn´t show, and today we don´t know where they are...ahead of us or here in town...don´t even know if they walked, or how Kasey´s temp turns out. If you guys are reading this, I hope KK is okay and we´ll see you in Santiago on the 10th.
Dinner was lame. I´ve decided my digestive issues are due to the TONS of oil and grease all our food seems to come with. So I decided today to go back to the good ol´ straightforward bocadillo sandwiches and try to avoid the grease. The food here is so hit-or-miss...in Triacastela I had AWESOME spaghetti...but yesterday´s was like soapy noodles in grease.
At one point the waiter came out carrying two tall bottles of water, the liter-and-a-half kind, taking them to another table, and they gleamed like bags of gold, and that´s how bad I wanted them. Did I mention that walking out of the field in Triacastela, back to the garage, I saw a shooting star? Usually I think of something huge to wish for, but when I thought about it, all I really wanted was a good night´s sleep. The Camino reduces your wishes to such simple things...it´s amazing. Water. Sleep. A cool morning. Strong legs and arms and lungs and back. Bread. A little meat, a cold beer. Fruit. A shower. A place in the sun, or a place in the shade, depending. So, so simple.
Anyway...got an awesome night´s sleep...too well, actually...we didn´t wake up till nearly 8, and it was almost 9am when we finished a quick breakfast in the hotel restaurant. (We shared the room with Yasmeen and a Dutchman [not a flying one] named Wem...so the cost was pretty manageable.) Before we left the hotel we decided to ask the receptionist if she´d help us try to make a reservation in an albergue in Portomarín. We weren´t sure they´d take one, but we may as well try. She made the call for us and asked for two beds, and was told that they´d hold them for us till 3pm. It was now 9am-ish and she claimed that Portomarín was a 4-hour walk. Uh...it´s 22km. Four hours for 22km is doable, but awful fast.... Anyway, no matter, we had six hours. No prob.
But then we looked out the window. RAIN!!! Dammiiiiiiit...back into the bags, rain gear, wrap my pack in my poncho, shift electronics into the raincoat pockets, cover Christa´s bag with the super-cool bag cover that came with hers (grr), and then on the road around 9:30am.
Well, turns out it wasn´t really raining. It was sort of a drizzle that quickly became nothing more than the mist, but it hung around till noon. I love mornings like this anyway, but when we´re walking, they´re PERFECT, as long as they´re not impeding some awesome mountain vista, which today they weren´t. But the cold misty mornings make everything look kind of magical, and when you get a forest path through farming villages, and your body temp stays down and you don´t have to suck a whole lot of water...well, the k´s go by pretty fast.
And let me tell you, I was FAST today. I don´t think I´ve ever felt so strong in my entire life. We had a lot of uphill this morning, and I seemed to devour every single hill. I´m amazed at how strong my legs are now, and I didn´t even have any foot issues (my pinkie toe was a dried crust this morning and you don´t even want me to describe it any further than that). I was unstoppable. I was passing newbies left and right, and even ran into the three Canadian women from Cacabelos...looking much healthier and in less pain.
We get cow traffic that early. At one intersection I passed a farmer driving a cow with a long stick...then I saw the calf. He looked wet. There was a car coming up the road, and suddenly the mama cow came hustling back down the road to bunt the calf out of the way, and after that, it seemed like the farmer had a hard time getting them both to go in the direction he wanted. I was going to pass right by, but when I saw how protective she was of her baby, I hestitated for a minute...do cows charge you if they think their babies are threatened?? Sigh...things my dad hasn´t told me about cattle farming yet....
The second time, I came up behind a farmer driving several cows up the road, and ended up in a rather one-sided conversation with him for several minutes (his side, and he didn´t seem to mind the monopoly). It was just cool to follow all these little roads and dirt tracks between stone fences and under tree canopies, past fields of cattle and crops, everything disappearing into the mist...I could´ve been in Ireland or Scotland or anywhere in the world.
I had left Christa far behind and my book said the 100km stone marker was coming up, so I found a place to stop and wait for her...which took about 8 or 10 minutes I guess. (Told you I was fast today.) I wanted to get a picture with her next to it because I knew it would have been a great experience when we saw it.
We didn´t see it. Somehow we missed it. I don´t know how. But when we stopped for a quick bottle of water, the marker stone said 99.5. I was pissed, but I wasn´t going back a whole half kilometer to see it. There had been a big group of people stopped on the path about that distance back, and I´d said as we came upon them, it must be up there...but as we passed them, I didn´t see anything. It had to be there. Sigh. So we got a picture next to 99.5.
In the bar where we got the bottle of water, we got news from Australia!! The bar book said ¨Skippy Norris was here today...4-8-08.¨ So Brad is probably a whole day ahead of us by now. We signed below him and hustled on. It was past noon by now.
We spent most of the day having no idea where we were, which was frustrating, and looking at the watch, which was more like a challenge than a hassle. We made lunch as quick as possible in Ferrerios and Christa left before I did, since she´s slower.
It took me about 15 minutes to catch her once I left. We had about 9km to go from our lunch spot and had 1:45 to do it in. Tough.
The road is covered in newbies. They are soft and pale and doughy...their feet hurt, their bags are uncomfortable or matching, their knees and thighs and ankles untrustworthy, they are loud, sometimes you see a woman walking with no bag next to a man with two. Today we declared them chum. Christa and I are sleek and dark and fast, with 700km in our strong thighs...our knees no longer betray us, and we can take the downhills fast with footing like mountain goats. We overtake them, devour them, leave them in our dust. It is a powerful feeling and we exalted in it.
It was a steep downhill and we could see Portomarín. 2.5k to go and 15 minutes. We´ll never make it. But the downhill was asphalt alternating with flat dirt and good footing. We charged. It´s not really a run, but we jog down them, packs tight against us, thighs and knees stronger than they ever were in the first weeks, and MAN we´re fast. Hit the bottom...uphill...cross the bridge and the albergue should be right on the other side. Ten minutes to go at the start of the bridge. Bridge takes 5 minutes and at the end are STAIRS. CRAP. Give me all the uphills you can throw at me, but NOT STAIRS. I charge. Christa is way behind me. I hit the top step of perhaps 40 and nearly die. A moment to rest, look behind, she is applauding from the bridge and laughing. Three minutes to go. Up more stairs. Signs pointing left, onward, down. Arrive, soaked with sweat and hotter than hell, out of breath and sucking water. 2:59. Lobby full of smelly pilgrims, laughing and joking with the hospitaleras. Soaking up our time. Christa arrives behind me. One of them finally looks at us. We give her name. It´s not in the book. They holler to someone else. The answer comes back... ¨Sí.¨ We´ve made it.
So tonight we have two bunk beds in an albergue with probably 160 beds, and no one without a reservation is being accepted. Todo completo. So THIS is the game. So be it, we´ll play it.
I wasn´t worried about getting a bed tonight. I was worried about all my clothes being dirty. I had to go two days in one shirt, which is much more of a problem than with pants. But everything´s clean now and hanging on the line...we´re waiting on her laundry, and then we´ll go find something to eat, or perhaps just throw ourselves into the river for a long-awaited swim.
Tomorrow, there is an albergue in our book in San Xiao (Still Spain or will I be in China tomorrow?) that claims to accept reservations. Hopefully we´ll go there...it´s a good goal, about 26km or so. Laundry should be good till right before Santiago on Friday. Can´t believe there´s so little time left, that we´ve come so far. 700km. Wow.
My German lessons continue. Today I got the days of the week and a song about the sunrise that Christa sings every morning. I know greetings, I´m hungry/thirsty, and ¨I have a cat,¨ which I resort to every time one of them says something to me I don´t understand...it´s my way of saying I have no idea, that´s all I got, and it cracks them up. Last night Yasmeen gave me her Spanish-German phrasebook...I was looking at Spanish phrases, trying to remember what they meant in English, and then trying to figure out how to pronounce them in German. It was pretty funny. At one point, Yasmeen said to the others in German, ¨Wow, give her something to study and suddenly the loud American is quiet.¨ Christa and Wem made her translate and she turned about six shades of pink, but it was funny.
All for now...so glad we get to relax a bit tonight instead of worrying about where we´re going to sleep and shower and wash clothes. Wish we knew where the boys were, but practicing being in the moment...here and now. Trying not even to think about where we go tomorrow till the morning...which is hard.
Catch you tomorrow, if I can...thanks for all the support in the comments, by the way, and love you all.
Monday, August 4, 2008
Triacastela to Sarria
Thank God today was uneventful, because yesterday, like I said, was enough for two days.
The boys had planned to walk at 4am. CHRIST. I don´t understand how they´re doing their Camino...they´re pushing 50ks in a day, just to get it over with, just walking to walk, and not seeing a thing, in my opinion. A lot of men do the Camino this way, I think. I don´t understand. They can walk it however they want, but Christa and I think they´re missing the point, and we´re glad we have the freedom to walk it like women and take our time and look around.
4am didn´t happen. It did for Malek...he was gone when it was still dark. The rest of us laid around till 7:30. The goal today was Sarria...a big enough town that we shouldn´t have the problem we had the night before in Triacastela.
Turns out Patrick and Kasey Kahne were sick...heat exhaustion and upset stomachs. They decided to take the bus to Sarria today. Christa and I just shook our heads...we think they´re pushing themselves too hard and are now paying the price. But we were happy they´d be at the same destination tomorrow; otherwise, we would´ve lost them again right away.
So Christa and I headed out. We took the long route to Sarria, through Samos, site of one of the oldest monasteries (5th or 6th century) in the Western world. It was a beautiful walk, through forest paths and heavy mist...in fact, I thought we´d get our first real rain today. But we didn´t, and we covered 10k before breakfast (which was more like brunch).
Morning, pre-breakfast k´s don´t count. Nothing hurts and all you´re thinking about is a cup of tea...they´re free and easy and the more you can do, the better. Once you stop, each restart is harder.
We thought the second half of the day would pass more quickly. It didn´t. We were on narrow highway shoulders almost all day...getting blasted by truckers doing 90mph on turns and not changing to the opposite lane when they saw us coming on the shoulder. We finally followed some dubious fletches off the path and soon found ourselves in largely unchartered territory...not in our books, no idea how far to Sarria. We ended up following the Río Sarria through a wood along a river...a walking course with PT obstacles set up along the way. It was beautiful; Christa loved it. But we were both out of water and soon I was out of sorts.
After forever, we made it to the town and began the 3:30 hunt for albergues. We found them.
And they were all full. And the hospitaleros were, again, NO help. I wanted to throttle them.
So here I sit, in the upstairs internet café of the bar where we found Felix and Patrick and Yasmeen...Kasey Kahne has a fever of 40C...and Christa went to find a hotel room. She´s come back and gone...found a quad for €75, which is great as long as we can find two other homeless pilgrims to split the cost. Shouldn´t be a problem. I have to go soon to find the Hotel Roma. But at least we have a roof for tonight.
The Camino is no longer a game. Suddenly the road is glutted with people who have just begun, and albergues fill up by 10am. Those left over are left to fend for themselves like dogs fighting for a scrap of meat in a cage. I´ve been warned not to let the final stages of my Camino disintegrate into a mad, pre-dawn dash for beds, but it´s a nerve-wracking thing now, wondering how far you can make it before it´s too late to get a bed, and being at unfriendly nighttime altitudes. I don´t know how the next few days will play out, so if I don´t post, it´s probably because I´m sleeping under a bridge. Ha ha. I doubt it´ll be that bad, but it won´t be as cheap as it´s been till now, even if we do get albergue beds (they are more expensive now). The good news is that we´ll be in Santiago on Saturday and the final stage will begin...Finisterra...Madrid...and home next Thursday.
What a day. Off to find the hotel.
By the way...my pinkie toe has exploded and shed the old bubble like a snake shedding its skin. It´s kind of gross and fascinating at the same time. Unfortunately, I had a moment of stupidity, and after popping the new blisters on my toes (one under the shedding skin, one beside it) I put lotion on them. Cross your fingers that that doesn´t come back to bite me in the ass....
Oh, and gastic problems STILL continue, as if this weren´t enough fun....
Christa has been asking for more suffering; she thinks she hasn´t suffered enough.
Now, we both are.
The boys had planned to walk at 4am. CHRIST. I don´t understand how they´re doing their Camino...they´re pushing 50ks in a day, just to get it over with, just walking to walk, and not seeing a thing, in my opinion. A lot of men do the Camino this way, I think. I don´t understand. They can walk it however they want, but Christa and I think they´re missing the point, and we´re glad we have the freedom to walk it like women and take our time and look around.
4am didn´t happen. It did for Malek...he was gone when it was still dark. The rest of us laid around till 7:30. The goal today was Sarria...a big enough town that we shouldn´t have the problem we had the night before in Triacastela.
Turns out Patrick and Kasey Kahne were sick...heat exhaustion and upset stomachs. They decided to take the bus to Sarria today. Christa and I just shook our heads...we think they´re pushing themselves too hard and are now paying the price. But we were happy they´d be at the same destination tomorrow; otherwise, we would´ve lost them again right away.
So Christa and I headed out. We took the long route to Sarria, through Samos, site of one of the oldest monasteries (5th or 6th century) in the Western world. It was a beautiful walk, through forest paths and heavy mist...in fact, I thought we´d get our first real rain today. But we didn´t, and we covered 10k before breakfast (which was more like brunch).
Morning, pre-breakfast k´s don´t count. Nothing hurts and all you´re thinking about is a cup of tea...they´re free and easy and the more you can do, the better. Once you stop, each restart is harder.
We thought the second half of the day would pass more quickly. It didn´t. We were on narrow highway shoulders almost all day...getting blasted by truckers doing 90mph on turns and not changing to the opposite lane when they saw us coming on the shoulder. We finally followed some dubious fletches off the path and soon found ourselves in largely unchartered territory...not in our books, no idea how far to Sarria. We ended up following the Río Sarria through a wood along a river...a walking course with PT obstacles set up along the way. It was beautiful; Christa loved it. But we were both out of water and soon I was out of sorts.
After forever, we made it to the town and began the 3:30 hunt for albergues. We found them.
And they were all full. And the hospitaleros were, again, NO help. I wanted to throttle them.
So here I sit, in the upstairs internet café of the bar where we found Felix and Patrick and Yasmeen...Kasey Kahne has a fever of 40C...and Christa went to find a hotel room. She´s come back and gone...found a quad for €75, which is great as long as we can find two other homeless pilgrims to split the cost. Shouldn´t be a problem. I have to go soon to find the Hotel Roma. But at least we have a roof for tonight.
The Camino is no longer a game. Suddenly the road is glutted with people who have just begun, and albergues fill up by 10am. Those left over are left to fend for themselves like dogs fighting for a scrap of meat in a cage. I´ve been warned not to let the final stages of my Camino disintegrate into a mad, pre-dawn dash for beds, but it´s a nerve-wracking thing now, wondering how far you can make it before it´s too late to get a bed, and being at unfriendly nighttime altitudes. I don´t know how the next few days will play out, so if I don´t post, it´s probably because I´m sleeping under a bridge. Ha ha. I doubt it´ll be that bad, but it won´t be as cheap as it´s been till now, even if we do get albergue beds (they are more expensive now). The good news is that we´ll be in Santiago on Saturday and the final stage will begin...Finisterra...Madrid...and home next Thursday.
What a day. Off to find the hotel.
By the way...my pinkie toe has exploded and shed the old bubble like a snake shedding its skin. It´s kind of gross and fascinating at the same time. Unfortunately, I had a moment of stupidity, and after popping the new blisters on my toes (one under the shedding skin, one beside it) I put lotion on them. Cross your fingers that that doesn´t come back to bite me in the ass....
Oh, and gastic problems STILL continue, as if this weren´t enough fun....
Christa has been asking for more suffering; she thinks she hasn´t suffered enough.
Now, we both are.
Ruitelán to Triacastela
This blog is going to take forever to write. I´m not even doubling up, even though I missed yesterday, because yesterday has to be one in its own...it was enough experience to fill three days.
It was the most challenging day since the Pyrenees, no question.
Up and out of Ruitelán at 7:30...the Buddhist monks who run the albergue (named Pequeña Potala, after a place in Lhasa) woke us up with opera music, which was kinda nice. Also nice was the strict rule that no one get up prior to the music starting at 6am. Nothing ruins your morning like being awake to the sounds of pack zippers and rummaging an hour and a half before you plan to wake up. We had only four people in our room last night (YAY stealing extra pillows!!!)...an East German and a girl from smalltown Georgia who went to study in Switzerland, met the East German, and now lives with him in West Berlin (much to the joy of her parents, she added, ha ha). They were very nice. The monks were strict, and not always very nice (in fact, I spent most of the time wondering what faux pas I had committed to make them be so sharp with me...I felt like the kid in the class that the teacher doesn´t like...wow, some job insight in the middle of Nowhere, España....) but they cooked an awesome meal and ran a tight ship. The kink in the works was that I´d left my laundry on the line last night, not realizing that we were at an altitude that would cool off considerably overnight and leave a dew...so some of it was damp, including my fleece and two pairs of socks. The fleece didn´t bother me much, though, and the socks can hang off my bag, so on we went. PS - Happiness = a cold morning on a terrace with a warm cup of tea in your hands.
The relatively short hop to La Faba was TOUGH. It was a mountain forest path. Good things: shade, cool weather, which is nice when you´re sweating and working hard because you don´t need as much water. Tough part: rocky ascent that seems to go on forever because you can´t see very far ahead of you. But we made it before too long. Christa had had breakfast at the albergue, and had gotten in a rhythm, so by the time I made La Faba, after her and the couple from our room, she was ready to go on. I had to stop for some toast and tea...which upset me at first because I like to walk with Christa, or at least near her, but it turned out well because I got to climb the rest of the way to O Ceb at my own pace.
O Ceb. Not remotely as bad as I thought it would be, and with a gorgeous, clear morning, the views made it all worthwhile. I know I´m getting redundant, talking about breathtaking mountain views and how incredible they are, and I´m going to stop trying to describe them, because you just won´t get it unless you do it yourself. The pictures won´t even come close. Anyway...the climb was steep, but nothing we hadn´t done before. There were a lot of us today...always people you´re passing and who are then passing you while you stop and take pictures or simply breathe in the experience of being on the top ridge of the world. Several women from the albergue last night became motivators for me, and vice versa, despite my bad Spanish and their limited English...it was wonderful just to have the smile for encouragement. At one point, we passed the rock marking the border to Galicia...the last province we´ll walk through to Santiago!!
At the top of O Cebriero, there is a stone wall that offers you a vista of the whole valley and the mountain range falling away behind you. Here´s that word ¨breathtaking¨ again. But it was. The town is beautiful...slate-colored roofs, church, gift shops that I finally decreed myself NOT allowed to enter, because, of course, I want EVERYTHING.... Found Christa in one of the bars and we had eggs and fries and sausage and OJ...ahhhhh, OJ. =) We are finding familiar faces everywhere...Ürigan was there, sitting at the base of a stone pilgrim statue and looking like a shaman, so peaceful and still. We have been leapfrogging a Croatian couple for days and Christa is tight with them, so we ate breakfast with them. The church was small and quaint and beautiful. It was a total tourist town...people selling fruit and charms and EVERYTHING pilgrim and Galician memorabilia. Apparently they´re very into witches...my guidebook says a typical Galician statement is ¨I do not believe in witches, but there are some.¨ Ha ha. It was beautiful. Almost as beautiful...Christa got a text message from Yasmeen: ¨Tell Christine her German boys are coming to meet you.¨ They were on their way!! YAAAY!! But we couldn´t wait...we´d been there an hour and still had Alto de Poio to tackle...had to press on.
Out of O Ceb. Poorly marked ways, like the book said it would be. Atop a higher peak I could see a large wooden cross. My friend John told me the view was incredible (though we weren´t there for sunrise or sunset...impossible unless you do a short day or tackle it at the end, something I would NOT have had the strength for yesterday) and that I was to look for a British 20p coin ¨in the cross.¨ I didn´t understand the direction at first. Christa decided to walk on ahead again, and I watched her disappear up a steep pathway that led away from the cross.
I reached the cross...well worth the climb, and when I finally took a good look at it, I understood what John had said. There were coins embedded in the long vertical cracks running up the sides of the wooden cross...some quite high, and I don´t know how people got them in there. It was mounted on a stone base, so the bottom of the cross was about waist high for me. The COINS, though...they were black with tar from the weeping of the wood, I suppose, and the exposed edges of most of them were bent against the surface...God only knows by what. I looked and looked for the 20p coin, which is distinctive because it´s not round; it has about eight sides. No luck. So down I came.
The pathway down from the cross met the pathway out of town very close to the edge of the village, and I just couldn´t resist. I told myself I´d just check the main road and the bar where we´d eaten, and see if the boys had arrived. No one in the bar. I headed out and took one last look...and there they were.
OVERJOYED. Wonderful to see them again, especially Felix. They had a new guy with them, Patrick from Cologne. I didn´t stay long; they were knackered and went for a beer and I hung around for a few minutes and then left...they were doing 40k-plus days and assured us they would see us later.
Wrong road out of town. I went a little ways, and then realized this road did not have the grade I saw Christa disappearing on. I looked up the mountain and could tell that there was a break in the vegetation above me where the right path cut. And here I digress....
I want to describe to you the activity I next undertook, which I hope to make a summer Olympic sport one day. It is called Mountain Fern Swimming. It is most commonly undertaken by lone wayward pilgrims who find themselves on the wrong path and fear the path they are on may take them to their destination, but by a different route, causing them to miss fellows who are waiting for them ahead. It is largely a solo sport. Competitors are allowed long trousers, boots, and a walking stick, and must carry a pack weighing no less than 20lbs. Caveats: The trousers must be thin enough for the plentiful stickerbushes to penetrate. Boots may be thick for footing protection, but must be heavy, and with exposed shoelaces that will snag on every possible unseen branch. The walking stick will aid in the climb, but must be fitted with a bell-shaped piece at the bottom to ensure that it will be difficult to pull out of deep, snarled grasses and roots. The terrain is mainly tall fern and stickerbushes, which are fitted with deceptively inviting yellow flowers, and small clumps of saplings and shrubbery. The common distance is approximately 20m at a steep grade. The difficulties are numerous. One, the pilgrim cannot turn back once the entry is attained, as footing is treacherous and the vegetation impossibly thick. The astute pilgrim will occasionally be able to locate crushed grasses where previous competitors have passed, but these footsteps are only so helpful as they invariably end at clumps of saplings and impassable shrubbery. The higher the competitor ascends, the thicker the ferns, which lends the name ¨fern swimming¨ to the event, which is very like treading water in jello. The breaststroke is not required, but is recommended, as the imaginitive reader will see that all other strokes would be highly inefficient. The winner is determined, of course, by the amount of time the pilgrim takes to complete the ascent, and the directness of the route chosen. Bonus points are awarded for the plentitude of green grass stains covering her trousers from thigh to shin, stickers that penetrate the trousers and embed in the skin, and red rashes from the impact of said stickers, penetrating or not. Points are deducted for lost articles in the vegetation, rips in the trousers, and any moments of stationary route indecision lasting longer than five seconds. The mental challenge of the sport can be intensified by the presence of groups of laughing and/or pointing, non-wayward pilgrims on the upper route. The pilgrim can win back such points by stoicism of mien when s/he finds that 10m beyond the route chosen, there is a broad swath of clear dirt path connecting the two paths, or that 1km ahead, the roads join, the lower route following a flat route while the upper one contains both a steep ascent and descent to the point of juncture, with no possibility for missing waiting companions in between.
Sigh. Thankfully I had no deductions and (I believe) no spectators.
During my fern swimming competition I thought a lot about times in my life when I´d waited for people and tried to stand still for people and tried to go back for people, when what I should have done was get on with my life...and what it had cost me.
Onward. Long periods of indecision in trying to figure out if the pilgrim ahead of me knew where he was going, and whether the road I was on matched the description in the book. No stops for ice cream. I had climbed to the top ridge of the world and was now walking along it, getting a view of Galicia only seen by hawks and pilgrims and people in (spit) CARS. Breathtaking. But Alto de Poio awaited and I was friendless.
Gastric problems contine...they come and go, usually at the most inopportune times, but occasionally I get lucky and it happens near a bar. Note: the Spanish? Not so big on making sure there´s always TP in the bathrooms. Lesson learned.
On the way, I found a bronze statue of a pilgrim, about 10ft high, straining into the wind at the Alto de San Roque. Missed Christa here, as I wanted my picture taken with him, but found a biker to do the job.
Alto de Poio is the last strenuous hurdle between us and Santiago (says the book). They weren´t kidding. It was the hardest part of the day. At this point, I figured Christa was a good hour or more ahead of me and I could only pray that she would be there at the top of the ridge. Lots of stops and starts...2pm at this point, hotter than HELL...but I made it to the top. As I finished the ascent, there was nothing but the vegetation around me, the top of the pass, and blue sky...couldn´t see a single thing beyond it, that´s how steep it was.
She was there...sitting outside a café bar with a beer. I nearly cried. We sat and had a beer and a Mars Bar next to a very strange-looking Spanish guy with several piercings and a long, iron-gray goatee it looked like he had dipped halfway into a vat of rust. We chatted, and she wants me to be sure to put in here (along with her hello to everyone) that the course of our conversation included the American National Anthem, and she knows ALL the words...and sang it softly with me on the top of the highest peak on the Galician Camino just to prove it. It was great. =)
So we walked on. I thought we´d stop in Fonfría, just another few k´s ahead of us, but she had a mind to get to Triacastela, which would make today a huge day both in changes in elevation (approximately 700 vertical meters in about 10k) and in distance (books, marker stones, and pedometer disagreed between 31k, 34k, and 23 miles...YOU do the math, I´m too tired.) We passed Fonfría without even stopping, something that would come back to haunt us later.
Onward, and onward, and onward...more panoramas of mountains draped in quilts of browns and greens and yellows...more stone fences, and the Galician pallozas, round stone huts with thatched roofs that go back to the Celts. We started the descent.
What seemed like hours later, we finally caught sight of a village far, far below us, and a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach told me this was Triacastela, and that there were no albergues between Fonfría, now far behind us, and Triacastela, nearly directly below us. But on we went.
It occurred to me yesterday that I´ve been walking with German-speaking people for about 4 weeks and haven´t learned a single word. So I got Christa to start teaching me some things, just to keep our minds off our feet and the heat and the weight of our packs. It worked wonderfully...except for the learning part...as I am visual and German contains sounds I´ve never made before. But I managed a few.
I wish I could adequately describe how long we walked and how exhausting it is and how hard it is to do steep downhills on a day with such steep uphills, but I can´t. About halfway down the mountain, we stopped for a break, and a few minutes later, we found a Californian Christa had walked with earlier, and a German mother and daughter. The daughter was sixteen and DONE...her legs hurt too much to go on...maybe her knee...I don´t know. They put her down in the shade and the mother started trying to hitchhike into town. No one would stop and the girl started to sob, which broke my heart. Christa and I felt like we should leave, because someone might stop for two but not if they thought we were five...but I hated to leave her. We finally told the mom we´d send for a taxi, and headed out. (They made it to town okay, by the way.)
Lots more little medieval villages, HUGE chestnut trees (one over 100 years old and ENORMOUS), and a lot farther walk than we thought.
Into Triacastela...at EIGHT PM. Walking for 12.5 hours. Unbelievable. We couldn´t believe how late it was. At the entrance of the village was a large municipal albergue with a huge field in which there were already several tents set up. We were thinking some of the others in town sounded nice, and were passing the field when a woman came up and told us the albergue was full. That was easy; made our decision...we´d walk to the others.
Second one: Completo. Full.
Third one...Completo.
LAST one...Completo.
Uh oh.
What pisses me off (sidebar) is that the hospitaleros are no longer friendly and helpful. They know all the albergues are full, this happens every day, but they don´t offer us any help, and when we ask for suggestions, they can´t be bothered. They´re here to HELP us, and they DON´T. It´s infuriating.
Beer. Indecision. It´s a good thing she and I have different books; hers gives information about hotels and hostels whereas mine is mainly albergues. She found one in her book for a double room for €30. Fine. Suddenly, I was tackled by something huge. Felix. The boys had arrived...the three with Malek, a German we´d been leapfrogging since the beginning. We told them everything was full; they said they knew and were going for a hotel room. They walked off.
Christa and I looked at each other. Everyone was suddenly an adversary...including the boys.
She left the bags with me and went to find the hotel room. I sat nervously with the beers.
She came back. Completo. Full.
Which left us with the field. SIGHHHHHH. At least I´d use my sleeping mat for the first time; it was a nuisance of a whole pound I´d been carrying since St. Jean. We didn´t love the idea of sleeping out in the field, but we didn´t seem to have any other options.
Back all the way through the town to the field. Ran into the couple from last night and the boys; found out the municipal albergue would let you take a shower, but only if you paid €3. Scalping bastard. I did it, the boys did it, Christa passed. We left our bags by the side of the albergue and went for dinner; the boys took theirs with them. On our way out, Neils and Elsbeth, the couple from last night, said they were going to see if they could find a school gym to sleep in. I thought the grass would be more comfortable than a gym floor, but Neils said something about gymnastics mats.
We found a place to eat and tried to make the best of a nervous situation. We decided we´d just drink a lot and hopefully that would chase the cold away. Ha. Ha. None of us really did. We had a good dinner and tried to stay in the moment...but it was hard, because it was getting colder and we knew that at this altitude, there would also be dew in the morning. Some of us, including me, had no sleeping bag. Some of us, including Christa, had no sleeping mat.
It got dark. The passing pilgrims became hated enemies every time one of us asked ¨Tienes camas?¨ Do you have a bed? And got answers like Yes, or We have a tent, or We got a hotel room. Bastards, every one of them. We felt stupid for walking so long, so late in the day, so close to Santiago. Suddenly, the Camino was no longer a game. I thought about what Neils had said about a gymnastics mat...but didn´t like the idea of blindly wandering in search of a school with my pack and my toe blisters.
I tried to explain to the guys that tonight would be about body heat and we had to huddle together. They kept looking dubiously at each other. Boys.
11pm. It fell to me to ask the bartender of the restaurant if we could sleep on the floor in the bar. He looked sympathetic and said no. But he talked about a plaza a little ways ahead of us and made motions that we understood to be a roof and directions off to the left of the plaza.
I said I´d go check it out. The others waited. The streets were silent and dark by now...as I walked, I passed the last albergue we´d checked and the door was still open. I could see space inside and a couch. I passed several sleeping dogs in the streets who barely flicked an ear as I walked by. I found the plaza. The roofed area was like a car park, dirty, with a broken-down post office. Dogs barking furiously somewhere in the dark nearby. Gave me the shivers. I headed back.
On the way, I walked into the open albergue and put on my most pitiful face. In my broken Spanish, I explained to the hospitalera, who seemed kind and was decked with all kinds of amulet necklaces (usually the symbol of a benign person well connected with the earth and karma and the forces of the universe), that I had five friends and we had nowhere to sleep, and that it would be cold tonight and wet in the field. I asked her if we could sleep on the floor. She said no, gently, but her husband said something to her and they took me outside and next door. To their GARAGE....
They slid open a heavy metal door. Inside it was raw concrete, half of it still powdered. But it was WARM. She said we could sleep there. I seized the opportunity and said my friend and I would have to go back to the field and get our bags, but the boys had theirs...she smiled and said she had noticed the boys earlier (her husband had served us at the restaurant) and said that was fine, but we had to be silent when we came in.
I made a dash back to the café to tell everyone I´d scored us a garage. They were ecstatic and headed for the albergue while Christa and I went BACK through the town to the field again. On the way, in a dark stretch, we looked up, and were nearly staggered by the number of stars and the clarity of the Milky Way...we´re usually locked in an albergue before it really gets dark.
We got our bags...no problems...and headed back to the garage, and when we got there, St. James had come and gone and there were MATTRESSES ON THE FLOOR!!! They were old and threadbare, but they were TWICE as thick as the ones we´d had in ANY albergue we´d stayed in!! It was like Christmas. We were overjoyed. There was enough room for all of us, though we were pretty close to one another, but we didn´t care. In fact, we were so warm in there, we were zipping off trouser legs and kicking off sleeping bags within minutes. It was a dusty, dirty old garage and the sound of water in the pipes from toilets and showers was loud, and two of the German boys snored, but to us, it was a Hilton.
And that was enough for one day. Wow. It´s a different story from here to Santiago...this is where the mad dash for beds begins.
It was the most challenging day since the Pyrenees, no question.
Up and out of Ruitelán at 7:30...the Buddhist monks who run the albergue (named Pequeña Potala, after a place in Lhasa) woke us up with opera music, which was kinda nice. Also nice was the strict rule that no one get up prior to the music starting at 6am. Nothing ruins your morning like being awake to the sounds of pack zippers and rummaging an hour and a half before you plan to wake up. We had only four people in our room last night (YAY stealing extra pillows!!!)...an East German and a girl from smalltown Georgia who went to study in Switzerland, met the East German, and now lives with him in West Berlin (much to the joy of her parents, she added, ha ha). They were very nice. The monks were strict, and not always very nice (in fact, I spent most of the time wondering what faux pas I had committed to make them be so sharp with me...I felt like the kid in the class that the teacher doesn´t like...wow, some job insight in the middle of Nowhere, España....) but they cooked an awesome meal and ran a tight ship. The kink in the works was that I´d left my laundry on the line last night, not realizing that we were at an altitude that would cool off considerably overnight and leave a dew...so some of it was damp, including my fleece and two pairs of socks. The fleece didn´t bother me much, though, and the socks can hang off my bag, so on we went. PS - Happiness = a cold morning on a terrace with a warm cup of tea in your hands.
The relatively short hop to La Faba was TOUGH. It was a mountain forest path. Good things: shade, cool weather, which is nice when you´re sweating and working hard because you don´t need as much water. Tough part: rocky ascent that seems to go on forever because you can´t see very far ahead of you. But we made it before too long. Christa had had breakfast at the albergue, and had gotten in a rhythm, so by the time I made La Faba, after her and the couple from our room, she was ready to go on. I had to stop for some toast and tea...which upset me at first because I like to walk with Christa, or at least near her, but it turned out well because I got to climb the rest of the way to O Ceb at my own pace.
O Ceb. Not remotely as bad as I thought it would be, and with a gorgeous, clear morning, the views made it all worthwhile. I know I´m getting redundant, talking about breathtaking mountain views and how incredible they are, and I´m going to stop trying to describe them, because you just won´t get it unless you do it yourself. The pictures won´t even come close. Anyway...the climb was steep, but nothing we hadn´t done before. There were a lot of us today...always people you´re passing and who are then passing you while you stop and take pictures or simply breathe in the experience of being on the top ridge of the world. Several women from the albergue last night became motivators for me, and vice versa, despite my bad Spanish and their limited English...it was wonderful just to have the smile for encouragement. At one point, we passed the rock marking the border to Galicia...the last province we´ll walk through to Santiago!!
At the top of O Cebriero, there is a stone wall that offers you a vista of the whole valley and the mountain range falling away behind you. Here´s that word ¨breathtaking¨ again. But it was. The town is beautiful...slate-colored roofs, church, gift shops that I finally decreed myself NOT allowed to enter, because, of course, I want EVERYTHING.... Found Christa in one of the bars and we had eggs and fries and sausage and OJ...ahhhhh, OJ. =) We are finding familiar faces everywhere...Ürigan was there, sitting at the base of a stone pilgrim statue and looking like a shaman, so peaceful and still. We have been leapfrogging a Croatian couple for days and Christa is tight with them, so we ate breakfast with them. The church was small and quaint and beautiful. It was a total tourist town...people selling fruit and charms and EVERYTHING pilgrim and Galician memorabilia. Apparently they´re very into witches...my guidebook says a typical Galician statement is ¨I do not believe in witches, but there are some.¨ Ha ha. It was beautiful. Almost as beautiful...Christa got a text message from Yasmeen: ¨Tell Christine her German boys are coming to meet you.¨ They were on their way!! YAAAY!! But we couldn´t wait...we´d been there an hour and still had Alto de Poio to tackle...had to press on.
Out of O Ceb. Poorly marked ways, like the book said it would be. Atop a higher peak I could see a large wooden cross. My friend John told me the view was incredible (though we weren´t there for sunrise or sunset...impossible unless you do a short day or tackle it at the end, something I would NOT have had the strength for yesterday) and that I was to look for a British 20p coin ¨in the cross.¨ I didn´t understand the direction at first. Christa decided to walk on ahead again, and I watched her disappear up a steep pathway that led away from the cross.
I reached the cross...well worth the climb, and when I finally took a good look at it, I understood what John had said. There were coins embedded in the long vertical cracks running up the sides of the wooden cross...some quite high, and I don´t know how people got them in there. It was mounted on a stone base, so the bottom of the cross was about waist high for me. The COINS, though...they were black with tar from the weeping of the wood, I suppose, and the exposed edges of most of them were bent against the surface...God only knows by what. I looked and looked for the 20p coin, which is distinctive because it´s not round; it has about eight sides. No luck. So down I came.
The pathway down from the cross met the pathway out of town very close to the edge of the village, and I just couldn´t resist. I told myself I´d just check the main road and the bar where we´d eaten, and see if the boys had arrived. No one in the bar. I headed out and took one last look...and there they were.
OVERJOYED. Wonderful to see them again, especially Felix. They had a new guy with them, Patrick from Cologne. I didn´t stay long; they were knackered and went for a beer and I hung around for a few minutes and then left...they were doing 40k-plus days and assured us they would see us later.
Wrong road out of town. I went a little ways, and then realized this road did not have the grade I saw Christa disappearing on. I looked up the mountain and could tell that there was a break in the vegetation above me where the right path cut. And here I digress....
I want to describe to you the activity I next undertook, which I hope to make a summer Olympic sport one day. It is called Mountain Fern Swimming. It is most commonly undertaken by lone wayward pilgrims who find themselves on the wrong path and fear the path they are on may take them to their destination, but by a different route, causing them to miss fellows who are waiting for them ahead. It is largely a solo sport. Competitors are allowed long trousers, boots, and a walking stick, and must carry a pack weighing no less than 20lbs. Caveats: The trousers must be thin enough for the plentiful stickerbushes to penetrate. Boots may be thick for footing protection, but must be heavy, and with exposed shoelaces that will snag on every possible unseen branch. The walking stick will aid in the climb, but must be fitted with a bell-shaped piece at the bottom to ensure that it will be difficult to pull out of deep, snarled grasses and roots. The terrain is mainly tall fern and stickerbushes, which are fitted with deceptively inviting yellow flowers, and small clumps of saplings and shrubbery. The common distance is approximately 20m at a steep grade. The difficulties are numerous. One, the pilgrim cannot turn back once the entry is attained, as footing is treacherous and the vegetation impossibly thick. The astute pilgrim will occasionally be able to locate crushed grasses where previous competitors have passed, but these footsteps are only so helpful as they invariably end at clumps of saplings and impassable shrubbery. The higher the competitor ascends, the thicker the ferns, which lends the name ¨fern swimming¨ to the event, which is very like treading water in jello. The breaststroke is not required, but is recommended, as the imaginitive reader will see that all other strokes would be highly inefficient. The winner is determined, of course, by the amount of time the pilgrim takes to complete the ascent, and the directness of the route chosen. Bonus points are awarded for the plentitude of green grass stains covering her trousers from thigh to shin, stickers that penetrate the trousers and embed in the skin, and red rashes from the impact of said stickers, penetrating or not. Points are deducted for lost articles in the vegetation, rips in the trousers, and any moments of stationary route indecision lasting longer than five seconds. The mental challenge of the sport can be intensified by the presence of groups of laughing and/or pointing, non-wayward pilgrims on the upper route. The pilgrim can win back such points by stoicism of mien when s/he finds that 10m beyond the route chosen, there is a broad swath of clear dirt path connecting the two paths, or that 1km ahead, the roads join, the lower route following a flat route while the upper one contains both a steep ascent and descent to the point of juncture, with no possibility for missing waiting companions in between.
Sigh. Thankfully I had no deductions and (I believe) no spectators.
During my fern swimming competition I thought a lot about times in my life when I´d waited for people and tried to stand still for people and tried to go back for people, when what I should have done was get on with my life...and what it had cost me.
Onward. Long periods of indecision in trying to figure out if the pilgrim ahead of me knew where he was going, and whether the road I was on matched the description in the book. No stops for ice cream. I had climbed to the top ridge of the world and was now walking along it, getting a view of Galicia only seen by hawks and pilgrims and people in (spit) CARS. Breathtaking. But Alto de Poio awaited and I was friendless.
Gastric problems contine...they come and go, usually at the most inopportune times, but occasionally I get lucky and it happens near a bar. Note: the Spanish? Not so big on making sure there´s always TP in the bathrooms. Lesson learned.
On the way, I found a bronze statue of a pilgrim, about 10ft high, straining into the wind at the Alto de San Roque. Missed Christa here, as I wanted my picture taken with him, but found a biker to do the job.
Alto de Poio is the last strenuous hurdle between us and Santiago (says the book). They weren´t kidding. It was the hardest part of the day. At this point, I figured Christa was a good hour or more ahead of me and I could only pray that she would be there at the top of the ridge. Lots of stops and starts...2pm at this point, hotter than HELL...but I made it to the top. As I finished the ascent, there was nothing but the vegetation around me, the top of the pass, and blue sky...couldn´t see a single thing beyond it, that´s how steep it was.
She was there...sitting outside a café bar with a beer. I nearly cried. We sat and had a beer and a Mars Bar next to a very strange-looking Spanish guy with several piercings and a long, iron-gray goatee it looked like he had dipped halfway into a vat of rust. We chatted, and she wants me to be sure to put in here (along with her hello to everyone) that the course of our conversation included the American National Anthem, and she knows ALL the words...and sang it softly with me on the top of the highest peak on the Galician Camino just to prove it. It was great. =)
So we walked on. I thought we´d stop in Fonfría, just another few k´s ahead of us, but she had a mind to get to Triacastela, which would make today a huge day both in changes in elevation (approximately 700 vertical meters in about 10k) and in distance (books, marker stones, and pedometer disagreed between 31k, 34k, and 23 miles...YOU do the math, I´m too tired.) We passed Fonfría without even stopping, something that would come back to haunt us later.
Onward, and onward, and onward...more panoramas of mountains draped in quilts of browns and greens and yellows...more stone fences, and the Galician pallozas, round stone huts with thatched roofs that go back to the Celts. We started the descent.
What seemed like hours later, we finally caught sight of a village far, far below us, and a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach told me this was Triacastela, and that there were no albergues between Fonfría, now far behind us, and Triacastela, nearly directly below us. But on we went.
It occurred to me yesterday that I´ve been walking with German-speaking people for about 4 weeks and haven´t learned a single word. So I got Christa to start teaching me some things, just to keep our minds off our feet and the heat and the weight of our packs. It worked wonderfully...except for the learning part...as I am visual and German contains sounds I´ve never made before. But I managed a few.
I wish I could adequately describe how long we walked and how exhausting it is and how hard it is to do steep downhills on a day with such steep uphills, but I can´t. About halfway down the mountain, we stopped for a break, and a few minutes later, we found a Californian Christa had walked with earlier, and a German mother and daughter. The daughter was sixteen and DONE...her legs hurt too much to go on...maybe her knee...I don´t know. They put her down in the shade and the mother started trying to hitchhike into town. No one would stop and the girl started to sob, which broke my heart. Christa and I felt like we should leave, because someone might stop for two but not if they thought we were five...but I hated to leave her. We finally told the mom we´d send for a taxi, and headed out. (They made it to town okay, by the way.)
Lots more little medieval villages, HUGE chestnut trees (one over 100 years old and ENORMOUS), and a lot farther walk than we thought.
Into Triacastela...at EIGHT PM. Walking for 12.5 hours. Unbelievable. We couldn´t believe how late it was. At the entrance of the village was a large municipal albergue with a huge field in which there were already several tents set up. We were thinking some of the others in town sounded nice, and were passing the field when a woman came up and told us the albergue was full. That was easy; made our decision...we´d walk to the others.
Second one: Completo. Full.
Third one...Completo.
LAST one...Completo.
Uh oh.
What pisses me off (sidebar) is that the hospitaleros are no longer friendly and helpful. They know all the albergues are full, this happens every day, but they don´t offer us any help, and when we ask for suggestions, they can´t be bothered. They´re here to HELP us, and they DON´T. It´s infuriating.
Beer. Indecision. It´s a good thing she and I have different books; hers gives information about hotels and hostels whereas mine is mainly albergues. She found one in her book for a double room for €30. Fine. Suddenly, I was tackled by something huge. Felix. The boys had arrived...the three with Malek, a German we´d been leapfrogging since the beginning. We told them everything was full; they said they knew and were going for a hotel room. They walked off.
Christa and I looked at each other. Everyone was suddenly an adversary...including the boys.
She left the bags with me and went to find the hotel room. I sat nervously with the beers.
She came back. Completo. Full.
Which left us with the field. SIGHHHHHH. At least I´d use my sleeping mat for the first time; it was a nuisance of a whole pound I´d been carrying since St. Jean. We didn´t love the idea of sleeping out in the field, but we didn´t seem to have any other options.
Back all the way through the town to the field. Ran into the couple from last night and the boys; found out the municipal albergue would let you take a shower, but only if you paid €3. Scalping bastard. I did it, the boys did it, Christa passed. We left our bags by the side of the albergue and went for dinner; the boys took theirs with them. On our way out, Neils and Elsbeth, the couple from last night, said they were going to see if they could find a school gym to sleep in. I thought the grass would be more comfortable than a gym floor, but Neils said something about gymnastics mats.
We found a place to eat and tried to make the best of a nervous situation. We decided we´d just drink a lot and hopefully that would chase the cold away. Ha. Ha. None of us really did. We had a good dinner and tried to stay in the moment...but it was hard, because it was getting colder and we knew that at this altitude, there would also be dew in the morning. Some of us, including me, had no sleeping bag. Some of us, including Christa, had no sleeping mat.
It got dark. The passing pilgrims became hated enemies every time one of us asked ¨Tienes camas?¨ Do you have a bed? And got answers like Yes, or We have a tent, or We got a hotel room. Bastards, every one of them. We felt stupid for walking so long, so late in the day, so close to Santiago. Suddenly, the Camino was no longer a game. I thought about what Neils had said about a gymnastics mat...but didn´t like the idea of blindly wandering in search of a school with my pack and my toe blisters.
I tried to explain to the guys that tonight would be about body heat and we had to huddle together. They kept looking dubiously at each other. Boys.
11pm. It fell to me to ask the bartender of the restaurant if we could sleep on the floor in the bar. He looked sympathetic and said no. But he talked about a plaza a little ways ahead of us and made motions that we understood to be a roof and directions off to the left of the plaza.
I said I´d go check it out. The others waited. The streets were silent and dark by now...as I walked, I passed the last albergue we´d checked and the door was still open. I could see space inside and a couch. I passed several sleeping dogs in the streets who barely flicked an ear as I walked by. I found the plaza. The roofed area was like a car park, dirty, with a broken-down post office. Dogs barking furiously somewhere in the dark nearby. Gave me the shivers. I headed back.
On the way, I walked into the open albergue and put on my most pitiful face. In my broken Spanish, I explained to the hospitalera, who seemed kind and was decked with all kinds of amulet necklaces (usually the symbol of a benign person well connected with the earth and karma and the forces of the universe), that I had five friends and we had nowhere to sleep, and that it would be cold tonight and wet in the field. I asked her if we could sleep on the floor. She said no, gently, but her husband said something to her and they took me outside and next door. To their GARAGE....
They slid open a heavy metal door. Inside it was raw concrete, half of it still powdered. But it was WARM. She said we could sleep there. I seized the opportunity and said my friend and I would have to go back to the field and get our bags, but the boys had theirs...she smiled and said she had noticed the boys earlier (her husband had served us at the restaurant) and said that was fine, but we had to be silent when we came in.
I made a dash back to the café to tell everyone I´d scored us a garage. They were ecstatic and headed for the albergue while Christa and I went BACK through the town to the field again. On the way, in a dark stretch, we looked up, and were nearly staggered by the number of stars and the clarity of the Milky Way...we´re usually locked in an albergue before it really gets dark.
We got our bags...no problems...and headed back to the garage, and when we got there, St. James had come and gone and there were MATTRESSES ON THE FLOOR!!! They were old and threadbare, but they were TWICE as thick as the ones we´d had in ANY albergue we´d stayed in!! It was like Christmas. We were overjoyed. There was enough room for all of us, though we were pretty close to one another, but we didn´t care. In fact, we were so warm in there, we were zipping off trouser legs and kicking off sleeping bags within minutes. It was a dusty, dirty old garage and the sound of water in the pipes from toilets and showers was loud, and two of the German boys snored, but to us, it was a Hilton.
And that was enough for one day. Wow. It´s a different story from here to Santiago...this is where the mad dash for beds begins.
Saturday, August 2, 2008
Cacebelos to Ruitelán
Well, today we were up with the chickens and left Cacabelos while it was still dark...I spared Christa the normal Christine-waking-up drama. Not that it helped much...we were still on the road for a very rough 10.5 hours today, despite our early start.
The first leg was beautiful, through vineyards with more blue mountains...I think I will love grapevines forever after this trip, and don´t be surprised if I try to grow some in Virginia. There are vineyards there, so don´t laugh!!!
The first gift we got today was a stop for breakfast in a tiny little town, inside some woman´s dream. She owned a little orange cement hut on the side of the road, with a little picnic area outside of it. She sold coffee and breakfast to passing pilgrims. It was the most beautiful space. The eating area was covered over with a light thatch canopy, and the hut was adorned with blue ceramic Camino tiles, some with the yellow shell sunburst, and one with Ultreïa on it...the pillars around the eating area were blue and purple with silver stars, and on the tables there were vases of fresh flowers and CANDLES...¨Breakfast by candlelight,¨ Christa exclaimed as we stopped. When we ordered our coffee, she came out with an incense stick and lit it. There was beautiful, meditative music playing from a CD player...it was gorgeous, and though I don´t think I got the words right when I asked her, you could just tell this was a dream of hers come to life. It was very peaceful and centering...a wonderful way to start the day.
And it went straight downhill from there. For me, at least.
Not long after we left the hut, I got sick to my stomach. I don´t think it had anything to do with breakfast...I think it was leftover from last night´s pasta. It got worse. In fact, I spent a LOT of quality time today on some of the finest porcelain Western León has to offer. Not fun. Plus, it was hotter than hell today...probably one of the hottest days we´ve had so far.
But I´m getting ahead of myself. After I had to leave the road for a few minutes...ahem...I raced off to catch up with Christa. Ten minutes later I realized I´d lost my hat. DAMMIT.... It´s probably not far, I told myself, and despite my no-backtracking-if-it´s-lost-it´s-lost rule, I went back. And every time I thought of stopping, I thought it must be just around the next bend. It was the FULL ten minutes back. Sigh. Got some extra K´s in today, I guess.
Caught up with Christa in Villafranca del Bierzo, a beautiful little village tucked in between the mountains. The church here is known as ¨little Santiago¨ because in the olden days, when pilgrims were too sick or weary to finish their Camino, they could get the same compostela from Villafranca. Well. We tried to find the right church, and after visiting three, we still weren´t quite sure which it was. We could see it coming in, but up close, we couldn´t tell. We got THREE stamps in Villafranca...ha ha. I´m on my second credential now, by the way.... Anyway...we headed out.
We were supposed to have two options leaving Villafranca...the ¨easy¨ one along the road, and the ¨camino duro¨ that headed up and over the mountain and was supposed to be QUITE a challenge. Rule: ALWAYS take the long route...NEVER take the road. The long route is usually away from the road and therefore much more beautiful. The extra Ks don´t matter. DO IT. And even if it climbs a mountain, the views will be breathtaking.
Well, we tried. But we missed the turn. And as we headed off on the road between the mountains, and the turn looked less and less likely, we stopped and debated going back to find it. We asked a local, pointing in our map books and asking where we were, and he assured us the fork in the road was still ahead of us. We weren´t convinced. Go on or go back? Torment. Indecision.
We flipped a coin. The coin said go on.
THANK GOD.
We took the easy road. We weren´t happy about it, but that´s how it turned out, as the fork never appeared and we later found out where we´d missed it. We wanted to go over the mountain, but when the roads met again later, we heard that it was a killer ascent for a whole hour and then a killer descent. And did I mention it was HOT today?? We would´ve died. So, c´est la vie.
We had enough today anyway. The walk by the roadside was kind of miserable. There was little shade and almost no wind...but there were blessedly few cars and the road also followed a bubbling river the whole way, and the sound of the water was nice. The other thing I should be thankful for is that the road wound between the mountains on the valley floor, so today was rather flat. So it wasn´t a ruin of a day...we missed some gorgeous views, but we also missed the bragging rights for the high road.
The end of the day was nothing to write home about, though the many little towns we passed through were quaint, and we´ve seen some awesome, HUGE chestnut trees that just BEG you to climb them. Christa has been teaching me about every kind of tree we pass. (I also drilled her on Austrian history most of the afternoon, just to make the time pass and take my mind off my feet.)
My feet. My toe blisters are still holding, but I´m almost out of Compeed and tomorrow is Sunday, so everything will be closed. My left pinkie toe now has this weird yellow fold of loose skin where that monster blister was. It´s kind of gross. Ha ha...aren´t you glad I included that? Like my brother told me, the rest of my heel blisters have become callouses and no longer bother me...knock on wood. Would you believe that I´m in the FOURTH WEEK of this Camino and we´re all STILL getting blisters??
We´re getting more people who have just started, as we are now at about 169k from Santiago. People are getting more impressed with words like ¨St. Jean Pied-de-Port¨ and ¨23 days now.¨ Ha haaaaa....
Anyway. No big deal on missing the mountain climb today, because tomorrow is O Cebriero, the last hurdle on the way to Santiago...our last mountain. Another tough ascent, and another following that, and then a downhill the day after (we probably won´t make it off the mountain tomorrow). Good news: we´re hitting it first thing in the morning, when it´s still cool and we´re fresh. Bad news: this stomach thing won´t go away. It´s been coming in waves all day. I´m trying to drink water because God forbid I be dehydrated tomorrow for our last mountain (about which I´m actually more nervous than I was about the Pyrenees...figure that...naïvete?)...but what if it´s the water? It´s me and my Pepto pills against the world. I am NOT looking forward to this. I hope to God I sleep well tonight and feel better tomorrow...this is gonna be the last tough day we have, I think....
PS - the plan is to walk into Santiago on the morning of the 9th. Did I mention that already? Did I mention it´s only ONE WEEK AWAY FROM TODAY???
Sigh.
Maybe I´ll go back to St. Jean and just start again....
PPS - Found Yasmeen again here at the albergue in Ruitelán...she says Skip was turning the Villafranca bars upside down last night.... Would love to have seen him climb O Ceb today with a hangover.... ;)
The first leg was beautiful, through vineyards with more blue mountains...I think I will love grapevines forever after this trip, and don´t be surprised if I try to grow some in Virginia. There are vineyards there, so don´t laugh!!!
The first gift we got today was a stop for breakfast in a tiny little town, inside some woman´s dream. She owned a little orange cement hut on the side of the road, with a little picnic area outside of it. She sold coffee and breakfast to passing pilgrims. It was the most beautiful space. The eating area was covered over with a light thatch canopy, and the hut was adorned with blue ceramic Camino tiles, some with the yellow shell sunburst, and one with Ultreïa on it...the pillars around the eating area were blue and purple with silver stars, and on the tables there were vases of fresh flowers and CANDLES...¨Breakfast by candlelight,¨ Christa exclaimed as we stopped. When we ordered our coffee, she came out with an incense stick and lit it. There was beautiful, meditative music playing from a CD player...it was gorgeous, and though I don´t think I got the words right when I asked her, you could just tell this was a dream of hers come to life. It was very peaceful and centering...a wonderful way to start the day.
And it went straight downhill from there. For me, at least.
Not long after we left the hut, I got sick to my stomach. I don´t think it had anything to do with breakfast...I think it was leftover from last night´s pasta. It got worse. In fact, I spent a LOT of quality time today on some of the finest porcelain Western León has to offer. Not fun. Plus, it was hotter than hell today...probably one of the hottest days we´ve had so far.
But I´m getting ahead of myself. After I had to leave the road for a few minutes...ahem...I raced off to catch up with Christa. Ten minutes later I realized I´d lost my hat. DAMMIT.... It´s probably not far, I told myself, and despite my no-backtracking-if-it´s-lost-it´s-lost rule, I went back. And every time I thought of stopping, I thought it must be just around the next bend. It was the FULL ten minutes back. Sigh. Got some extra K´s in today, I guess.
Caught up with Christa in Villafranca del Bierzo, a beautiful little village tucked in between the mountains. The church here is known as ¨little Santiago¨ because in the olden days, when pilgrims were too sick or weary to finish their Camino, they could get the same compostela from Villafranca. Well. We tried to find the right church, and after visiting three, we still weren´t quite sure which it was. We could see it coming in, but up close, we couldn´t tell. We got THREE stamps in Villafranca...ha ha. I´m on my second credential now, by the way.... Anyway...we headed out.
We were supposed to have two options leaving Villafranca...the ¨easy¨ one along the road, and the ¨camino duro¨ that headed up and over the mountain and was supposed to be QUITE a challenge. Rule: ALWAYS take the long route...NEVER take the road. The long route is usually away from the road and therefore much more beautiful. The extra Ks don´t matter. DO IT. And even if it climbs a mountain, the views will be breathtaking.
Well, we tried. But we missed the turn. And as we headed off on the road between the mountains, and the turn looked less and less likely, we stopped and debated going back to find it. We asked a local, pointing in our map books and asking where we were, and he assured us the fork in the road was still ahead of us. We weren´t convinced. Go on or go back? Torment. Indecision.
We flipped a coin. The coin said go on.
THANK GOD.
We took the easy road. We weren´t happy about it, but that´s how it turned out, as the fork never appeared and we later found out where we´d missed it. We wanted to go over the mountain, but when the roads met again later, we heard that it was a killer ascent for a whole hour and then a killer descent. And did I mention it was HOT today?? We would´ve died. So, c´est la vie.
We had enough today anyway. The walk by the roadside was kind of miserable. There was little shade and almost no wind...but there were blessedly few cars and the road also followed a bubbling river the whole way, and the sound of the water was nice. The other thing I should be thankful for is that the road wound between the mountains on the valley floor, so today was rather flat. So it wasn´t a ruin of a day...we missed some gorgeous views, but we also missed the bragging rights for the high road.
The end of the day was nothing to write home about, though the many little towns we passed through were quaint, and we´ve seen some awesome, HUGE chestnut trees that just BEG you to climb them. Christa has been teaching me about every kind of tree we pass. (I also drilled her on Austrian history most of the afternoon, just to make the time pass and take my mind off my feet.)
My feet. My toe blisters are still holding, but I´m almost out of Compeed and tomorrow is Sunday, so everything will be closed. My left pinkie toe now has this weird yellow fold of loose skin where that monster blister was. It´s kind of gross. Ha ha...aren´t you glad I included that? Like my brother told me, the rest of my heel blisters have become callouses and no longer bother me...knock on wood. Would you believe that I´m in the FOURTH WEEK of this Camino and we´re all STILL getting blisters??
We´re getting more people who have just started, as we are now at about 169k from Santiago. People are getting more impressed with words like ¨St. Jean Pied-de-Port¨ and ¨23 days now.¨ Ha haaaaa....
Anyway. No big deal on missing the mountain climb today, because tomorrow is O Cebriero, the last hurdle on the way to Santiago...our last mountain. Another tough ascent, and another following that, and then a downhill the day after (we probably won´t make it off the mountain tomorrow). Good news: we´re hitting it first thing in the morning, when it´s still cool and we´re fresh. Bad news: this stomach thing won´t go away. It´s been coming in waves all day. I´m trying to drink water because God forbid I be dehydrated tomorrow for our last mountain (about which I´m actually more nervous than I was about the Pyrenees...figure that...naïvete?)...but what if it´s the water? It´s me and my Pepto pills against the world. I am NOT looking forward to this. I hope to God I sleep well tonight and feel better tomorrow...this is gonna be the last tough day we have, I think....
PS - the plan is to walk into Santiago on the morning of the 9th. Did I mention that already? Did I mention it´s only ONE WEEK AWAY FROM TODAY???
Sigh.
Maybe I´ll go back to St. Jean and just start again....
PPS - Found Yasmeen again here at the albergue in Ruitelán...she says Skip was turning the Villafranca bars upside down last night.... Would love to have seen him climb O Ceb today with a hangover.... ;)
Friday, August 1, 2008
Molinaseca to Cacabelos
Today was...wonderful. Beautiful. Gorgeous scenery...we were absolutely glutted on blues and greens and mountains and vineyards and sky. Gorgeous walking.
Last night, after our foray in the library (where Christa DID manage to find me), we wandered back into Molinaseca for dinner and ran into German Boys II. We have found two new ones, both named Stefan. In some ways, they are very like the other two, which makes me laugh at odd moments...but in case F&KK are reading this, in NO way do they replace the two we had before (whom we still hope will catch up with us at some point!!). Christa noted that it was funny that we had four people at the dinner table last night and only two names between us...two Stefans and two Christa-Christines. Ha ha. Then we decided that it we couldn´t deal with two Stefans and we had to re-name them. My job, as usual. So when they mentioned that one of their principle debates as they walk is whether or not the value of 80´s hair band music is compromised by their ridiculous hair and outfits, and that another was whether or not Bon Jovi is the best band EVER (duh), I dubbed one Jon (Bon Jovi) and the other Eddie (Van Halen). And life goes on.
They talk about this German drinking song called Santa Maria, which they won´t translate for me, but apparently is quite explicit, so, heretofore, to avoid confusion, they will be the Santa Maria boys (to distinguish them from the German boys, Felix and Kasey Kahne). Postscript...StefanJonBonJovi vaguely resembles Ryan Newman. =)
Anyway...we had a wonderful late dinner, since our albergue didn´t close till 11pm and they didn´t know when theirs closed. Note: In Spain, when you order fish, the fish arrives with every single part given to it by God, to include skin, fins, tail, and HEAD. Um. Okay. I managed. And decided not to order fish anymore (it doesn´t seem to have a fuel-carryover the next day anyway).
So back to the albergue, where we had the good fortune to try to get ready for bed, with stuff scattered EVERYWHERE, in the pitch black. PITCH black. I dropped a lot of things, of course, which always makes me very popular with my fellow pilgrims in the room. The municipal albergue (ours) in Molinaseca has several bunks outside on the porch...which on a warmer night would´ve been awesome, but no takers last night.
We were (again) among the last to leave this morning. Christa says she hates to shake someone awake, but when she told me tonight that she wants to be walking tomorrow by 6:30am, I told her she´s either gonna have to either do that or set off firecrackers in my nostrils. Problem: NO hospitalero this morning and NO, I mean NO TOILET PAPER. Grrrrr.... We got on the road at about 8am.
The long walk into Ponferrada that would´ve been hellacious yesterday was rather pleasant this morning. We met up with a Quebecois (?) named Marie who was very nice, and saw our French savior from Foncebadón as well...and two American kids I first met back in Boadilla who seem to have come to Spain to read books. They were reading books in the albergue this morning when we were leaving, and when we got to the castle in Ponferrada, there they were, sitting outside it, reading books again. Um...far be it from ME to discourage anyone from reading, but...don´t we have a cathedral in Santiago to get to...?
Anyway. Nice walk in. LONG walk in. We hit a sweet shop for breakfast and found the Santa Maria boys again. Like most of what we order to eat, we took a gamble on the pastries we ordered and they were okay. But it was an ice cream shoppe, too, and when I saw a girl we know from Sweden with a cup of chocolate and mint, I had to do it too. So the ice cream stop happened today before there were even four numbers on the clock. Ha haaa....
On to the castle. We didn´t go in. We heard it wasn´t that great inside, and I don´t think it was even open, but it looked AWESOME. Typical castle...gray stone, battlements, round towers, everything. Loved it. Hit the square afterwards and found the red all-purpose-multi-purpose shawl I´ve been looking for since Burgos...Skip had a green one I kept stealing. The red one spent the rest of the day pirate-style on my head. I don´t know if I looked badass, but I felt like it, so as far as I´m concerned, everyone wins. (Like I say about my hair and having no makeup and wearing clothes with God-knows-what stained on them at this point, -I- don´t have to look at me!! HAH.)
We made short work of Ponferrada and were heading out of it before too long. OH...stopped in the Basilica of Our Lady of the Encina (oak tree) to see a statue of the Virgin Mary with the infant Jesus...apparently it was hidden inside an oak tree by Bishop Toribio, and when it was found and the tree was to be cut down, the infant Jesus apparently began to weep. Interesting stuff, and beautiful church.
Enough of Ponferrada. We moseyed out, mostly taking our time. We were only going 22k...had all day to do it...no particular hurry, doing a lot of looking around in the towns we passed through. Saw another little church outside of Ponferrada with a beautiful carved oak altarpiece. I´m not actually sure I´m using the word altarpiece correctly...this was the back wall of the church, behind the altar, which is usually in gold metal and includes paintings and all kinds of figures...well, this one was wood and it was gorgeous and a welcome break from all the gilt ones. We sat outside it for a while and looked back at the city of Ponferrada, where we could still see the steeple of the basilica and the castle and the mountains behind.
A word about the Montes de León...the ones back behind Molinaseca, which we descended yesterday. Neither Christa nor I have any particular memories of climbing that mountain. We must have, because we sure as hell went DOWN it yesterday!! But we hardly noticed the climb the day before!! We had some ups, certainly, but they didn´t feel like MOUNTAIN ups. So, future pilgrims, take heart. We still have one mountain left in front of us...which will probably be a short day ending in O Cebreiro...apparently it´s supposed to be a tough one and John says the sunrise and sunset are awesome from there, so we want to make that a stopping point.
Back to the walk. The vineyards are back. We went through a little town called Camponaraya and stopped and had a long, leisurely lunch of...PIZZA!! It was pretty good, but mostly, we were so happy it wasn´t a bocadillo that it was even better. We´d been sure it would rain today, but the sky cleared, so even though we sat under a canopy, we kept going out into the middle of the plaza to sit on the concrete when we weren´t actually eating. The summer weather reminds me of Northern Cal...big difference between sun and shade. One minute you´re dying for shade and the next minute you´re cold and you want the sun again.
Onward. More vineyards. A little wine joint outside Camponaraya offered a glass of wine to passing pilgrims...apparently, it´s traditional to ask the woman there in Spanish, ¨Could you spare a glass of wine for a pilgrim dying of thirst?¨ It was pretty good stuff!! After we left, we had a beautiful walk down a country road with lots of farmland on each side...stretching out to little villages (Ponferrada´s suburban sprawl) and up to the blue mountains beyond. We passed some cornfields that were pretty ripe and had to fight to resist the urge to pinch a few ears of corn for dinner tonight. =)
As we walked into the last stretch of vineyards and aspen groves, we started to see beautifully handcarved wooden signs delineating the road to Santiago, and one of them had a sign that said Santiago - 195 km. We started hollering and yelling and cheering, just the two of us, out in the middle of this vineyard!!! It was hysterical. Then we stopped and looked at each other and wailed, ¨But that means it´s almost over!!!¨ More hollering and yelling and wailing. We´re idiots. =)
Along the way, we found another walnut tree, and Christa wrote Brad´s name across the road, just in case he was behind us for some reason. Ha ha.
Anyway...aspen groves, vineyards, farmland, and finally, Cacabelos...today´s goal. It was just past four when we entered the village, but it´s LONG and took FOREVER to find the albergue!! We had to go through the new part of town, across a river, through the old part of town, and finally to the town church. It´s a really cool albergue. The book said it was built ¨around¨ the church, which I didn´t get till I saw it. But it is. There´s a tile courtyard that surrounds the church, and the rooms are built like a U-shape of bungalows around it. They´re divided into little two-bed rooms, and there´s a sitting area covered in tables and washing sinks and drying racks in the middle. And the church is in the middle. It´s really cool!! I like it a lot. Everyone sits in the middle and talks. We met some Canadians and another Swede and found the Santa Maria boys. Hit the showers and wandered into town for dinner, and after checking out five or six different places, we ended up in this place with an internet café attached to it...where I am now. (The internet at the albergue is free, but also doesn´t work, so....)
Dinner was nice. Christa, me, Marie, the Santa Maria boys, and an East German I met a few days ago in Mazarife named Yurigan (NO idea if I spelled that right).
Basically, it was just a really, really chilled out, relaxed day. NO hurry...and with a decreased distance, we got to look around a lot and enjoy things because we weren´t trying to get 30km before the heat got too intense. Mind you, we miss Skip terribly, and we hope to catch him before Santiago if we can, but he´s a man on a mission and he´s probably walking longer than we are each day...he´s only 8k ahead, but still. Barring some kind of injury (knock on wood), we´ll have to catch him in Santiago.
My toe blisters are holding. Compeed is straight from God himself. Christa ended up with a heel blister today that looked like a grape. It was obscene. I thought she was budding another, smaller version of herself. Ha ha. And two days without the packs made us soft...our shoulders were KILLING us again. Must find the bricks someone undoubtably snuck into the bottom of my bag....
To anyone in our gang reading this: Hank, Al, Mimi, Jocelyn, Skip, Yasmeen, Felix, Kasey...I´m hoping we´ll all be at Sunday mass in Santiago on Aug 10. I know Skip and Christa and I plan to be there...hope to see you all.
No plans for tomorrow yet. Christa´s not letting us set an ending point, but I´m guessing it´ll be Vega de Valcarce or Ruitelán. If the next day is the climb to O Cebreiro, we´ll make it a super short day...it looks STEEP.
All for now...time´s up. Hope to hear from people. The inbox is looking scarce. Love you all.
Last night, after our foray in the library (where Christa DID manage to find me), we wandered back into Molinaseca for dinner and ran into German Boys II. We have found two new ones, both named Stefan. In some ways, they are very like the other two, which makes me laugh at odd moments...but in case F&KK are reading this, in NO way do they replace the two we had before (whom we still hope will catch up with us at some point!!). Christa noted that it was funny that we had four people at the dinner table last night and only two names between us...two Stefans and two Christa-Christines. Ha ha. Then we decided that it we couldn´t deal with two Stefans and we had to re-name them. My job, as usual. So when they mentioned that one of their principle debates as they walk is whether or not the value of 80´s hair band music is compromised by their ridiculous hair and outfits, and that another was whether or not Bon Jovi is the best band EVER (duh), I dubbed one Jon (Bon Jovi) and the other Eddie (Van Halen). And life goes on.
They talk about this German drinking song called Santa Maria, which they won´t translate for me, but apparently is quite explicit, so, heretofore, to avoid confusion, they will be the Santa Maria boys (to distinguish them from the German boys, Felix and Kasey Kahne). Postscript...StefanJonBonJovi vaguely resembles Ryan Newman. =)
Anyway...we had a wonderful late dinner, since our albergue didn´t close till 11pm and they didn´t know when theirs closed. Note: In Spain, when you order fish, the fish arrives with every single part given to it by God, to include skin, fins, tail, and HEAD. Um. Okay. I managed. And decided not to order fish anymore (it doesn´t seem to have a fuel-carryover the next day anyway).
So back to the albergue, where we had the good fortune to try to get ready for bed, with stuff scattered EVERYWHERE, in the pitch black. PITCH black. I dropped a lot of things, of course, which always makes me very popular with my fellow pilgrims in the room. The municipal albergue (ours) in Molinaseca has several bunks outside on the porch...which on a warmer night would´ve been awesome, but no takers last night.
We were (again) among the last to leave this morning. Christa says she hates to shake someone awake, but when she told me tonight that she wants to be walking tomorrow by 6:30am, I told her she´s either gonna have to either do that or set off firecrackers in my nostrils. Problem: NO hospitalero this morning and NO, I mean NO TOILET PAPER. Grrrrr.... We got on the road at about 8am.
The long walk into Ponferrada that would´ve been hellacious yesterday was rather pleasant this morning. We met up with a Quebecois (?) named Marie who was very nice, and saw our French savior from Foncebadón as well...and two American kids I first met back in Boadilla who seem to have come to Spain to read books. They were reading books in the albergue this morning when we were leaving, and when we got to the castle in Ponferrada, there they were, sitting outside it, reading books again. Um...far be it from ME to discourage anyone from reading, but...don´t we have a cathedral in Santiago to get to...?
Anyway. Nice walk in. LONG walk in. We hit a sweet shop for breakfast and found the Santa Maria boys again. Like most of what we order to eat, we took a gamble on the pastries we ordered and they were okay. But it was an ice cream shoppe, too, and when I saw a girl we know from Sweden with a cup of chocolate and mint, I had to do it too. So the ice cream stop happened today before there were even four numbers on the clock. Ha haaa....
On to the castle. We didn´t go in. We heard it wasn´t that great inside, and I don´t think it was even open, but it looked AWESOME. Typical castle...gray stone, battlements, round towers, everything. Loved it. Hit the square afterwards and found the red all-purpose-multi-purpose shawl I´ve been looking for since Burgos...Skip had a green one I kept stealing. The red one spent the rest of the day pirate-style on my head. I don´t know if I looked badass, but I felt like it, so as far as I´m concerned, everyone wins. (Like I say about my hair and having no makeup and wearing clothes with God-knows-what stained on them at this point, -I- don´t have to look at me!! HAH.)
We made short work of Ponferrada and were heading out of it before too long. OH...stopped in the Basilica of Our Lady of the Encina (oak tree) to see a statue of the Virgin Mary with the infant Jesus...apparently it was hidden inside an oak tree by Bishop Toribio, and when it was found and the tree was to be cut down, the infant Jesus apparently began to weep. Interesting stuff, and beautiful church.
Enough of Ponferrada. We moseyed out, mostly taking our time. We were only going 22k...had all day to do it...no particular hurry, doing a lot of looking around in the towns we passed through. Saw another little church outside of Ponferrada with a beautiful carved oak altarpiece. I´m not actually sure I´m using the word altarpiece correctly...this was the back wall of the church, behind the altar, which is usually in gold metal and includes paintings and all kinds of figures...well, this one was wood and it was gorgeous and a welcome break from all the gilt ones. We sat outside it for a while and looked back at the city of Ponferrada, where we could still see the steeple of the basilica and the castle and the mountains behind.
A word about the Montes de León...the ones back behind Molinaseca, which we descended yesterday. Neither Christa nor I have any particular memories of climbing that mountain. We must have, because we sure as hell went DOWN it yesterday!! But we hardly noticed the climb the day before!! We had some ups, certainly, but they didn´t feel like MOUNTAIN ups. So, future pilgrims, take heart. We still have one mountain left in front of us...which will probably be a short day ending in O Cebreiro...apparently it´s supposed to be a tough one and John says the sunrise and sunset are awesome from there, so we want to make that a stopping point.
Back to the walk. The vineyards are back. We went through a little town called Camponaraya and stopped and had a long, leisurely lunch of...PIZZA!! It was pretty good, but mostly, we were so happy it wasn´t a bocadillo that it was even better. We´d been sure it would rain today, but the sky cleared, so even though we sat under a canopy, we kept going out into the middle of the plaza to sit on the concrete when we weren´t actually eating. The summer weather reminds me of Northern Cal...big difference between sun and shade. One minute you´re dying for shade and the next minute you´re cold and you want the sun again.
Onward. More vineyards. A little wine joint outside Camponaraya offered a glass of wine to passing pilgrims...apparently, it´s traditional to ask the woman there in Spanish, ¨Could you spare a glass of wine for a pilgrim dying of thirst?¨ It was pretty good stuff!! After we left, we had a beautiful walk down a country road with lots of farmland on each side...stretching out to little villages (Ponferrada´s suburban sprawl) and up to the blue mountains beyond. We passed some cornfields that were pretty ripe and had to fight to resist the urge to pinch a few ears of corn for dinner tonight. =)
As we walked into the last stretch of vineyards and aspen groves, we started to see beautifully handcarved wooden signs delineating the road to Santiago, and one of them had a sign that said Santiago - 195 km. We started hollering and yelling and cheering, just the two of us, out in the middle of this vineyard!!! It was hysterical. Then we stopped and looked at each other and wailed, ¨But that means it´s almost over!!!¨ More hollering and yelling and wailing. We´re idiots. =)
Along the way, we found another walnut tree, and Christa wrote Brad´s name across the road, just in case he was behind us for some reason. Ha ha.
Anyway...aspen groves, vineyards, farmland, and finally, Cacabelos...today´s goal. It was just past four when we entered the village, but it´s LONG and took FOREVER to find the albergue!! We had to go through the new part of town, across a river, through the old part of town, and finally to the town church. It´s a really cool albergue. The book said it was built ¨around¨ the church, which I didn´t get till I saw it. But it is. There´s a tile courtyard that surrounds the church, and the rooms are built like a U-shape of bungalows around it. They´re divided into little two-bed rooms, and there´s a sitting area covered in tables and washing sinks and drying racks in the middle. And the church is in the middle. It´s really cool!! I like it a lot. Everyone sits in the middle and talks. We met some Canadians and another Swede and found the Santa Maria boys. Hit the showers and wandered into town for dinner, and after checking out five or six different places, we ended up in this place with an internet café attached to it...where I am now. (The internet at the albergue is free, but also doesn´t work, so....)
Dinner was nice. Christa, me, Marie, the Santa Maria boys, and an East German I met a few days ago in Mazarife named Yurigan (NO idea if I spelled that right).
Basically, it was just a really, really chilled out, relaxed day. NO hurry...and with a decreased distance, we got to look around a lot and enjoy things because we weren´t trying to get 30km before the heat got too intense. Mind you, we miss Skip terribly, and we hope to catch him before Santiago if we can, but he´s a man on a mission and he´s probably walking longer than we are each day...he´s only 8k ahead, but still. Barring some kind of injury (knock on wood), we´ll have to catch him in Santiago.
My toe blisters are holding. Compeed is straight from God himself. Christa ended up with a heel blister today that looked like a grape. It was obscene. I thought she was budding another, smaller version of herself. Ha ha. And two days without the packs made us soft...our shoulders were KILLING us again. Must find the bricks someone undoubtably snuck into the bottom of my bag....
To anyone in our gang reading this: Hank, Al, Mimi, Jocelyn, Skip, Yasmeen, Felix, Kasey...I´m hoping we´ll all be at Sunday mass in Santiago on Aug 10. I know Skip and Christa and I plan to be there...hope to see you all.
No plans for tomorrow yet. Christa´s not letting us set an ending point, but I´m guessing it´ll be Vega de Valcarce or Ruitelán. If the next day is the climb to O Cebreiro, we´ll make it a super short day...it looks STEEP.
All for now...time´s up. Hope to hear from people. The inbox is looking scarce. Love you all.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Foncebadón to Molinaseca
Today´s Camino lesson: All the various ways that sending your pack ahead can come back to bite you in the ass.
So after I got off the computer last night, we had a pretty decent dinner...and this guy wandered in and sat at the table next to ours. His name was Ryan, he was American and had been living in Madrid for about five years. We chatted a bit...he wanted to talk a lot about the war and wanted up-to-date-from-home information about the presidential campaign and all my opinions on Bush and his war. Wrong person to ask on all counts, I tried to tell him, but he persisted. In an attempt to throw him off the track, I threw in some questions about his Camino. He´s just started the other day. I mentioned that we´d sent our packs that day and planned to do the same thing tomorrow. His ears perked up...he was in about day 3, when the pain begins. He was in. Even better, he´d make the call. Thank GOD, because his Spanish was sure to be better than mine.
It took till morning, but we got the call through and expected the taxi at 8 to take the bags to Ponferrada, 29k down the mountain. Ryan came and went at 7:30 and left the €7.50 it would cost each of us to close the deal. Off he went. We waited. 8:00 came and went. So did 8:15. As did 8:30. At 8:40, I attempted, in my butchered Spanish, to have a conversation with the bartender who had given Ryan the number. (Please note that my recounting of this conversation is based upon what I believe I said and what I believe he said back. It is entirely possible, however, that at some point, I asked him how many green ostriches live in his bathtub.)
Me: We called a taxi to take our bags. It isn´t here yet. What´s up?
Him: What time was he supposed to be here?
Me: 8 o´clock.
Him: That´s unusual; they´re usually very punctual.
Me: Can you call them? Or help us somehow?
Him: ...
(this may be the ostrich part)
Him: Where did you get the number?
Me: From your book.
So he slings me the number, and it says at the bottom, ¨Se habla Frances.¨ FRENCH. They speak French. I do not speak French. At this point, I start looking around the ragtag group of peregrinos who have straggled in for breakfast. I give up and just call out, ¨Anyone here speak English and Spanish? Or FRENCH??¨ German gal pipes up that there are French people here, and this glorious French angel rises from the table and comes to rescue me. I dash outside for Christa´s phone and we make the call and afterwards, St. Frances assures me that the taxi is on its way. We decide to wait till 9am and take off.
The problem is...we can´t just abandon ship and take the bags because that guy Ryan left his with ours, confident that things would be taken care of. Despite the devil on my left that whispered that you gotta look out for yours and he should´ve waited with us, I knew St. James wouldn´t like it if we left him high and dry. So we were stuck. My other problem was having walked 34k into Astorga and 29k out of it, and that Ponferrada was another 29k away and another big city.... Ick. I wanted to stop in Molinaseca. But I didn´t speak up, so....
9am. I asked the bartender (after scouring Skip´s Spanish-English dictionary for some random verbs I hadn´t studied in 1992) if we could leave the bags and the €30 and go. He said a lot of words in a very reassuring tone of voice with his hand on my arm, and I took that as a yes, and we booked it.
Now. It is quite a feeling to watch some dude whose language you don´t speak drive off in a van containing all your worldly possessions on an entire continent, taking them from a city in which you´ve spent 10 hours, to a town you´ve never been to, with a population of FIVE people. It is an even MORE interesting (read: nauseous) feeling to leave them sitting in a bar ATOP A MOUNTAIN waiting for a taxi that may or may not ever come.
But off we went. It wasn´t long before we were assuaged by the incredibly powerful views of the mountains and the country beyond stretching behind us. Herds of cows, stone walls and facades of long-abandoned houses, a GOAT in the top of the village...it was beautiful. Also, we were to hit the Iron Cross in 45 minutes, so we were excited about that, too. We could see it from far off, on an adjacent mountaintop, its tall wooden post shining in the sunlight against the purple backdrop of some very ominous looking stormclouds behind it. Without our packs, we were practically skipping towards it. The incredible green of the ferns and the little purple bell flowers continued. It was a beautiful walk.
The Iron Cross was as impressive as we expected it to be. It is a foot-high cross at the top of a wooden pole that is probably 20 feet tall, mounted in a huge pile of stones and rocks...and shells, and shoes, and hats, and walking sticks, and all kinds of things that people leave behind there. You´re supposed to bring a rock from home and leave it there, and either infuse it with all your sorrows and broken hearts, or make a wish as you put it down. (Christa planned to make a wish with hers, but in the end, decided to fill it with sorrows and spiked it as hard as she could. lol) The pole itself is covered with photographs, bracelets, watches, messages, flags, everything you could think of.
What should I leave?
Ahem. There is now a photograph of my four-year-old nephew on the pillar of an iron cross on a windswept mountaintop in northern Spain.
On the back it says, ¨Eric Michael Engelen, The love of my life, Born 14 May 2004, Love, Aunt Teenie.¨ =) I got pictures of it there, and one of me pointing to it from the bottom of the rockpile. COOL, huh? =)
There was also a giant sundial there at the site. In the center of the sundial are boxes containing the names of the months. You´re supposed to stand in the box of the month it is and then go through some mathematical manipulations based upon the season, and your shadow serves as the sundial. It was really cool. The math was beyond me, but I guessed it was probably pretty accurate, and we moved on.
Onward. Lots of up-downs and then a killer downhill that seemed to go on forever, but gave us another stunning panorama, this time of what lay ahead rather than what lay behind, which is a different feeling altogether. (Ponferrada was FAR, far in the distance....) It was gorgeous, though, and very windy. (If you go on the Camino, bring a hat that either stays on your head or can be stuffed into a bag...if you don´t it will drive you absolutely out of your mind to try to hang onto it.) As we passed, the mountains beside us seemed to turn their long, solemn faces to watch us go by...they never seemed to move. It was a partly cloudy day, so the different greens on their faces were beautiful, and sometimes we could see a tiny road or a tiny village.
Finally, El Acebo appeared, almost directly below us at an impossible tilt. It was all gray roofs along a tiny little narrow street...very charming. About a million pilgrims were there, especially in this one little restaurant that had done some advertising along the path up on the mountain. They advertised grandes bocadillos...huge sandwiches. They weren´t lying. I got one with hot bacon and cheese and tomatoes again (when I learn how to order something new, I´m stuck with it till I learn another food word) and it was SOOOOO good. They also had a cider that had me not wanting to get up off my barstool. Learning to savor and appreciate food is DEFINITELY one of my Camino lessons...usually, I couldn´t care less what I eat. But here, everything is like manna from heaven.
On the way out of El Acebo, we passed a walnut tree, and Christa ran to pull one down. She started to write on the sidewalk with it and told us that she used to do this all the time as a child because the writing would stay on the sidewalk for weeks. Unfortunately, so do the greenish-brown stains on your fingers, so when she was in school as a little girl, she was branded guilty as soon as the headmaster saw her fingers. Ha ha. So I wrote, on the way out of El Acebo, ¨HI FELIX -CME¨ on the sidewalk!! The boys are a day behind us, and I hope he sees it. =)
We walked on. More downhills, and each time I looked up, either at mountains or valley below, I wanted to take another picture. (I have a million of Skip´s and Christa´s backs.) I headed off in the lead for a while, which is a much different feeling than following behind, and we all drifted apart into iPods and (in Christa´s case) contemplation.
At long last, we reached Molinaseca and I was DONE. It was past 4pm. The bags, however, were 7k ahead in Ponferrada. We had to get there...that was the deal we´d made with ourselves when we´d sent them. But I had trouble brewing...I could feel blisters forming on what felt like EVERY toe on my left foot. (It amazes me how little I´ve been able to get used to this, even after three weeks. I still have muscle sores...I still get blisters...the boots are fine and comfortable now, but the blisters still come...???) I wanted to stay in Molinaseca. It was a gorgeous town, with a beautiful river and an even more beautiful church, and an even MORE beautiful Calle Mejor. It wasn´t that I was too tired to do another 7k...I wasn´t...but I was worried that if I kept on with the blisters forming, I´d be laid up tomorrow completely. Plus, Ponferrada is a decently big city, and the afternoon walks into cities like Burgos and Astorga have been hellacious, whereas the morning walk into Logroño was merely ugly. Ponferrada in the morning sounded a whole lot better than Ponferrada until 6:30pm.
But the bags. THE BAGS. The bags were at the municipal albergue in Ponferrada. Plus, Skip was keen to get there, because he´s sticking to the book. Out of the three of us, he is the only one who has a good reason (really, any reason) to reach Santiago on a certain day. He wants to be there on the 7th, the 10th anniversary of his brother´s death. So he wanted to go on and do whatever stretch the book laid out for us. Molinaseca was one stop before this leg ended.
Plus, I was in a mood because I was frustrated at having allowed myself to cede control of my Camino to someone else. Though the pack send saved a LOT of wear and tear on our joints today with all the steep downhilling, it still put us in a bind to reach Ponferrada. Since I´d wanted to stop in Molinaseca since the night before, and allowed myself to be carried on the Ponferrada current instead of making my own plans, I was mad at myself and trying to figure out which was more important...my own Camino decisions alone (and alone is hard), or give in to friends´ plans (and friends are good). Tough call.
So there was a lot of stony silence and a lot of sitting and staring at each other as we tried to figure out what to do. Christa was stuck in the middle.
Plan A: Skip suggested we could do without our packs tonight, stay here without them, he´d secure them to wait for us in the morning, and we´d just have a tough, showerless, slightly odiferous night. No go. My Compeed and my lotion and my foot care stuff was there, and I was NOT going without a shower.
Plan B: Two German women were catching a taxi to Ponferrada because they were knackered too. But I will NOT get back in a vehicle unless I am losing arterial blood from either aorta or femoral (brachial wounds will be judged on a case-by-case basis).
Plan C: Walk to Ponferrada anyway. And risk the next day´s walk because of burgeoning, crippling toe blisters. Started to try this one, then realized what a stupid idea it was.
Plan D: Christa and I check into an albergue in Molinaseca...Skip goes on to Ponferrada with a €20 and sends our bags back in a cab, the way they went in the first place.
Plan D Modified: Christa rides to Ponferrada with the German gals and brings back our packs, so as to minimize possible FUBARing of Plan D (i.e., wrong albergue, etc.)
Plan D Modified happened. Hug goodbye for Skip...we´re 7k apart so will almost definitely meet up again within a day or two. Christa decided to stay with me (for which I am guiltily grateful). She headed off in a taxi, I got stuck in a conversation with a power plant guy from VA Beach, talking about NASCAR and cross-country Harley riding forEVER. Found my albergue after two false starts and Christa was already there and (insert angels singing) so were the BAGS!!! Shower...bliss. Computer...not working, sent me to the local library, where it is free if you can stand the 90 degree temps inside. My raincoat is finally earning its 3-week, nearly-untouched place in my pack. And we are off to find dinner in this beautiful little town, as I try and figure out what the best course of action is for tonight regarding the bubbles on my toes. One is a bubble on the lower end of the horn that now functions as my little toe...the other one is at the bottom of a ridge forming on the toe next to it.
My feet will be nothing short of mutant by the time this is over. My pedicurist will be horrified. I´ve decided that when he stops rubbing my feet, I´ll hand him a 10 and ask him to keep going...and rinse and repeat until I run out of 10s.
All for now. Library closing and dinner calling. Hope today was amusing for all of you...not so much for me. But as I´ve experienced in travel, you either get a great time or a great story...and sometimes they overlap at least a little.
Skip...if you read this and need to email me, use merlintoes@hotmail.com, not the address on my card...the computer at home is not forwarding. We´ll keep an eye out for you.
(Anyone else is welcome to email too, ha ha.)
Love you all!!!
So after I got off the computer last night, we had a pretty decent dinner...and this guy wandered in and sat at the table next to ours. His name was Ryan, he was American and had been living in Madrid for about five years. We chatted a bit...he wanted to talk a lot about the war and wanted up-to-date-from-home information about the presidential campaign and all my opinions on Bush and his war. Wrong person to ask on all counts, I tried to tell him, but he persisted. In an attempt to throw him off the track, I threw in some questions about his Camino. He´s just started the other day. I mentioned that we´d sent our packs that day and planned to do the same thing tomorrow. His ears perked up...he was in about day 3, when the pain begins. He was in. Even better, he´d make the call. Thank GOD, because his Spanish was sure to be better than mine.
It took till morning, but we got the call through and expected the taxi at 8 to take the bags to Ponferrada, 29k down the mountain. Ryan came and went at 7:30 and left the €7.50 it would cost each of us to close the deal. Off he went. We waited. 8:00 came and went. So did 8:15. As did 8:30. At 8:40, I attempted, in my butchered Spanish, to have a conversation with the bartender who had given Ryan the number. (Please note that my recounting of this conversation is based upon what I believe I said and what I believe he said back. It is entirely possible, however, that at some point, I asked him how many green ostriches live in his bathtub.)
Me: We called a taxi to take our bags. It isn´t here yet. What´s up?
Him: What time was he supposed to be here?
Me: 8 o´clock.
Him: That´s unusual; they´re usually very punctual.
Me: Can you call them? Or help us somehow?
Him: ...
(this may be the ostrich part)
Him: Where did you get the number?
Me: From your book.
So he slings me the number, and it says at the bottom, ¨Se habla Frances.¨ FRENCH. They speak French. I do not speak French. At this point, I start looking around the ragtag group of peregrinos who have straggled in for breakfast. I give up and just call out, ¨Anyone here speak English and Spanish? Or FRENCH??¨ German gal pipes up that there are French people here, and this glorious French angel rises from the table and comes to rescue me. I dash outside for Christa´s phone and we make the call and afterwards, St. Frances assures me that the taxi is on its way. We decide to wait till 9am and take off.
The problem is...we can´t just abandon ship and take the bags because that guy Ryan left his with ours, confident that things would be taken care of. Despite the devil on my left that whispered that you gotta look out for yours and he should´ve waited with us, I knew St. James wouldn´t like it if we left him high and dry. So we were stuck. My other problem was having walked 34k into Astorga and 29k out of it, and that Ponferrada was another 29k away and another big city.... Ick. I wanted to stop in Molinaseca. But I didn´t speak up, so....
9am. I asked the bartender (after scouring Skip´s Spanish-English dictionary for some random verbs I hadn´t studied in 1992) if we could leave the bags and the €30 and go. He said a lot of words in a very reassuring tone of voice with his hand on my arm, and I took that as a yes, and we booked it.
Now. It is quite a feeling to watch some dude whose language you don´t speak drive off in a van containing all your worldly possessions on an entire continent, taking them from a city in which you´ve spent 10 hours, to a town you´ve never been to, with a population of FIVE people. It is an even MORE interesting (read: nauseous) feeling to leave them sitting in a bar ATOP A MOUNTAIN waiting for a taxi that may or may not ever come.
But off we went. It wasn´t long before we were assuaged by the incredibly powerful views of the mountains and the country beyond stretching behind us. Herds of cows, stone walls and facades of long-abandoned houses, a GOAT in the top of the village...it was beautiful. Also, we were to hit the Iron Cross in 45 minutes, so we were excited about that, too. We could see it from far off, on an adjacent mountaintop, its tall wooden post shining in the sunlight against the purple backdrop of some very ominous looking stormclouds behind it. Without our packs, we were practically skipping towards it. The incredible green of the ferns and the little purple bell flowers continued. It was a beautiful walk.
The Iron Cross was as impressive as we expected it to be. It is a foot-high cross at the top of a wooden pole that is probably 20 feet tall, mounted in a huge pile of stones and rocks...and shells, and shoes, and hats, and walking sticks, and all kinds of things that people leave behind there. You´re supposed to bring a rock from home and leave it there, and either infuse it with all your sorrows and broken hearts, or make a wish as you put it down. (Christa planned to make a wish with hers, but in the end, decided to fill it with sorrows and spiked it as hard as she could. lol) The pole itself is covered with photographs, bracelets, watches, messages, flags, everything you could think of.
What should I leave?
Ahem. There is now a photograph of my four-year-old nephew on the pillar of an iron cross on a windswept mountaintop in northern Spain.
On the back it says, ¨Eric Michael Engelen, The love of my life, Born 14 May 2004, Love, Aunt Teenie.¨ =) I got pictures of it there, and one of me pointing to it from the bottom of the rockpile. COOL, huh? =)
There was also a giant sundial there at the site. In the center of the sundial are boxes containing the names of the months. You´re supposed to stand in the box of the month it is and then go through some mathematical manipulations based upon the season, and your shadow serves as the sundial. It was really cool. The math was beyond me, but I guessed it was probably pretty accurate, and we moved on.
Onward. Lots of up-downs and then a killer downhill that seemed to go on forever, but gave us another stunning panorama, this time of what lay ahead rather than what lay behind, which is a different feeling altogether. (Ponferrada was FAR, far in the distance....) It was gorgeous, though, and very windy. (If you go on the Camino, bring a hat that either stays on your head or can be stuffed into a bag...if you don´t it will drive you absolutely out of your mind to try to hang onto it.) As we passed, the mountains beside us seemed to turn their long, solemn faces to watch us go by...they never seemed to move. It was a partly cloudy day, so the different greens on their faces were beautiful, and sometimes we could see a tiny road or a tiny village.
Finally, El Acebo appeared, almost directly below us at an impossible tilt. It was all gray roofs along a tiny little narrow street...very charming. About a million pilgrims were there, especially in this one little restaurant that had done some advertising along the path up on the mountain. They advertised grandes bocadillos...huge sandwiches. They weren´t lying. I got one with hot bacon and cheese and tomatoes again (when I learn how to order something new, I´m stuck with it till I learn another food word) and it was SOOOOO good. They also had a cider that had me not wanting to get up off my barstool. Learning to savor and appreciate food is DEFINITELY one of my Camino lessons...usually, I couldn´t care less what I eat. But here, everything is like manna from heaven.
On the way out of El Acebo, we passed a walnut tree, and Christa ran to pull one down. She started to write on the sidewalk with it and told us that she used to do this all the time as a child because the writing would stay on the sidewalk for weeks. Unfortunately, so do the greenish-brown stains on your fingers, so when she was in school as a little girl, she was branded guilty as soon as the headmaster saw her fingers. Ha ha. So I wrote, on the way out of El Acebo, ¨HI FELIX -CME¨ on the sidewalk!! The boys are a day behind us, and I hope he sees it. =)
We walked on. More downhills, and each time I looked up, either at mountains or valley below, I wanted to take another picture. (I have a million of Skip´s and Christa´s backs.) I headed off in the lead for a while, which is a much different feeling than following behind, and we all drifted apart into iPods and (in Christa´s case) contemplation.
At long last, we reached Molinaseca and I was DONE. It was past 4pm. The bags, however, were 7k ahead in Ponferrada. We had to get there...that was the deal we´d made with ourselves when we´d sent them. But I had trouble brewing...I could feel blisters forming on what felt like EVERY toe on my left foot. (It amazes me how little I´ve been able to get used to this, even after three weeks. I still have muscle sores...I still get blisters...the boots are fine and comfortable now, but the blisters still come...???) I wanted to stay in Molinaseca. It was a gorgeous town, with a beautiful river and an even more beautiful church, and an even MORE beautiful Calle Mejor. It wasn´t that I was too tired to do another 7k...I wasn´t...but I was worried that if I kept on with the blisters forming, I´d be laid up tomorrow completely. Plus, Ponferrada is a decently big city, and the afternoon walks into cities like Burgos and Astorga have been hellacious, whereas the morning walk into Logroño was merely ugly. Ponferrada in the morning sounded a whole lot better than Ponferrada until 6:30pm.
But the bags. THE BAGS. The bags were at the municipal albergue in Ponferrada. Plus, Skip was keen to get there, because he´s sticking to the book. Out of the three of us, he is the only one who has a good reason (really, any reason) to reach Santiago on a certain day. He wants to be there on the 7th, the 10th anniversary of his brother´s death. So he wanted to go on and do whatever stretch the book laid out for us. Molinaseca was one stop before this leg ended.
Plus, I was in a mood because I was frustrated at having allowed myself to cede control of my Camino to someone else. Though the pack send saved a LOT of wear and tear on our joints today with all the steep downhilling, it still put us in a bind to reach Ponferrada. Since I´d wanted to stop in Molinaseca since the night before, and allowed myself to be carried on the Ponferrada current instead of making my own plans, I was mad at myself and trying to figure out which was more important...my own Camino decisions alone (and alone is hard), or give in to friends´ plans (and friends are good). Tough call.
So there was a lot of stony silence and a lot of sitting and staring at each other as we tried to figure out what to do. Christa was stuck in the middle.
Plan A: Skip suggested we could do without our packs tonight, stay here without them, he´d secure them to wait for us in the morning, and we´d just have a tough, showerless, slightly odiferous night. No go. My Compeed and my lotion and my foot care stuff was there, and I was NOT going without a shower.
Plan B: Two German women were catching a taxi to Ponferrada because they were knackered too. But I will NOT get back in a vehicle unless I am losing arterial blood from either aorta or femoral (brachial wounds will be judged on a case-by-case basis).
Plan C: Walk to Ponferrada anyway. And risk the next day´s walk because of burgeoning, crippling toe blisters. Started to try this one, then realized what a stupid idea it was.
Plan D: Christa and I check into an albergue in Molinaseca...Skip goes on to Ponferrada with a €20 and sends our bags back in a cab, the way they went in the first place.
Plan D Modified: Christa rides to Ponferrada with the German gals and brings back our packs, so as to minimize possible FUBARing of Plan D (i.e., wrong albergue, etc.)
Plan D Modified happened. Hug goodbye for Skip...we´re 7k apart so will almost definitely meet up again within a day or two. Christa decided to stay with me (for which I am guiltily grateful). She headed off in a taxi, I got stuck in a conversation with a power plant guy from VA Beach, talking about NASCAR and cross-country Harley riding forEVER. Found my albergue after two false starts and Christa was already there and (insert angels singing) so were the BAGS!!! Shower...bliss. Computer...not working, sent me to the local library, where it is free if you can stand the 90 degree temps inside. My raincoat is finally earning its 3-week, nearly-untouched place in my pack. And we are off to find dinner in this beautiful little town, as I try and figure out what the best course of action is for tonight regarding the bubbles on my toes. One is a bubble on the lower end of the horn that now functions as my little toe...the other one is at the bottom of a ridge forming on the toe next to it.
My feet will be nothing short of mutant by the time this is over. My pedicurist will be horrified. I´ve decided that when he stops rubbing my feet, I´ll hand him a 10 and ask him to keep going...and rinse and repeat until I run out of 10s.
All for now. Library closing and dinner calling. Hope today was amusing for all of you...not so much for me. But as I´ve experienced in travel, you either get a great time or a great story...and sometimes they overlap at least a little.
Skip...if you read this and need to email me, use merlintoes@hotmail.com, not the address on my card...the computer at home is not forwarding. We´ll keep an eye out for you.
(Anyone else is welcome to email too, ha ha.)
Love you all!!!
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Astorga to Foncebadón
Well, we´ve been talking about doing it for weeks, and today we finally did it. Sent the packs ahead. Most albergues advertise a service that will transport your rucksack to a destination you plan to reach at the end of the day...usually about 6-8€. Ours today was 9€ apiece to where we wanted to go, and we all had to do it as there was a minimum of 3 bags for the guy to make the run. It was SOOOOO WORTH IT.
We had an incredibly late morning. Skip couldn´t do his post office business till they opened at 8:30, and during his time there, Christa and I were supposed to have a nice long breakfast. But we didn´t know he´d gone, so we stood around, loaded up, and got underfoot of some very testy hospitaleros while we waited around for him. He finally showed up and we made the decision to send the packs. We were still hurting from yesterday´s abysmal trek into Astorga and were facing a 28k day with a good deal of uphill at the end. And it was going to be HOT. So we did it. THANK GOD. I don´t even want to think about what today would have been like otherwise.
As it were, we had a leisurely breakfast and didn´t stroll out of Astorga till nearly 11am. (We were to pay for it later in sweat.) And it was a stroll...no weight on our backs except for our light daypack/hippacks slung over our shoulders. It started out fine, but I have a joint issue in my left leg...don´t even know how to describe it...that had me in agony on a day that should have been easy. I finally asked Christa for a painkiller and was better in a little while.
The walk was pleasant otherwise. It was a bit like Oregon today...scrubby trees and brush beside the road...the tracks alternated between rocky sandy roads and red dirt. The orange-red contrasted beautifully with the blue skies and green trees. And the mountains steadily increased in focus...no longer pale blue backdrops but sharper blue with shades of green as we neared them.
Stops were blessedly short today...they´re wonderful until you have to start going again, and then it gets harder every time. The ice cream stop came before the lunch stop today, ha ha. Nothing really especially noteworthy. Lunch was...managed to get bacon instead of that thick ham stuff...and when it came out, the bacon was hot and the cheese was like Kraft singles and there were even tomatoes on it...wonderful. We found some folks we´ve managed to become friends with in the past few days...big difference in the feel of the Camino now that most faces are unfamiliar.
I felt like an imposter today without my pack. Like a fake pilgrim...like I wasn´t suffering enough. At the beginning, when I first heard about the pack transport, I thought that sounded more like cheating than the bus. Today I had NO moral issues with it.
We left Rabanal del Camino at 4pm...usually way too late to walk because of the heat, and a fine stopping place, but since our bags were all the way at Foncebadón, we didn´t have much choice. On we went. Up. The climb began late in the day.
But it was okay...obviously, since we were all about 20-30 pounds lighter...but it was beautiful shades of green with vibrant purple flowers along the way, some of which looked like little bells hung along stalks. We also had some breathtaking views of the valley behind us and the meseta beyond...we could see for miles and miles. Wind farms up on the crests above us...HUGE white propeller bladed windmills.
We finally reached Foncebadón...population FIVE. Just a little collection of buildings on the top of a windswept mountain. It´s gorgeous and quiet and peaceful and the albergue looks like a newly built mountain lodge. There´s a place to sit where we get the view of the whole valley below us, and Astorga looks a billion miles away. To look at it, it seems we walked 50 miles today instead of just under 20. It´s wonderful and very soothing.
Tomorrow, we´ll get to see the Cruz de Ferro...Iron Cross...important landmark on the Camino. It´s a tall stone pillar with a small iron cross at the top...the cross is only about a foot high. If I´d known about its tradition, I would have brought a stone from home to put at its base. But I didn´t...so I´ll have to come up with something else. We´re 45 minutes from it, and it´s the real crest of this mountain. Then it´s a TON of downhill till we get to the bottom...which can be much harder than uphill, as I´m sure I´ve said before. If we can, we´ll send the packs ahead and try to give our knees and feet a break for another day. If we go all the way to Ponferrada, it´ll be 29k, but Christa and I are thinking of staging a mutiny and stopping in Molinaseca...only 22k and puts us into Ponferrada the next morning, when we can take some time to see the Templar Castle...?
Forgot to put this part in for yesterday...the pasta sauce Skip made in Mazarife will heretofore be referred to as Skip´s Revenge. I don´t know WHAT I did to that boy, but he got me back for it. All. Day. LONG. Sheesh.
All for now. Gotta eat dinner, since the lady is closing down and is getting VERY testy with us for ordering a pilgrim´s menu (three of them) twenty minutes past the closing of dinnertime.
Love you all...talk to you tomorrow.
We had an incredibly late morning. Skip couldn´t do his post office business till they opened at 8:30, and during his time there, Christa and I were supposed to have a nice long breakfast. But we didn´t know he´d gone, so we stood around, loaded up, and got underfoot of some very testy hospitaleros while we waited around for him. He finally showed up and we made the decision to send the packs. We were still hurting from yesterday´s abysmal trek into Astorga and were facing a 28k day with a good deal of uphill at the end. And it was going to be HOT. So we did it. THANK GOD. I don´t even want to think about what today would have been like otherwise.
As it were, we had a leisurely breakfast and didn´t stroll out of Astorga till nearly 11am. (We were to pay for it later in sweat.) And it was a stroll...no weight on our backs except for our light daypack/hippacks slung over our shoulders. It started out fine, but I have a joint issue in my left leg...don´t even know how to describe it...that had me in agony on a day that should have been easy. I finally asked Christa for a painkiller and was better in a little while.
The walk was pleasant otherwise. It was a bit like Oregon today...scrubby trees and brush beside the road...the tracks alternated between rocky sandy roads and red dirt. The orange-red contrasted beautifully with the blue skies and green trees. And the mountains steadily increased in focus...no longer pale blue backdrops but sharper blue with shades of green as we neared them.
Stops were blessedly short today...they´re wonderful until you have to start going again, and then it gets harder every time. The ice cream stop came before the lunch stop today, ha ha. Nothing really especially noteworthy. Lunch was...managed to get bacon instead of that thick ham stuff...and when it came out, the bacon was hot and the cheese was like Kraft singles and there were even tomatoes on it...wonderful. We found some folks we´ve managed to become friends with in the past few days...big difference in the feel of the Camino now that most faces are unfamiliar.
I felt like an imposter today without my pack. Like a fake pilgrim...like I wasn´t suffering enough. At the beginning, when I first heard about the pack transport, I thought that sounded more like cheating than the bus. Today I had NO moral issues with it.
We left Rabanal del Camino at 4pm...usually way too late to walk because of the heat, and a fine stopping place, but since our bags were all the way at Foncebadón, we didn´t have much choice. On we went. Up. The climb began late in the day.
But it was okay...obviously, since we were all about 20-30 pounds lighter...but it was beautiful shades of green with vibrant purple flowers along the way, some of which looked like little bells hung along stalks. We also had some breathtaking views of the valley behind us and the meseta beyond...we could see for miles and miles. Wind farms up on the crests above us...HUGE white propeller bladed windmills.
We finally reached Foncebadón...population FIVE. Just a little collection of buildings on the top of a windswept mountain. It´s gorgeous and quiet and peaceful and the albergue looks like a newly built mountain lodge. There´s a place to sit where we get the view of the whole valley below us, and Astorga looks a billion miles away. To look at it, it seems we walked 50 miles today instead of just under 20. It´s wonderful and very soothing.
Tomorrow, we´ll get to see the Cruz de Ferro...Iron Cross...important landmark on the Camino. It´s a tall stone pillar with a small iron cross at the top...the cross is only about a foot high. If I´d known about its tradition, I would have brought a stone from home to put at its base. But I didn´t...so I´ll have to come up with something else. We´re 45 minutes from it, and it´s the real crest of this mountain. Then it´s a TON of downhill till we get to the bottom...which can be much harder than uphill, as I´m sure I´ve said before. If we can, we´ll send the packs ahead and try to give our knees and feet a break for another day. If we go all the way to Ponferrada, it´ll be 29k, but Christa and I are thinking of staging a mutiny and stopping in Molinaseca...only 22k and puts us into Ponferrada the next morning, when we can take some time to see the Templar Castle...?
Forgot to put this part in for yesterday...the pasta sauce Skip made in Mazarife will heretofore be referred to as Skip´s Revenge. I don´t know WHAT I did to that boy, but he got me back for it. All. Day. LONG. Sheesh.
All for now. Gotta eat dinner, since the lady is closing down and is getting VERY testy with us for ordering a pilgrim´s menu (three of them) twenty minutes past the closing of dinnertime.
Love you all...talk to you tomorrow.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Villar de Mazarife to Astorga
Gotta make this one uber-quick because I´m getting someone else´s leftover 13 minutes and then they´re going to lock me down.
I know I say this almost every day, but WHAT a day. Last night, I went to sleep on the deck...had the thickest wool blanket over me and it felt like camping with a mattress...cold face, incredibly warm under the blanket...kept tucking it under me as fingers of cold crept in here and there. It was very nice. Below me, in the dining area, a very competent guitar player from I-don´t-know-where was ROCKING the American classic rock canon with an equally talented American girl singing along...it was awesome. Proud Mary, We Can Work It Out, all of ´em. Nice.
Woke up before Skip today and wasn´t about to wake him up...because he would´ve made me GET up. As it was, it was ten till 7 when he finally poked me. Ha ha haaaa...got my sleep in. =) We were on the road by 7:30 and hit HARD a 6k, ramrod straight asphault road. Busted a total of 9k in under two hours before I stopped for tea, and was there a full fifteen minutes before Skip rolled in for his morning cerveza. The first run of the day is always the easiest...if I could get him to cool his heels before we started, I could go a long way without stopping. Each time we stop, it´s harder to start again, and by afternoon, it´s damn near impossible.
We hit Hospital de Órbigo for lunch. Someone posted a few days ago, advising me to skip from León to Hospital because it was by the road and noisy and boring. Not so. Whoever it was took the alternate route by the highway. We go through the fields when there´s a choice between the two. As Skip said the other day, ¨I didn´t come here to walk beside a highway.¨ Today´s scenery was breathtaking...beautiful green fields, pale blue mountains in the distance, farmhouses, John Deere tractors...very, very nice. Occasionally the yellow streak of a faroff sunflower field. Gorgeous.
Hospital de Órbigo is a nice little town, with a beautiful, long bridge with 20 arches. The translated legend to go with it in the guidebook makes NO sense...perhaps I have a future taking translations and making them into sensible English...so I´ll have to research it when I get home.
After Hospital, a lot of up and rolling hills. Our midafternoon ice cream stop, with 11k to go, was almost impossible to start again from. But we had to do it. Soon after it (it has an impossibly long name...I think Sanitibañar de Valdeiglesias?) there was a shrine-like setup and had an outfitted peregrino statue and a table and lots of rock formations done by pilgrims. There was an awesome passage on the table, laminated and left there, by Eckhart Tolle and I felt compelled to stop and copy the whole thing down...which got me 20 minutes behind Skip and worried him so much he came back looking for me, till four Italians who had passed me told him I was okay.
The remaining road was nice and scenic, but hot and difficult, too. We made it to the cross at San Toribio and had a panorama of the Astorga valley and the mountains we´re heading into tomorrow. It was beautiful...but again, we had 29k behind us and 5 to go. The last hour and a half almost did us both in. At one point I started hollering at arrows again that led us far wide of the cathedral where I knew the albergue to be, so I usurped them and followed my nose and we made it here.
We split up...he had to hunt a mailbox where he´d mailed himself something, and I went wandering through the cathedral and the museum. The museums were disappointing (perhaps I was just tired) but the cathedral inside was impressive...very, VERY tall with beautiful stonework.
I am SO SICK of crucifixes. Baby Jesus, Dead Jesus, Baby Jesus, dead Jesus. SICK OF IT!!!
So we had dinner at this fancy.looking restaurant with a peregrino menu. We were nearly snoozing into our plates, we were so knackered. Exhausted beyond all movement. We finished, and we were just sipping our beers, and all of a sudden, Skip goes, ¨OH. MY. GODDDDDD....¨ I look up.
CHRISTA!!!
She jumped the train and came to find us. Hated being alone. So she´s here now. Skip was beside himself. I was overjoyed. So now we are three again. We´re thrilled. She was still shaking from excitement and relief ten minutes after she arrived. I thought I didn´t have enough energy to blog tonight but knew I had to after her reappearance.
Two minutes left. Let me say this. I am DONE with 30k days. No more. We did 34 today...almost 22 miles. It´s too much. Too painful, too costly, too short-tempered at the end of the day. NO MORE. Santiago in about 9 days. Time is getting short now and I´m dragging my feet...I don´t want it to end.
Must post. Out of time. Love you all. MORE COMMENTS!!!
I know I say this almost every day, but WHAT a day. Last night, I went to sleep on the deck...had the thickest wool blanket over me and it felt like camping with a mattress...cold face, incredibly warm under the blanket...kept tucking it under me as fingers of cold crept in here and there. It was very nice. Below me, in the dining area, a very competent guitar player from I-don´t-know-where was ROCKING the American classic rock canon with an equally talented American girl singing along...it was awesome. Proud Mary, We Can Work It Out, all of ´em. Nice.
Woke up before Skip today and wasn´t about to wake him up...because he would´ve made me GET up. As it was, it was ten till 7 when he finally poked me. Ha ha haaaa...got my sleep in. =) We were on the road by 7:30 and hit HARD a 6k, ramrod straight asphault road. Busted a total of 9k in under two hours before I stopped for tea, and was there a full fifteen minutes before Skip rolled in for his morning cerveza. The first run of the day is always the easiest...if I could get him to cool his heels before we started, I could go a long way without stopping. Each time we stop, it´s harder to start again, and by afternoon, it´s damn near impossible.
We hit Hospital de Órbigo for lunch. Someone posted a few days ago, advising me to skip from León to Hospital because it was by the road and noisy and boring. Not so. Whoever it was took the alternate route by the highway. We go through the fields when there´s a choice between the two. As Skip said the other day, ¨I didn´t come here to walk beside a highway.¨ Today´s scenery was breathtaking...beautiful green fields, pale blue mountains in the distance, farmhouses, John Deere tractors...very, very nice. Occasionally the yellow streak of a faroff sunflower field. Gorgeous.
Hospital de Órbigo is a nice little town, with a beautiful, long bridge with 20 arches. The translated legend to go with it in the guidebook makes NO sense...perhaps I have a future taking translations and making them into sensible English...so I´ll have to research it when I get home.
After Hospital, a lot of up and rolling hills. Our midafternoon ice cream stop, with 11k to go, was almost impossible to start again from. But we had to do it. Soon after it (it has an impossibly long name...I think Sanitibañar de Valdeiglesias?) there was a shrine-like setup and had an outfitted peregrino statue and a table and lots of rock formations done by pilgrims. There was an awesome passage on the table, laminated and left there, by Eckhart Tolle and I felt compelled to stop and copy the whole thing down...which got me 20 minutes behind Skip and worried him so much he came back looking for me, till four Italians who had passed me told him I was okay.
The remaining road was nice and scenic, but hot and difficult, too. We made it to the cross at San Toribio and had a panorama of the Astorga valley and the mountains we´re heading into tomorrow. It was beautiful...but again, we had 29k behind us and 5 to go. The last hour and a half almost did us both in. At one point I started hollering at arrows again that led us far wide of the cathedral where I knew the albergue to be, so I usurped them and followed my nose and we made it here.
We split up...he had to hunt a mailbox where he´d mailed himself something, and I went wandering through the cathedral and the museum. The museums were disappointing (perhaps I was just tired) but the cathedral inside was impressive...very, VERY tall with beautiful stonework.
I am SO SICK of crucifixes. Baby Jesus, Dead Jesus, Baby Jesus, dead Jesus. SICK OF IT!!!
So we had dinner at this fancy.looking restaurant with a peregrino menu. We were nearly snoozing into our plates, we were so knackered. Exhausted beyond all movement. We finished, and we were just sipping our beers, and all of a sudden, Skip goes, ¨OH. MY. GODDDDDD....¨ I look up.
CHRISTA!!!
She jumped the train and came to find us. Hated being alone. So she´s here now. Skip was beside himself. I was overjoyed. So now we are three again. We´re thrilled. She was still shaking from excitement and relief ten minutes after she arrived. I thought I didn´t have enough energy to blog tonight but knew I had to after her reappearance.
Two minutes left. Let me say this. I am DONE with 30k days. No more. We did 34 today...almost 22 miles. It´s too much. Too painful, too costly, too short-tempered at the end of the day. NO MORE. Santiago in about 9 days. Time is getting short now and I´m dragging my feet...I don´t want it to end.
Must post. Out of time. Love you all. MORE COMMENTS!!!
Monday, July 28, 2008
León to Villar de Mazarife
Well, we did it. I´m tainted. The stink of tire rubber is on me. Sigh.
It was pretty tough to get on that bus, I´m tellin´ you. After I posted, I went back to the bar...because what else was there to do...and we sat some more. And we watched the pilgrims roll in. I felt so guilty not to walk yesterday...but apparently everyone else takes a day off, and even if mine was forced, I guess I needed it too. We started seeing familiar faces. Gunnar showed up, and later, Al, and Christa too!!! It was wonderful to see Al and Christa again because it had been a while...since Burgos!! They had stories of Estelle, and she finally got there too, which amazed us all...she´s indomitable.
We had a couple new people...this French girl Charlotte from Normandy...in my head, she´s Joan of Arc. She was this little waiflike creature with hair sticking up all over her head...she looked about 12 but was 28...tiny little thing. She was crazy. Her Spanish was better than her English, so most of our conversation was a hodgepodge of both. She managed to communicate to me that she´d been doing shots that morning at 7am. She went to the nuns where we stayed last night and bargained to sleep outside in the garden for free. Then she decided she wanted to make crepes for dinner. We told her it´s Sunday, the stores are closed. She said no problemo. She went off into town and came back with a sack full of ingredients. Turned out she went begging at doors until someone gave her milk, flour, eggs...everything. Hysterical.
There was this guy Matt from Dundee, Scotland. I sat by him and tried to get him to talk because I love Scottish accents so much and hadn´t heard one in forever. Wouldn´t you know, I get a shy quiet one. ;) He was lovely, though...I finally did get him to talk some. I was lovin´ it.
The bus came half an hour late, and suddenly, it was a flurry of activity. Hugs, yelling, a few tears, pictures, throwing bags into the luggage compartment, the driver hollering at us to hurry, Christa not wanting to let go of us, Al telling me ¨Enjoy your life...use all the time that you have,¨ in his thick German accent...and when we finally made it to the bus door, the driver shut the door right on me, like he was going to drive off without us. Jackass. Skip was furious. But we wrestled our way on and watched through the back window as our friends disappeared behind us.
So the fellowship is broken....
Isn´t that what they say in Lord of the Rings when everyone parts ways?
Sigh. Swear to God...after 18 days without wheels, tracks, or wings, I got a little motion sickness on the bus, to go with my heartsickness at watching four days´ walking swallowed up by the diesel engine of the bus. HUGE fields of sunflowers on the way. Message from Felix tonight on Facebook...at least we know they´re only a day behind. I´m tempted to park myself somewhere at a cafe and wait until they show.
But anyway, we got to León and managed to locate the albergue with the nuns, like John said to do. John said there was a lovely pilgrim´s blessing. Unfortunately, by the time we got there, it was 9:15 with a 9:30 door closing time, and we´d had no dinner and had passed a BK five minutes before we arrived. We looked at each other and knew in a heartbeat...it had to be done. We both vowed that neither of us do this at home, but a Whopper just sounded too good. So we had a choice...pilgrim´s blessing by Benedictine nuns, or Whopper. Hate to say it, but the Whopper won. And here´s a tip...the Spanish get the Whopper meal right. ;)
This albergue was different in that the men and women were separated into different dorms. Felt strange not to have guys in the room that I knew, especially Skip. He´s usually in the bed next to mine or below mine or across the room from mine, but there. It helps because we get each other moving in the morning. This time, I was on my own and I have no alarm, so it´s a matter of wake up or don´t wake up.
Tip: I have not yet needed my sleeping mat, but three or four nights now, I´ve longed for a pillow, as sometimes there are none.
We left the albergue this morning at 7:30, heading for the Cathedral of León. Byron, if your sci-fi-fantasy radar went off last night at 11pm, it was because I saw the most awesome pewter King Arthur´s Knights of the Round Table set in a shop window, complete with BOMB Round Table. Sigh.
The Cathedral was not anywhere near as impressive as the one in Burgos. It was open in the center all the way through, not a maze like the one in Burgos. But the stained glass was beautiful, as were the choir stalls and the marblework on the rostrums.
I wanted to see the cloister walk in the Basilica of St. Isadoro, too, and the Camino went right by it. We hit the gift shop and found out there was a tour...in Spanish. So in we went. It looked pretty...and had a library filled with HUGE AWESOME 1200 YEAR OLD LEATHERBOUND BOOKS...maybe the coolest thing I´ve seen so far. I couldn´t tear myself away, they were beautiful.
The cloister walk was cool, but Burgos was better. We got lots of good pictures.
Out of León. Took forEVER. Felt good to be walking again after 44 hours. León dragged on forever and ever...we hit a supermarket and got tomatoes and bread and cream cheese and ham and salami for lunch...Philly makes any bocadillo AWESOME.
The rest of the day was uneventful...other than the fact that we´re once again walking through natural landscape, which is wonderful. We had some beautiful views today, and we can see the mountains in the distance. We have a few ahead of us...day after tomorrow is a lot of up and the following is a lot of down.
We made it to Villar de Mazarife and picked the Albergue de Jesús. With a pirate ship in the yard. And a pool. Which it was once again too cool for me to jump into, but Skip went for it. It´s pretty nice here in this one...the surrounding area looks like Texas. A whole lotta nothin´.
We went hunting a supermarket in town and took the longest route possible. I´ve found out that trying to teach an Australian to speak Spanish is a lot like that episode of Friends when Phoebe tries to teach Joey French. You just have to see it. I´ve determined their mouths are not capable of making some sounds, and that´s just the way it is. Either that, or Skip is REALLY special. ;) We decided to cook (read: SKIP decided to cook; most of us know how proficient I am in a kitchen) and words can´t describe his attempts to ask for fresh parsley. We collected another hodgepodge of whatchagot and ended up with a GORGEOUS sauce to go with the pasta I nabbed in Agés when someone left it behind. That boy is a master.
Skip told me we´re shooting for a 6am start tomorrow. I told him everything about that sentence was fine with me except for the pronoun. 6AM??? We have 31k to go tomorrow to Astorga...either that or we wuss out and stop at 18k somewhere else (I don´t have my book on me). We´ll see. He´s going to call the boys tomorrow and find out what we can do to meet up...which we decided was cheating unless they contacted us, and since I just got a message from Felix, we´re good to go.
All for now. This guy has been waiting ages to get online, so I need to wrap it up and go to bed. By the way...tonight´s bed is a mattress on a second-story, outside deck. I´m kinda excited. As long as I can find a spare wool blanket somewhere....
Love you all.
It was pretty tough to get on that bus, I´m tellin´ you. After I posted, I went back to the bar...because what else was there to do...and we sat some more. And we watched the pilgrims roll in. I felt so guilty not to walk yesterday...but apparently everyone else takes a day off, and even if mine was forced, I guess I needed it too. We started seeing familiar faces. Gunnar showed up, and later, Al, and Christa too!!! It was wonderful to see Al and Christa again because it had been a while...since Burgos!! They had stories of Estelle, and she finally got there too, which amazed us all...she´s indomitable.
We had a couple new people...this French girl Charlotte from Normandy...in my head, she´s Joan of Arc. She was this little waiflike creature with hair sticking up all over her head...she looked about 12 but was 28...tiny little thing. She was crazy. Her Spanish was better than her English, so most of our conversation was a hodgepodge of both. She managed to communicate to me that she´d been doing shots that morning at 7am. She went to the nuns where we stayed last night and bargained to sleep outside in the garden for free. Then she decided she wanted to make crepes for dinner. We told her it´s Sunday, the stores are closed. She said no problemo. She went off into town and came back with a sack full of ingredients. Turned out she went begging at doors until someone gave her milk, flour, eggs...everything. Hysterical.
There was this guy Matt from Dundee, Scotland. I sat by him and tried to get him to talk because I love Scottish accents so much and hadn´t heard one in forever. Wouldn´t you know, I get a shy quiet one. ;) He was lovely, though...I finally did get him to talk some. I was lovin´ it.
The bus came half an hour late, and suddenly, it was a flurry of activity. Hugs, yelling, a few tears, pictures, throwing bags into the luggage compartment, the driver hollering at us to hurry, Christa not wanting to let go of us, Al telling me ¨Enjoy your life...use all the time that you have,¨ in his thick German accent...and when we finally made it to the bus door, the driver shut the door right on me, like he was going to drive off without us. Jackass. Skip was furious. But we wrestled our way on and watched through the back window as our friends disappeared behind us.
So the fellowship is broken....
Isn´t that what they say in Lord of the Rings when everyone parts ways?
Sigh. Swear to God...after 18 days without wheels, tracks, or wings, I got a little motion sickness on the bus, to go with my heartsickness at watching four days´ walking swallowed up by the diesel engine of the bus. HUGE fields of sunflowers on the way. Message from Felix tonight on Facebook...at least we know they´re only a day behind. I´m tempted to park myself somewhere at a cafe and wait until they show.
But anyway, we got to León and managed to locate the albergue with the nuns, like John said to do. John said there was a lovely pilgrim´s blessing. Unfortunately, by the time we got there, it was 9:15 with a 9:30 door closing time, and we´d had no dinner and had passed a BK five minutes before we arrived. We looked at each other and knew in a heartbeat...it had to be done. We both vowed that neither of us do this at home, but a Whopper just sounded too good. So we had a choice...pilgrim´s blessing by Benedictine nuns, or Whopper. Hate to say it, but the Whopper won. And here´s a tip...the Spanish get the Whopper meal right. ;)
This albergue was different in that the men and women were separated into different dorms. Felt strange not to have guys in the room that I knew, especially Skip. He´s usually in the bed next to mine or below mine or across the room from mine, but there. It helps because we get each other moving in the morning. This time, I was on my own and I have no alarm, so it´s a matter of wake up or don´t wake up.
Tip: I have not yet needed my sleeping mat, but three or four nights now, I´ve longed for a pillow, as sometimes there are none.
We left the albergue this morning at 7:30, heading for the Cathedral of León. Byron, if your sci-fi-fantasy radar went off last night at 11pm, it was because I saw the most awesome pewter King Arthur´s Knights of the Round Table set in a shop window, complete with BOMB Round Table. Sigh.
The Cathedral was not anywhere near as impressive as the one in Burgos. It was open in the center all the way through, not a maze like the one in Burgos. But the stained glass was beautiful, as were the choir stalls and the marblework on the rostrums.
I wanted to see the cloister walk in the Basilica of St. Isadoro, too, and the Camino went right by it. We hit the gift shop and found out there was a tour...in Spanish. So in we went. It looked pretty...and had a library filled with HUGE AWESOME 1200 YEAR OLD LEATHERBOUND BOOKS...maybe the coolest thing I´ve seen so far. I couldn´t tear myself away, they were beautiful.
The cloister walk was cool, but Burgos was better. We got lots of good pictures.
Out of León. Took forEVER. Felt good to be walking again after 44 hours. León dragged on forever and ever...we hit a supermarket and got tomatoes and bread and cream cheese and ham and salami for lunch...Philly makes any bocadillo AWESOME.
The rest of the day was uneventful...other than the fact that we´re once again walking through natural landscape, which is wonderful. We had some beautiful views today, and we can see the mountains in the distance. We have a few ahead of us...day after tomorrow is a lot of up and the following is a lot of down.
We made it to Villar de Mazarife and picked the Albergue de Jesús. With a pirate ship in the yard. And a pool. Which it was once again too cool for me to jump into, but Skip went for it. It´s pretty nice here in this one...the surrounding area looks like Texas. A whole lotta nothin´.
We went hunting a supermarket in town and took the longest route possible. I´ve found out that trying to teach an Australian to speak Spanish is a lot like that episode of Friends when Phoebe tries to teach Joey French. You just have to see it. I´ve determined their mouths are not capable of making some sounds, and that´s just the way it is. Either that, or Skip is REALLY special. ;) We decided to cook (read: SKIP decided to cook; most of us know how proficient I am in a kitchen) and words can´t describe his attempts to ask for fresh parsley. We collected another hodgepodge of whatchagot and ended up with a GORGEOUS sauce to go with the pasta I nabbed in Agés when someone left it behind. That boy is a master.
Skip told me we´re shooting for a 6am start tomorrow. I told him everything about that sentence was fine with me except for the pronoun. 6AM??? We have 31k to go tomorrow to Astorga...either that or we wuss out and stop at 18k somewhere else (I don´t have my book on me). We´ll see. He´s going to call the boys tomorrow and find out what we can do to meet up...which we decided was cheating unless they contacted us, and since I just got a message from Felix, we´re good to go.
All for now. This guy has been waiting ages to get online, so I need to wrap it up and go to bed. By the way...tonight´s bed is a mattress on a second-story, outside deck. I´m kinda excited. As long as I can find a spare wool blanket somewhere....
Love you all.
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Carrión...Carry on...carrion....
Just a quick one. Still in Carrión. STILL in Carrión. STIIIIIIIILL in Carrión.
Killin´ me.
Yesterday, Skip gently suggested that the universe did this as an attempt to give me a lesson in patience. I gently suggested back to him, in my sweetest way, of course, how such lessons are generally received...historically speaking. You can imagine.
Stop laughing.
Anyway, yeah, we´re still here. It´s 3pm. I´m taking a break from the endless parade of beers on the table (all but one of them Skip´s, thank you very much...). The nuns have allowed us to leave our bags here all day while we endure this interminable wait for the bus. We´re still at the Bar España. And every time the bar man comes out, he just laughs when he sees me. Our attempts at communication have been many, frustrating, semi-successful, and tedious, but at least we´re getting some laughs out of it. I think he knows how frustrating it is for me to be sitting and doing nothing for an entire day after seventeen days filled with walking.
And it IS. I´ve been good, though. We went and had tea and coffee this morning after I got yelled at (not really) by a nun coming up to turn over the dorm rooms. She was quite surprised to find us still there, as everyone was supposed to leave by 8. By the time I got up at 7:30, only the Sicilians were left in the room, so I got a shower, mainly because I was nervous that I WOULD be yelled at. But there was no rousing Skip, so after I got back from the shower, she came in and got just a bit stern with us till I explained what our arrangement had been from last night.
So we packed up, left the bags, and headed out into the Sunday ghost town of Carrión. The only places open were the café/bars and the souvenir shops. So we stopped for coffee. The cafés where you get coffee and breakfast in the morning are also bars, so this morning we were treated to a group of people whom we assume were still drinking from the night before. They were roaring drunk. One of them had a black t-shirt with rubber breasts on the front. Good Lord. We finally vacated our tables after they stumbled out, went to the next one down the street, kept roaring and drinking and singing and bothering old men on the sidewalk. Sunday morning, mind you.
We went on walkabout...through the part of town we saw yesterday and the park beyond. There is a river (Yens the German went swimming in it yesterday) and a beautiful park and a rose garden. Nice to stop and smell the roses literally if we´re forced to do it symbolically. Back to the square...patch of sunlight in the grass where we sat for an hour or more, me reading interesting bits of the guidebook while Skip dozed in the sunshine and tried to rid himself of his rather vibrant case of raccoon eyes.
I went for a sandwich at Bar España and by the time I got out (with about 8 crawdads that the barman just decided to throw in for free), Skip had decided it was beer-thirty. So we sat, same place as yesterday, and he tried to explain to me how to eat crawdads. That was interesting. Not long after, we collected Gunna, who had arrived by bus that morning and said Al and Christa were with him in Frómista the night before and would be along shortly. (You were right, John...everyone who came out of Frómista was eaten alive by bedbugs. Regular infestation. Be forewarned, all ye future Camino walkers.) So we sat. And waited. And drank. And waited. And told stories. And shared photos. And waited.
Al showed up. Overjoyed to see him...not long after, the same with Christa. She had been hoping to catch us and is very sad that we´ll be leaving on the bus tonight. I suggested she come with us, but she´s just checked in here with the nuns, so I suppose this is it.
We´ve worked it out (which, of course, means very little on the Camino) that if we follow the book from León starting tomorrow, we´ll make it to Santiago on the 7th. Skip wants to bus from there to Frómista and come back for the Santiago mass on Sunday the 10th. (Correct me if my date - day of the week lineup is wrong...I have no idea.) Then I still have four days. I think the money situation is fine...so who knows what we´ll do. I just hope we find the boys somewhere, as we´ve found everyone else so far.
Bit of Camino life I keep forgetting to throw in...sometimes in the bunk rooms, the smell of BenGay and mentholated muscle rub can absolutely bowl you over. The air is absolutely permeated with it.
Had to buy a huge bottle of shampoo yesterday because I´m out and they don´t sell small ones. Sigh.
Keep seeing souvenirs and wanting them, but I´m sure there isn´t a thing we´re seeing now that we won´t find in Santiago as well.
Did I mention I sewed Skip´s busted camera bag back together again yesterday? Anyone counting how many times I´ve taken a needle to this boy and his gear? THREE!!! Sigh. Boys.
All for now. Bus in 4 hours. Wish us luck finding a place tonight....
Will probably not write till tomorrow night. Love you all.
Killin´ me.
Yesterday, Skip gently suggested that the universe did this as an attempt to give me a lesson in patience. I gently suggested back to him, in my sweetest way, of course, how such lessons are generally received...historically speaking. You can imagine.
Stop laughing.
Anyway, yeah, we´re still here. It´s 3pm. I´m taking a break from the endless parade of beers on the table (all but one of them Skip´s, thank you very much...). The nuns have allowed us to leave our bags here all day while we endure this interminable wait for the bus. We´re still at the Bar España. And every time the bar man comes out, he just laughs when he sees me. Our attempts at communication have been many, frustrating, semi-successful, and tedious, but at least we´re getting some laughs out of it. I think he knows how frustrating it is for me to be sitting and doing nothing for an entire day after seventeen days filled with walking.
And it IS. I´ve been good, though. We went and had tea and coffee this morning after I got yelled at (not really) by a nun coming up to turn over the dorm rooms. She was quite surprised to find us still there, as everyone was supposed to leave by 8. By the time I got up at 7:30, only the Sicilians were left in the room, so I got a shower, mainly because I was nervous that I WOULD be yelled at. But there was no rousing Skip, so after I got back from the shower, she came in and got just a bit stern with us till I explained what our arrangement had been from last night.
So we packed up, left the bags, and headed out into the Sunday ghost town of Carrión. The only places open were the café/bars and the souvenir shops. So we stopped for coffee. The cafés where you get coffee and breakfast in the morning are also bars, so this morning we were treated to a group of people whom we assume were still drinking from the night before. They were roaring drunk. One of them had a black t-shirt with rubber breasts on the front. Good Lord. We finally vacated our tables after they stumbled out, went to the next one down the street, kept roaring and drinking and singing and bothering old men on the sidewalk. Sunday morning, mind you.
We went on walkabout...through the part of town we saw yesterday and the park beyond. There is a river (Yens the German went swimming in it yesterday) and a beautiful park and a rose garden. Nice to stop and smell the roses literally if we´re forced to do it symbolically. Back to the square...patch of sunlight in the grass where we sat for an hour or more, me reading interesting bits of the guidebook while Skip dozed in the sunshine and tried to rid himself of his rather vibrant case of raccoon eyes.
I went for a sandwich at Bar España and by the time I got out (with about 8 crawdads that the barman just decided to throw in for free), Skip had decided it was beer-thirty. So we sat, same place as yesterday, and he tried to explain to me how to eat crawdads. That was interesting. Not long after, we collected Gunna, who had arrived by bus that morning and said Al and Christa were with him in Frómista the night before and would be along shortly. (You were right, John...everyone who came out of Frómista was eaten alive by bedbugs. Regular infestation. Be forewarned, all ye future Camino walkers.) So we sat. And waited. And drank. And waited. And told stories. And shared photos. And waited.
Al showed up. Overjoyed to see him...not long after, the same with Christa. She had been hoping to catch us and is very sad that we´ll be leaving on the bus tonight. I suggested she come with us, but she´s just checked in here with the nuns, so I suppose this is it.
We´ve worked it out (which, of course, means very little on the Camino) that if we follow the book from León starting tomorrow, we´ll make it to Santiago on the 7th. Skip wants to bus from there to Frómista and come back for the Santiago mass on Sunday the 10th. (Correct me if my date - day of the week lineup is wrong...I have no idea.) Then I still have four days. I think the money situation is fine...so who knows what we´ll do. I just hope we find the boys somewhere, as we´ve found everyone else so far.
Bit of Camino life I keep forgetting to throw in...sometimes in the bunk rooms, the smell of BenGay and mentholated muscle rub can absolutely bowl you over. The air is absolutely permeated with it.
Had to buy a huge bottle of shampoo yesterday because I´m out and they don´t sell small ones. Sigh.
Keep seeing souvenirs and wanting them, but I´m sure there isn´t a thing we´re seeing now that we won´t find in Santiago as well.
Did I mention I sewed Skip´s busted camera bag back together again yesterday? Anyone counting how many times I´ve taken a needle to this boy and his gear? THREE!!! Sigh. Boys.
All for now. Bus in 4 hours. Wish us luck finding a place tonight....
Will probably not write till tomorrow night. Love you all.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
Boadilla to Carrión de los Condes
Yes, we´re in Carrión. And that´s exactly what we are today and tomorrow...carrion. We´re stuck here till tomorrow night. If we´d arrived on any other day but a Saturday, we would be in Terradilla de los Templarios, looking at a Templar castle and maybe even catching the boys (it seems EVERYONE on the Camino has seen them but us). But it´s Saturday, and tomorrow is Sunday, and like every day from 2pm to 5pm, life grinds to a halt in Spain on the weekends. It´s a very enviable and relaxing custom, but maddening as well when it doesn´t match up with your plans, or if you´re an American and are used to 24-7 everything. Sigh. Nothing for it but to wait. God knows what my mind will chew on if I have nowhere to walk, and it´s going to be hard enough to get on that bus tomorrow after SEVENTEEN days of straight walking. We´re at mile marker 420 from Santiago at the moment, and tomorrow, since the only bus is a 7pm to León, we´ll jump 95km at once. Not the plan, but as we said many times tonight in our English-French dinner conversation, c´est la vie.
The walk today. It was gorgeous out of Boadilla. The sunlight was falling just right when we hit the fork in the road and chose to walk along the 18th century canal. It was such still water, but still travelling along with us through the reeds. In my mind, I walked beside donkeys braying and clopping along, protesting against the weight of the barges they pulled from both sides of the canal. It was an iPod morning for both of us, and Loreena McKennitt was perfect for the setting. Skip and I agreed that we see no sign of this horrid monotonous meseta we keep hearing about. Granted...we´ll skip most of the hardest days tomorrow, but still, these three days we charged into it have been gorgeous.
We got to Frómista...the church there was near the top of my list. We walked across a dam when we got there...part of the 17th century canal and moving water 14 vertical meters. It was quite a shot, standing on this tiny little bridge across the top, with the water exploding below us and pouring off of four or five shelves before it went back to its placid, sluggish pace at the bottom. It was still misty and sunlight fell in rays through the treetops. One part we loved was that, near the top, hundreds of little streams of water were bursting through the brickwork...Skip and I agreed that in our countries, that would be a major concern and the engineers would be brought right back at once.
The church was great, though we found two wrong ones before we found the one I was looking for. (By the way, Skip had a beer WITH BREAKFAST. 9:30 AM. Sigh. Can´t take him anywhere.) The church looked like a small castle, Romanesque (like all of them here, in every single little town, no matter how small), and lined along the eaves with hundreds of little stone carvings of animals and people and symbols...one of the things that makes this one so interesting is that it has both Christian and pagan themes. I got lots of pictures that I want to blow up when I get home. I was hoping to stall us in Frómista till 10, when the church was supposed to open, but at about ten till, I went back to where the Spice Girls were having breakfast across the street and they said he´d gone just a moment before because he thought I´d left him. So, no inside, no stamp. Sigh. Oh well. Like my Aunt Carolyn says, it just means I´ll have to come back another time.
The rest of the day was largely unnoteworthy, except for one thing. One of Skip´s top-of-the-list experiences he wanted from the Camino was to walk through a field of sunflowers fully open, and today he got his wish. We´ve passed several such fields, but they´re always spotted with just a few open blooms, and this one was full on...an absolute riot of yellow and green. I took his cameras and he waded in, hip deep, into the huge, bobbing, yellow heads and spread his arms, grinning like a little kid. I got some great shots, some from standing atop a stone irrigation trough next to the field (I´m so glad I got some photo savvy somewhere earlier in my life...he´s quite the photog and I´m glad he´s so confident in my ability to take pictures that are framed well and turn out the way he wants). We switched and he got some great ones of me, too...then, giggling like kids, we took pictures of each other taking pictures of each other. It was intoxicating. I got one of a tall, tall sunflower against the blue sky, and another of one that wasn´t open yet but was like a green sunburst waiting to pop open. What a beautiful experience. Ten years from now, the email...¨Skip...remember that sunflower field?¨ lol.
The rest of the day was slow. We walked fast, but lingered long everywhere (like in the sunflowers), so we were just coming to Carrión at 4pm. The last two stretches were tough, but we ¨smashed ´em,¨ as he says. We did a 6km bit in 55 minutes. Arrrgh.... =)
Carrión is nice, but frustrating as hell, as I´ve already said. Skip was afraid I was gonna blow my top. I was back and forth between the information booth, the barman who sells the bus tickets, and an old man on the street for what felt like FOREVER, trying to figure out why there was no timetable, and why the (non)information booth didn´t match up with the barman. It was MADDENING!! We were hoping like I said yesterday to just make two little hops and still do a day´s walking each time...but now we´re going to be spinning our wheels, Camino roadkill, till 7pm tomorrow!! We´ll get in late to León, see the cathedral in the morning, and walk right out, and hopefully have a place to stay in between.
Speaking of places to stay, I´ve found another beautiful albergue for the top of the Camino list. We´re staying with the Benedictine sisters in the church in Carrión. The name escapes me now...there are apparently three church hostels, so I´ll have to put it up tomorrow. But they are lovely, lovely people. True Esprit du Chemin. Habits and everything. They brought in little children for a big singalong before the mass...then had a mass...then had a FEAST with about 30 people. Skip and I were able to catch Hank, Mimi, and Jocelyn cooking dinner in time for us to go to the market, get two chicken legs, and get back in time to join them...we brought wine and chocolates and pineapple and cherries for dessert. It was a wonderful dinner, somewhat complicated since Mimi speaks no English and Skip and I speak no French, so Jocelyn and Hank translated all throughout.
Mimi story: She has pajamas that consist of a shirt and shorts...the shirt says really big, ¨RICH FAMOUS SEXY.¨ What it really says is, ¨If you want to sleep with me, you must be RICH, you must be FAMOUS, and you must be SEXY.¨ And till yesterday, Mimi had no idea what it said. She is 62 and is a very spunky little French lady with an awesome sense of humor, and so that story was just perfect for her. =) She says those pajamas sell really well in France but not in the States.
Jocelyn story: Jocelyn is 53...not 58, like I said under her picture. Mon Dieu. I was so embarrassed!!! Sorry, Jocelyn!!!
With our hop, we´ll lose Hank and Mimi and Jocelyn for good. Very sad. They´ve been with me the whole way.
The nuns have let me stay up past curfew to write this blog, since I snuck my euro into the computer machine before they could tell me it was time to go to bed. Easier to get forgiveness than permission. But it´s winding down, so I better go. GOD what am I gonna do with myself tomorrow.... Skip´s threatening to tie me up somewhere so I don´t drive him crazy. There´s a river, apparently...maybe we´ll go for a swim.
Sunday night, León, and Monday, Villar de Mazarife. In case anyone on the Camino is reading.
PS - My brother is AWESOME!!! JUST PASSED HIS MASTER ELECTRICIAN´S TEST!! GO MIKE!! =)=)=)
The walk today. It was gorgeous out of Boadilla. The sunlight was falling just right when we hit the fork in the road and chose to walk along the 18th century canal. It was such still water, but still travelling along with us through the reeds. In my mind, I walked beside donkeys braying and clopping along, protesting against the weight of the barges they pulled from both sides of the canal. It was an iPod morning for both of us, and Loreena McKennitt was perfect for the setting. Skip and I agreed that we see no sign of this horrid monotonous meseta we keep hearing about. Granted...we´ll skip most of the hardest days tomorrow, but still, these three days we charged into it have been gorgeous.
We got to Frómista...the church there was near the top of my list. We walked across a dam when we got there...part of the 17th century canal and moving water 14 vertical meters. It was quite a shot, standing on this tiny little bridge across the top, with the water exploding below us and pouring off of four or five shelves before it went back to its placid, sluggish pace at the bottom. It was still misty and sunlight fell in rays through the treetops. One part we loved was that, near the top, hundreds of little streams of water were bursting through the brickwork...Skip and I agreed that in our countries, that would be a major concern and the engineers would be brought right back at once.
The church was great, though we found two wrong ones before we found the one I was looking for. (By the way, Skip had a beer WITH BREAKFAST. 9:30 AM. Sigh. Can´t take him anywhere.) The church looked like a small castle, Romanesque (like all of them here, in every single little town, no matter how small), and lined along the eaves with hundreds of little stone carvings of animals and people and symbols...one of the things that makes this one so interesting is that it has both Christian and pagan themes. I got lots of pictures that I want to blow up when I get home. I was hoping to stall us in Frómista till 10, when the church was supposed to open, but at about ten till, I went back to where the Spice Girls were having breakfast across the street and they said he´d gone just a moment before because he thought I´d left him. So, no inside, no stamp. Sigh. Oh well. Like my Aunt Carolyn says, it just means I´ll have to come back another time.
The rest of the day was largely unnoteworthy, except for one thing. One of Skip´s top-of-the-list experiences he wanted from the Camino was to walk through a field of sunflowers fully open, and today he got his wish. We´ve passed several such fields, but they´re always spotted with just a few open blooms, and this one was full on...an absolute riot of yellow and green. I took his cameras and he waded in, hip deep, into the huge, bobbing, yellow heads and spread his arms, grinning like a little kid. I got some great shots, some from standing atop a stone irrigation trough next to the field (I´m so glad I got some photo savvy somewhere earlier in my life...he´s quite the photog and I´m glad he´s so confident in my ability to take pictures that are framed well and turn out the way he wants). We switched and he got some great ones of me, too...then, giggling like kids, we took pictures of each other taking pictures of each other. It was intoxicating. I got one of a tall, tall sunflower against the blue sky, and another of one that wasn´t open yet but was like a green sunburst waiting to pop open. What a beautiful experience. Ten years from now, the email...¨Skip...remember that sunflower field?¨ lol.
The rest of the day was slow. We walked fast, but lingered long everywhere (like in the sunflowers), so we were just coming to Carrión at 4pm. The last two stretches were tough, but we ¨smashed ´em,¨ as he says. We did a 6km bit in 55 minutes. Arrrgh.... =)
Carrión is nice, but frustrating as hell, as I´ve already said. Skip was afraid I was gonna blow my top. I was back and forth between the information booth, the barman who sells the bus tickets, and an old man on the street for what felt like FOREVER, trying to figure out why there was no timetable, and why the (non)information booth didn´t match up with the barman. It was MADDENING!! We were hoping like I said yesterday to just make two little hops and still do a day´s walking each time...but now we´re going to be spinning our wheels, Camino roadkill, till 7pm tomorrow!! We´ll get in late to León, see the cathedral in the morning, and walk right out, and hopefully have a place to stay in between.
Speaking of places to stay, I´ve found another beautiful albergue for the top of the Camino list. We´re staying with the Benedictine sisters in the church in Carrión. The name escapes me now...there are apparently three church hostels, so I´ll have to put it up tomorrow. But they are lovely, lovely people. True Esprit du Chemin. Habits and everything. They brought in little children for a big singalong before the mass...then had a mass...then had a FEAST with about 30 people. Skip and I were able to catch Hank, Mimi, and Jocelyn cooking dinner in time for us to go to the market, get two chicken legs, and get back in time to join them...we brought wine and chocolates and pineapple and cherries for dessert. It was a wonderful dinner, somewhat complicated since Mimi speaks no English and Skip and I speak no French, so Jocelyn and Hank translated all throughout.
Mimi story: She has pajamas that consist of a shirt and shorts...the shirt says really big, ¨RICH FAMOUS SEXY.¨ What it really says is, ¨If you want to sleep with me, you must be RICH, you must be FAMOUS, and you must be SEXY.¨ And till yesterday, Mimi had no idea what it said. She is 62 and is a very spunky little French lady with an awesome sense of humor, and so that story was just perfect for her. =) She says those pajamas sell really well in France but not in the States.
Jocelyn story: Jocelyn is 53...not 58, like I said under her picture. Mon Dieu. I was so embarrassed!!! Sorry, Jocelyn!!!
With our hop, we´ll lose Hank and Mimi and Jocelyn for good. Very sad. They´ve been with me the whole way.
The nuns have let me stay up past curfew to write this blog, since I snuck my euro into the computer machine before they could tell me it was time to go to bed. Easier to get forgiveness than permission. But it´s winding down, so I better go. GOD what am I gonna do with myself tomorrow.... Skip´s threatening to tie me up somewhere so I don´t drive him crazy. There´s a river, apparently...maybe we´ll go for a swim.
Sunday night, León, and Monday, Villar de Mazarife. In case anyone on the Camino is reading.
PS - My brother is AWESOME!!! JUST PASSED HIS MASTER ELECTRICIAN´S TEST!! GO MIKE!! =)=)=)
Friday, July 25, 2008
Castrojeriz to Boadilla del Camino
Short post today because I'm on the slowest internet connection ever created and I'm not even sure this will save.
I'm in Boadilla...one stop before Fromista. Did I mention I smashed the 30k barrier yesterday? Full on 32k...finally hit my 20 mile mark. Longest day I've done. But I paid for it today. My right knee came back with a vengeance by the end of the day and we decided to stop here, even though we only did 20k today.
We. Yeah, still with Skip. I decided, and later told him and he concurred, that I did my part in striking out alone and trying to leave the group behind and face the Camino alone, and the Camino's response was, nearly immediately, to toss us back together. So together we are, and together we'll stay.
We're formulating a game plan. Tomorrow, I'll break my streak of 16 (?) days without transport. We're hoping to get as far as Carrion de los Condes, and then hop a bus for either 18 or 28k, depending on what we can do. Time to quit messing around...we have somewhere to be around the 8th or 9th of August and we need to make some serious time. We've rationalized it...we'll walk a full day tomorrow, 25k, then skip ahead about a day's worth, as that stretch contains 18k without civilization. Then we'll walk another day, perhaps a day and a half, and blow the next 50k into Leon. We talked it over, and neither of us like the idea of skipping huge chunks of the meseta, but to skip across it like a stone, never missing that much...and missing either chunks with no civilization or bits that follow right beside the road anyway...as Skip puts it, "it's gotta be done."
Anyway. Back to business. Big winding steep hill out of Castrojeriz today, which we SMASHED...then killer, straight-arrow downslope on the other side. Then lots more meseta, but it was nice. It wasn't just wheat this time...we finally found some corn, and then closer on to Itero, even some spinach and a few other crops. We didn't stop much...an old man was selling coffee for donations on the side of the road about an hour and a half in, but other than that and a quick stop for a baguette to go with his tomato and ham he had for lunch...off we went. We did the whole 20k in 5 hours. HELL YEAH!!
Noteworthy things along the way...we are now in Palencia, out of Castilla y Leon (I think). Or in a new part of it. We passed, right before the border, a beautiful little chapel/hostel called San Nicolas which was staffed by the most wonderfully kind people. The lady inside said she'd seen more Americans this year than ever before...thank God they're staying away from me. (The CCM group jumped from Burgos the other day to the end of the line to make Santiago by today.) (Not that I don't love my countrymen, but I'm not here to see them, thank you very much....) Anyway...since today is St. James' Day, they had coffee and tea waiting outside for us there as well (or maybe they do that every day, but still, today is special). St. James Day is a national holiday, and when it falls on a Sunday it's called a Holy Year and the Camino explodes with pilgrims. Definitely want to try staying in San Nicolas if I do this again...it's tiny and basic and quaint but beautiful and peaceful and definitely a place where the Esprit du Chemin (Spirit of the Camino) resides.
Boadilla. The best albergue so far. From the outside, it looks like a condemned building. Inside, it's an oasis. Fairway lawns with giant stone planters overflowing with petunias and geraniums and snapdragons (!!!)...small swimming pool...LAUNDRY!!! Oh, God, EVERYTHING I own is now clean and sun-dried. It's like heaven. Good dinner...patio sitting area with thick grapevines strung overhead and creeping up the walls...beautiful wrought iron statue of two pilgrims, one standing over his friend who is checking something on his foot...one iron shoe off...someone put a bandaid on the foot. I have pictures, it's gorgeous. The people are SOOOOO nice. And we got here at noon, so we've had the whole afternoon to lounge around in the sunshine and be lazy and it's been WONderful.
The weather has been perfect. Bright sun, cool mornings, cool breeze, and even though it's a solid and strong headwind, it's refreshing, and it could be 20 degrees hotter and miserable. Thank you, St. James!!!
The Spice Girls are here too. So are Mimi and Jocelyn. Hank is ahead, I assume, and the German boys were with Malek yesterday and are supposedly about 20k ahead by now. If we catch that bus tomorrow afternoon, we might catch up to them. But the bus schedule is still a mystery and apparently there's an issue with Saturday or Sunday service...like with everything else in Spain. Apparently, there's a bar in Carrion that will have information for us. It's a 25k day tomorrow, and the light day today and lots of rest this afternoon will hopefully have my knee feeling all right again.
Cannot TELL you how exciting it is to have clean clothes. Skip and I want to throw them on the lawn and roll around in them. It's joy.
Lost Kate. Thought she'd be here...was determined to make it to the pool but no sign of her. Every time we hit a pool, it's a bit too cold (or, in Belorado, WAY too cold) to swim. Dammit.
By the way, for those of you who are wondering, Skip's ankle is fine...today was his first day walking after four days off...he's still slugging antibiotics and slathering his ankle in betadine, but the swelling is coming down and he was pretty much in full form today, to watch him. He certainly didn't seem to be babying it. So I think he'll be okay. It's still hideous, by the way. Ha ha.
For some reason, can't get to my Hotmail from this computer. Have a message from Dad and one from Byron and can't get either, which of course is no reason not to send more. MIKE...help a girl out. Send some love.
Tomorrow, hopefully we'll get 25k walked and 45 or so actually travelled. Will update, of course, as soon as I can. I've missed several days lately...trust me, it's not because I'm blowing it off. Service seems spotty on the meseta.
Love you all!!!
I'm in Boadilla...one stop before Fromista. Did I mention I smashed the 30k barrier yesterday? Full on 32k...finally hit my 20 mile mark. Longest day I've done. But I paid for it today. My right knee came back with a vengeance by the end of the day and we decided to stop here, even though we only did 20k today.
We. Yeah, still with Skip. I decided, and later told him and he concurred, that I did my part in striking out alone and trying to leave the group behind and face the Camino alone, and the Camino's response was, nearly immediately, to toss us back together. So together we are, and together we'll stay.
We're formulating a game plan. Tomorrow, I'll break my streak of 16 (?) days without transport. We're hoping to get as far as Carrion de los Condes, and then hop a bus for either 18 or 28k, depending on what we can do. Time to quit messing around...we have somewhere to be around the 8th or 9th of August and we need to make some serious time. We've rationalized it...we'll walk a full day tomorrow, 25k, then skip ahead about a day's worth, as that stretch contains 18k without civilization. Then we'll walk another day, perhaps a day and a half, and blow the next 50k into Leon. We talked it over, and neither of us like the idea of skipping huge chunks of the meseta, but to skip across it like a stone, never missing that much...and missing either chunks with no civilization or bits that follow right beside the road anyway...as Skip puts it, "it's gotta be done."
Anyway. Back to business. Big winding steep hill out of Castrojeriz today, which we SMASHED...then killer, straight-arrow downslope on the other side. Then lots more meseta, but it was nice. It wasn't just wheat this time...we finally found some corn, and then closer on to Itero, even some spinach and a few other crops. We didn't stop much...an old man was selling coffee for donations on the side of the road about an hour and a half in, but other than that and a quick stop for a baguette to go with his tomato and ham he had for lunch...off we went. We did the whole 20k in 5 hours. HELL YEAH!!
Noteworthy things along the way...we are now in Palencia, out of Castilla y Leon (I think). Or in a new part of it. We passed, right before the border, a beautiful little chapel/hostel called San Nicolas which was staffed by the most wonderfully kind people. The lady inside said she'd seen more Americans this year than ever before...thank God they're staying away from me. (The CCM group jumped from Burgos the other day to the end of the line to make Santiago by today.) (Not that I don't love my countrymen, but I'm not here to see them, thank you very much....) Anyway...since today is St. James' Day, they had coffee and tea waiting outside for us there as well (or maybe they do that every day, but still, today is special). St. James Day is a national holiday, and when it falls on a Sunday it's called a Holy Year and the Camino explodes with pilgrims. Definitely want to try staying in San Nicolas if I do this again...it's tiny and basic and quaint but beautiful and peaceful and definitely a place where the Esprit du Chemin (Spirit of the Camino) resides.
Boadilla. The best albergue so far. From the outside, it looks like a condemned building. Inside, it's an oasis. Fairway lawns with giant stone planters overflowing with petunias and geraniums and snapdragons (!!!)...small swimming pool...LAUNDRY!!! Oh, God, EVERYTHING I own is now clean and sun-dried. It's like heaven. Good dinner...patio sitting area with thick grapevines strung overhead and creeping up the walls...beautiful wrought iron statue of two pilgrims, one standing over his friend who is checking something on his foot...one iron shoe off...someone put a bandaid on the foot. I have pictures, it's gorgeous. The people are SOOOOO nice. And we got here at noon, so we've had the whole afternoon to lounge around in the sunshine and be lazy and it's been WONderful.
The weather has been perfect. Bright sun, cool mornings, cool breeze, and even though it's a solid and strong headwind, it's refreshing, and it could be 20 degrees hotter and miserable. Thank you, St. James!!!
The Spice Girls are here too. So are Mimi and Jocelyn. Hank is ahead, I assume, and the German boys were with Malek yesterday and are supposedly about 20k ahead by now. If we catch that bus tomorrow afternoon, we might catch up to them. But the bus schedule is still a mystery and apparently there's an issue with Saturday or Sunday service...like with everything else in Spain. Apparently, there's a bar in Carrion that will have information for us. It's a 25k day tomorrow, and the light day today and lots of rest this afternoon will hopefully have my knee feeling all right again.
Cannot TELL you how exciting it is to have clean clothes. Skip and I want to throw them on the lawn and roll around in them. It's joy.
Lost Kate. Thought she'd be here...was determined to make it to the pool but no sign of her. Every time we hit a pool, it's a bit too cold (or, in Belorado, WAY too cold) to swim. Dammit.
By the way, for those of you who are wondering, Skip's ankle is fine...today was his first day walking after four days off...he's still slugging antibiotics and slathering his ankle in betadine, but the swelling is coming down and he was pretty much in full form today, to watch him. He certainly didn't seem to be babying it. So I think he'll be okay. It's still hideous, by the way. Ha ha.
For some reason, can't get to my Hotmail from this computer. Have a message from Dad and one from Byron and can't get either, which of course is no reason not to send more. MIKE...help a girl out. Send some love.
Tomorrow, hopefully we'll get 25k walked and 45 or so actually travelled. Will update, of course, as soon as I can. I've missed several days lately...trust me, it's not because I'm blowing it off. Service seems spotty on the meseta.
Love you all!!!
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Burgos to Tardajos to Castrojeriz
When I left you, I was headed to the Cathedral of Burgos. It was as majestic inside as I expected it to be. Surprises included the tomb of El Cid, whose statue I found after getting directions from two people on the street. I headed in that direction, then lost the trail, and asked two little old ladies in a traffic roundabout. I pulled out a postcard showing the monument and asked, ¿Donde esta este? Wonderingly, this 90-something little old lady pointed right behind me. There it was. I friggin´ missed it and was standing right under it. I blame my hat. lol
After that, the Cathedral. The best part was the cloister walk. It was a square enclosing a garden, one floor up, and was playing haunting monk-like ethereal music throughout, with soft gongs and little bell sounds, and you could almost feel the monks sweeping by you in their long, brown, whispering roads. It was roped off at one point, to keep people moving in a procession through the cathedral, but I cheated and ducked under and walked the hallways four or five times. Had to force myself to leave. Very meditative, very addictive...I could´ve paced through those hallways all day. There was a postcard in the gift shop that showed them, so I kind of get to take them with me, but I wish there was a place like that near home where I could go to think. It was beautiful.
From my journal yesterday, written in the cloister: ¨Cathedrals like this make me miss my mother. I want her to be here so she can tell me how to look at the art and the architecture, to read the codes they use, to show me what the untrained eye will miss, help me look between the places I´m looking and see wonders hidden in plain sight.¨ Mom...we need to start planning a trip to Italy.
Also from my journal: Ï wish Catholics would focus more on Jesus´ life work, rather than just his infancy and his crucifixion. I really get tired of bloody miserable martyrs writhing in agony and repeated images of the mortification of Christ. There was so much more to his life than an immaculate conception and a grisly death.¨
After the cathedral, I had lunch, hit a touristy-Camino shop where I bought yet another amulet-type necklace (a triskela this time, intuition and constant change), and saw Kevin from Boston (from several days ago in Los Arcos) sitting where we had drinks the day before. I headed over to say hi, and told him I was heading out, despite the fact that it was 4pm, hot as Jeezus, and probably pretty stupid. He agreed. But Burgos was so expensive, I couldn´t handle another day there, and there were apparently two towns within 10k, so off I went. The cathedral bells struck 4 as I left the old city behind me and headed out. Alone.
From my journal: ¨Well, I found solitude, and the first thing I found in solitude was stupidity. The dangerous kind. The kind borne of stubbornness, and ignorance of common sense (as in, ignoring it, not lacking it). The kind that dashes your spirits and makes loneliness almost impossible to bear.
If you spend all day in Burgos on a computer, then hunting El Cid, then wandering the halls of a cathedral, and it´s 4pm, and upwards of 90 degrees, STAY PUT. Especially if you´re alone, whether or not you have water and an extra bocadillo (sandwich) in your pack. At least use the bathroom before you go, so you don´t get desperate on the way as the Camino swings wide of the first town....CENSORED. ;)
The heat was intense. It was bearable in the shade of the trees leading out of the old town of Burgos, but even the lady I asked for directions on the side of the street said it was too hot to walk. The locals know. But I was full of headstrong recklessness and felt like pushing the boundaries, so I went on.
Once out of the old city, more construction and a very unfriendly gravel road that curved away from Villabilla and the promise of a bathroom. More dumptrucks. More dust. More wheat. Every time I saw a Camino sign, I missed my friends, especially happy-go-lucky Felix and his incessant chatter and references to stupid American comedy films. Felix. What a good name for him. Only a few hours on my own, and I was lonely.
So, like usual, I tried to fill the emptiness with activity. Maybe that´s why I headed out at such an inopportune hour. Walk. It won´t be that bad. You have water, you´ve eaten plenty and have an extra sandwich. Just go. Besides, where are you going to stay if you don´t? You have to get to another albergue. Two, maybe three towns ahead. It´ll be fine.
It wasn´t. The towns didn´t come. I passed one, and the road threatened to rise over a hill and God only knew what lay beyond. I didn´t have it in me. When I stopped, and then started again, my muscles went to water. My mouth was gummy, though I was drinking every time I thought about water. The sun was relentless. My head said I could go on, but my body was rebelling and I knew it.
Through an underpass tunnel ahead, I could hear men shouting, angry. I drew my knife...actually drew my knife...and tried to hold it concealed, blade point pricking my forearm, reassuring in its sharpness. The men, three of them, fell silent as I passed, and then shouted again, but a quick glance revealed they were only addressing each other. It was my first moment of fear on the Camino...probably having more to do with being suddenly alone than any real menace. They were just workmen, agitated over something that had nothing to do with me. As I left the tunnel, one of the men got into a van. As he passed me, he seemed to slow, and he looked at me, but drove on. I put my knife back in my pocket.
An hour had passed, maybe more. Three blessings suddenly converged to form a miracle, and thus, my salvation. First, the road ahead suddenly turned under another overpass, this one high...twin roads leading into tunnels into a hillside, and provided shade next to a tree-lined river. Second, a handmade cardboard sign advertised the next albergue only a scant 3km away. Third, the purple sky behind me formed softly rumbling thunderheads that finally overtook the sun and dropped the temperature to a bearable 80 or so. I thought for a moment about stopping beneath the bridges to wait for rain, but since I had only 3km to go and no idea how long the rain would go on if it did come, decided to walk on.
The road started to look more promising. From a gravel road to an asphalt motorway. To my left, in the distance, gray curtains of rain fell from heaven to earth in sweeping sheets. They looked far away.
I was hoping I´d made it three towns away, to Rabé de las Calzadas, but it was only two, to Tardajos.
As I entered the town, the wind picked up something fierce. Huge gusts of wind blew eddies of dust across the road. The bars I could see ahead, earmarked for emergency shelter, were suddenly alive with people scurrying to retract canopies and take down umbrellas in the sudden storm. Old men begrudgingly got to their feet and hurried stiffly from their park benches. The arrows began to conflict as the rain began to fall in scant, fat drops. I was in no mood to sort out Camino arrows from albergue arrows. I found a hustle I didn´t know I had, and as the windstorm intensified and the purple sky got closer and the dust made it harder to see, the need to find the most direct route to shelter became more urgent.
¨Albergue?¨ I cried to passersby, dispensing with my usual painstaking politeness. The usual stream of unintelligible chatter came back to me, and I forgot about picking through for recognizable patterns of sounds and simply followed hand signals. There it was. A line of people on the scant front porch, ducked behind clotheslines and watching the dust blow across the streets. Among them, a boy whose face I recognized, but no one I´d spoken to...I don´t think he spoke English. A child of about 3. A pregnant woman. Two iron-haired hippie-looking folks, with kind faces, beckoning me in urgently.
The man was pure granola...tall, thin, sandals, glasses, long hair falling in eyes that sloped downward to meet his broad smile curving upward. He spoke to me in manageable speed, and as I entered the tiny foyer, I tried to understand if he was telling me they still had beds or were full...and when he said ¨Bienvenidos,¨ I nearly wept with relief.
He was so, so kind. He explained the rules to me, invited me to a meeting at 7:30 where pilgrims could talk about their Caminos, told me they were a donativo and had no kitchen. The shower stalls were even with the floor and you were asked to mop after your shower to soak up the excess. Breakfast at 6:30am. He carried my pack up to my room (a blessing in itself...hospitaleros, take note) and we came back down for the stamp and the credential dance. He spoke so comfortingly, so welcomingly. It had been such a miserable trek...two hours had felt like two weeks...my nerves were raw and I felt destitute and deserted...no familiar faces for the first night since St. Jean. I just wanted to crawl into a corner away from everyone.
But I coped. I know, I have the tendency to be a bit dramatic...but this is tough stuff. There´s a lot of Camino to go, and the meseta is not the easiest part, and to do it alone is tougher.
To add insult to injury, my towel is full of burrs. Certainly no washing machine here...this is bare as bare bones gets. But it´s warm and comfortable and these are good, good people.¨
I went to the bar and wrote for some two hours or so. In the middle of it, the bartender gave me a funny grin, took the half beer I had in front of me and tapped his chest. He poured it out, washed the glass, and refilled it to the top. I smiled gratefully at him and tried to say ¨I guess I need to drink faster.¨ He just smiled again and stamped my passport.
Back to the albergue, ate my bocadillo, and went up to my room. Two older men in there with me. We didn´t speak at all. I crawled into bed at 9:45. It was still light out. Some time later, the men went to bed and it was dark. I slept like a stone.
This morning, I woke up several times, and each time, it seems that one of the men had just come back from the shower, and may not have been totally naked, but it seemed that way to me in my half-sleep. I tried to get up early and ended up hopping down from my bunk just before the hospitalero came to make sure we were all up. Quick shower, pack up, head outside for tea and some beautiful crispy little donuts, and attempts at conversation through a girl who spoke fluent Spanish and very good English. The hospitaleros were from Madrid and I tried to tell them my mother has a friend there, and that she was very worried about me until her friend reassured her I´d be fine. They thought that was amusing. I wrote a note in the albergue book thanking Fernando for his kindness, and headed out at 7:15.
The Camino was different today. The meseta is, indeed, softly undulating wheat fields that stretch on to the horizon in all directions, and at times, the sky was beautiful, with its wispy cirrus clouds and impossible blues. The temperature this morning was like summer in Tahoe...crisp and cold, much colder in the shade than in the sun. The mornings are always cold, but a fleece is too much within ten minutes and I´m stopping to stuff it in my bag (though, in fact, I´ve gotten quite adept at taking it off around my backpack without breaking my stride...a feat that amazed Felix the other day when I also was able to put it back on without stopping...ha ha).
But alone...all the winds are headwinds. All the rocks reach up to trip you. Your muscles get tired sooner, and the pain of your feet goes to the forefront of your mind. Your pack is heavier and your hat won´t stay on, forcing you to carry it. You walk constantly in your own shadow, which takes the sunlight away from the rocks of the path and makes it harder for you to judge where to step. It takes longer between towns. The Camino is no longer a game...no longer a quick daily segment from beginning (breakfast with friends, grousing over whoever takes longest to be ready) to end (beers and companionship before bedtime), but an endless plain of nothingness, Santiago impossibly far away. It is a very intimidating place today.
But I charged on. Hornillos del Camino was a nice little hamlet, tucked into a valley. The road dropped suddenly from in front of me, and the valley ahead, and the road apparently climbing up the other side had me feeling like Mr. Potato Head in Toy Story 2, when he sees all the bags in the airport and loses all his stuff out his back trapdoor. But the man in the first store in Hornillos gave me an apple, a diet Coke, a bag of peanuts, and a good sized bocadillo for 5.80...which was beautiful.
Onward. More wheat fields. Life of Pi on the iPod for a while, till I felt guilty, like I should be thinking deep searching thoughts about my life and not escaping or mooning over lost Camino friends. More wheat fields. MORE wheat fields. Gradually they changed into something else...barley, perhaps? Definitely not corn, like the book said. No other walkers. NO other walkers. Only bicyclists today. I think many pilgrims skip the meseta (actually, I know they do, which makes me feel a bit like a badass and lifts my spirits momentarily). Lots of cyclists. They holler ¨Hola!¨ or ¨Buen Camino¨ as they speed by, and inside, I laugh as I think about Skip, who would curse viciously at the cyclists when they blew by us, wishing them flat tires and seats that fall off at inopportune times.
San Bol. San Bol has an interesting story. It is now nothing but a lone albergue in the middle of endless wheat fields. It was a hamlet but was deserted in 1503 by its inhabitants, my book says ¨for unknown reasons,¨ but I believe it was probably plague. It´s worth a quick detour to look around. No electricity, no running water...campground and spring in the grove below. I say hello to the hospitalero and ask for a stamp. When he gives it to me, it is in red, and is the Masonic symbol...the square and compass. I ask him why, but he doesn´t know...he just started there recently. He asks me what the Masons are, and with his limited English (he is German), I am hard put to explain it. I tell him they are vaguely related to the Templars, and he nods. I move on.
Hontanas. I sit on a bench next to yet another German, an older man. After a long silence, I ask him where he has come from today. He looks at me for a minute. ¨I sleep in the bed below you.¨ I am an idiot yet again. I try to explain that I was miserable last night and didn´t want to interact with anyone, even look at anyone.
A chipper looking girl with bleach blonde hair comes out of nowhere, offering us a piece of a baguette she has. We both refuse. She is Kate, from Southampton, and we instantly fall to talking about the Titanic...the first English conversation I´ve had since yesterday morning.
Suddely, Mimi and Jocelyn emerge from a bar!! They´re staying in Hontanas tonight, but it´s only noon, and I want to go far today. I update them on whoever I can, as best I can, and tell them their pictures are on my blog. Mimi laughs like a schoolgirl when Jocelyn translates that I put up her picture with her grass hat.
(Sidenote: the bar I´m in right this moment has a bloodhound and a tabby cat in it. The Rescuers, anyone?)
Kate asks how far I´m going; I tell her Castrojeriz. 10km from here, 22 behind me. She muses over that for a moment, and I invite her to walk with me. She says yes. Off we go.
Kate is British, reminds me of Jen Partridge, is of a completely unreadable age, and prattles away unceasingly as we walk, all in this chirpy, singsong British accent, and it is incessant and it is beautiful. After my miserable evening the day before and my miserable morning missing the crowd and flinging myself into solitude, I feel I´ve earned pleasant company. She is a true free spirit, and I really enjoy walking with her.
We go 6km of rather more pleasant meseta, with random groves of trees and a path that cuts into a hillside...it´s a bit less monotonous. Her chatter keeps my mind off my feet. We make it to San Antón before we know it.
She has done the Camino before, but only to Astorga, and says that San Antón is beautiful. I am intrigued by the story of animal blessings each January, the mystical cure of St. Anthony´s disease (result of wheat parasites nonexistent in Spain, which led to the belief that pilgrims were ¨cured¨ of a disease they simply had no more exposure to at this point) and the fact that it´s a ruined monastery. And it is truly beautiful. Some walls are standing, the ceiling is open to the sky, there are tiny little figures in alcoves in the walls. The albergue is in the ruins...a tarp standing as the only wall between the sleeping area and the outside. The kitchen is still set for breakfast (at noon) and little dishes of yellow pellets here and there hold innumerable dead flies.
The hospitaleros are not welcoming at all. They stamp our passports begrudgingly. We go across the courtyard to sit on a bench away; my German bedfellow shows up a few minutes later. Kate expresses a bad feeling, and suddenly, my eyes fall on something strange.
Above the kitchen, on a high wall, there is a string hanging from the top down to the roof below, stopping a few inches above the roof. There is a pigeon hanging from the string. By its neck. It is dead. It swings back and forth in the breeze.
I call attention to it...everyone is shocked. Kate goes to ask why it´s there. They don´t know. It appeared, they say, some three days ago, both pigeon and string. They believe the pigeon got entangled by mistake. They seem unconcerned.
Kate, who had thought of staying there, and I suddenly agreed that this was an ominous sign and gave us the creeps. Combined with the standoffishness of the staff, we decided to leave right away. We headed out. Thankfully, Castrojeriz was almost immediately in view.
It is a long, long town, wrapping around the side of a hillside topped with the ruins of a small castle. It´s very charming looking. It takes us a long time to find the albergue, and when we check in, about 600 dreadlocked Germans (okay, 7) push their way in front of us, causing a great deal of ado about a small dog that is not allowed inside and has bandaged feet and keeps trying to creep into the foyer. There is no washing machine...damn, I´m out of socks. There is no internet, but we passed a place here and there along the way.
I go back to an albergue we passed up because of a high price...wandered looking for the hospitalero and ran into HANK!! He is there. We spoke briefly. He tells me the German boys are some 15k on from here. =( I was happy to see him, but got the feeling I needed to distance myself from familiarity...this is my next stage of the Camino. I use the computer for only a few minutes before it crashes.
I go find Kate. She is having a bottle of wine...an entire bottle of wine...in the bar across from our albergue. We have a wonderful conversation that lasts for hours...literature, America, England, movies, teaching, the stages of the Camino, signs, our reasons for being here...everything. She is delightful. She was a hospitalera in San Bol for the previous week, has chopped off all her hair to avoid male attention, and is heading to Thailand in December to see what will find her there. We talk a lot about travel vs. family. She is 35. The kid thing comes up and we understand each other.
As she talks, I glance out the window of the bar, and who is passing by....
SKIP!!!!!!
I cannot help myself, I explode out the doors and tackle him, and he tackles back, laughing his head off and giving me the ¨Of all the gin joints¨ line. I demand he join us for a beer...he checks into our albergue...I go back in to Kate and try to explain my dismay over seeing him.
I am THRILLED to see Skip...but I just got primed for this alone thing this morning. Now, here he is. No coordination, just appeared. Doesn´t that mean the Camino threw us back together, and I should follow that? I tell Kate I feel like I need to stay away from him tomorrow, to continue alone. She asks if I´m Catholic. That makes me laugh. I said no, just a Marine´s kid. She says, ¨Ah, that´s why you´re so obsessed with making life tough for yourself....¨
So...we finish drinking, and I head here for this café, where the internet is a bit cheaper than the first place, trying to concentrate while Hank talks at the next table with a woman with very painstaking English and who has NO awareness of her vocal volume. I keep waiting for this cat to get a beer. The smoke is making my eyes hurt. And I think I´m finally caught up.
I did tell Skip I felt torn by his appearance...that I was thrilled to have a friendly face after the last day or two, but that I felt like my crucible had just begun and I needed to let it sink in. He reminded me that we can walk for hours with no speaking at all, and that it´s no big deal. But it does change things. Today was hard, but it was priming. Trial by endless wheatfields.
I dunno. Someone here has perfume that is absolutely cloying and making my head hurt. Off to bed. We´ll see what happens tomorrow....
After that, the Cathedral. The best part was the cloister walk. It was a square enclosing a garden, one floor up, and was playing haunting monk-like ethereal music throughout, with soft gongs and little bell sounds, and you could almost feel the monks sweeping by you in their long, brown, whispering roads. It was roped off at one point, to keep people moving in a procession through the cathedral, but I cheated and ducked under and walked the hallways four or five times. Had to force myself to leave. Very meditative, very addictive...I could´ve paced through those hallways all day. There was a postcard in the gift shop that showed them, so I kind of get to take them with me, but I wish there was a place like that near home where I could go to think. It was beautiful.
From my journal yesterday, written in the cloister: ¨Cathedrals like this make me miss my mother. I want her to be here so she can tell me how to look at the art and the architecture, to read the codes they use, to show me what the untrained eye will miss, help me look between the places I´m looking and see wonders hidden in plain sight.¨ Mom...we need to start planning a trip to Italy.
Also from my journal: Ï wish Catholics would focus more on Jesus´ life work, rather than just his infancy and his crucifixion. I really get tired of bloody miserable martyrs writhing in agony and repeated images of the mortification of Christ. There was so much more to his life than an immaculate conception and a grisly death.¨
After the cathedral, I had lunch, hit a touristy-Camino shop where I bought yet another amulet-type necklace (a triskela this time, intuition and constant change), and saw Kevin from Boston (from several days ago in Los Arcos) sitting where we had drinks the day before. I headed over to say hi, and told him I was heading out, despite the fact that it was 4pm, hot as Jeezus, and probably pretty stupid. He agreed. But Burgos was so expensive, I couldn´t handle another day there, and there were apparently two towns within 10k, so off I went. The cathedral bells struck 4 as I left the old city behind me and headed out. Alone.
From my journal: ¨Well, I found solitude, and the first thing I found in solitude was stupidity. The dangerous kind. The kind borne of stubbornness, and ignorance of common sense (as in, ignoring it, not lacking it). The kind that dashes your spirits and makes loneliness almost impossible to bear.
If you spend all day in Burgos on a computer, then hunting El Cid, then wandering the halls of a cathedral, and it´s 4pm, and upwards of 90 degrees, STAY PUT. Especially if you´re alone, whether or not you have water and an extra bocadillo (sandwich) in your pack. At least use the bathroom before you go, so you don´t get desperate on the way as the Camino swings wide of the first town....CENSORED. ;)
The heat was intense. It was bearable in the shade of the trees leading out of the old town of Burgos, but even the lady I asked for directions on the side of the street said it was too hot to walk. The locals know. But I was full of headstrong recklessness and felt like pushing the boundaries, so I went on.
Once out of the old city, more construction and a very unfriendly gravel road that curved away from Villabilla and the promise of a bathroom. More dumptrucks. More dust. More wheat. Every time I saw a Camino sign, I missed my friends, especially happy-go-lucky Felix and his incessant chatter and references to stupid American comedy films. Felix. What a good name for him. Only a few hours on my own, and I was lonely.
So, like usual, I tried to fill the emptiness with activity. Maybe that´s why I headed out at such an inopportune hour. Walk. It won´t be that bad. You have water, you´ve eaten plenty and have an extra sandwich. Just go. Besides, where are you going to stay if you don´t? You have to get to another albergue. Two, maybe three towns ahead. It´ll be fine.
It wasn´t. The towns didn´t come. I passed one, and the road threatened to rise over a hill and God only knew what lay beyond. I didn´t have it in me. When I stopped, and then started again, my muscles went to water. My mouth was gummy, though I was drinking every time I thought about water. The sun was relentless. My head said I could go on, but my body was rebelling and I knew it.
Through an underpass tunnel ahead, I could hear men shouting, angry. I drew my knife...actually drew my knife...and tried to hold it concealed, blade point pricking my forearm, reassuring in its sharpness. The men, three of them, fell silent as I passed, and then shouted again, but a quick glance revealed they were only addressing each other. It was my first moment of fear on the Camino...probably having more to do with being suddenly alone than any real menace. They were just workmen, agitated over something that had nothing to do with me. As I left the tunnel, one of the men got into a van. As he passed me, he seemed to slow, and he looked at me, but drove on. I put my knife back in my pocket.
An hour had passed, maybe more. Three blessings suddenly converged to form a miracle, and thus, my salvation. First, the road ahead suddenly turned under another overpass, this one high...twin roads leading into tunnels into a hillside, and provided shade next to a tree-lined river. Second, a handmade cardboard sign advertised the next albergue only a scant 3km away. Third, the purple sky behind me formed softly rumbling thunderheads that finally overtook the sun and dropped the temperature to a bearable 80 or so. I thought for a moment about stopping beneath the bridges to wait for rain, but since I had only 3km to go and no idea how long the rain would go on if it did come, decided to walk on.
The road started to look more promising. From a gravel road to an asphalt motorway. To my left, in the distance, gray curtains of rain fell from heaven to earth in sweeping sheets. They looked far away.
I was hoping I´d made it three towns away, to Rabé de las Calzadas, but it was only two, to Tardajos.
As I entered the town, the wind picked up something fierce. Huge gusts of wind blew eddies of dust across the road. The bars I could see ahead, earmarked for emergency shelter, were suddenly alive with people scurrying to retract canopies and take down umbrellas in the sudden storm. Old men begrudgingly got to their feet and hurried stiffly from their park benches. The arrows began to conflict as the rain began to fall in scant, fat drops. I was in no mood to sort out Camino arrows from albergue arrows. I found a hustle I didn´t know I had, and as the windstorm intensified and the purple sky got closer and the dust made it harder to see, the need to find the most direct route to shelter became more urgent.
¨Albergue?¨ I cried to passersby, dispensing with my usual painstaking politeness. The usual stream of unintelligible chatter came back to me, and I forgot about picking through for recognizable patterns of sounds and simply followed hand signals. There it was. A line of people on the scant front porch, ducked behind clotheslines and watching the dust blow across the streets. Among them, a boy whose face I recognized, but no one I´d spoken to...I don´t think he spoke English. A child of about 3. A pregnant woman. Two iron-haired hippie-looking folks, with kind faces, beckoning me in urgently.
The man was pure granola...tall, thin, sandals, glasses, long hair falling in eyes that sloped downward to meet his broad smile curving upward. He spoke to me in manageable speed, and as I entered the tiny foyer, I tried to understand if he was telling me they still had beds or were full...and when he said ¨Bienvenidos,¨ I nearly wept with relief.
He was so, so kind. He explained the rules to me, invited me to a meeting at 7:30 where pilgrims could talk about their Caminos, told me they were a donativo and had no kitchen. The shower stalls were even with the floor and you were asked to mop after your shower to soak up the excess. Breakfast at 6:30am. He carried my pack up to my room (a blessing in itself...hospitaleros, take note) and we came back down for the stamp and the credential dance. He spoke so comfortingly, so welcomingly. It had been such a miserable trek...two hours had felt like two weeks...my nerves were raw and I felt destitute and deserted...no familiar faces for the first night since St. Jean. I just wanted to crawl into a corner away from everyone.
But I coped. I know, I have the tendency to be a bit dramatic...but this is tough stuff. There´s a lot of Camino to go, and the meseta is not the easiest part, and to do it alone is tougher.
To add insult to injury, my towel is full of burrs. Certainly no washing machine here...this is bare as bare bones gets. But it´s warm and comfortable and these are good, good people.¨
I went to the bar and wrote for some two hours or so. In the middle of it, the bartender gave me a funny grin, took the half beer I had in front of me and tapped his chest. He poured it out, washed the glass, and refilled it to the top. I smiled gratefully at him and tried to say ¨I guess I need to drink faster.¨ He just smiled again and stamped my passport.
Back to the albergue, ate my bocadillo, and went up to my room. Two older men in there with me. We didn´t speak at all. I crawled into bed at 9:45. It was still light out. Some time later, the men went to bed and it was dark. I slept like a stone.
This morning, I woke up several times, and each time, it seems that one of the men had just come back from the shower, and may not have been totally naked, but it seemed that way to me in my half-sleep. I tried to get up early and ended up hopping down from my bunk just before the hospitalero came to make sure we were all up. Quick shower, pack up, head outside for tea and some beautiful crispy little donuts, and attempts at conversation through a girl who spoke fluent Spanish and very good English. The hospitaleros were from Madrid and I tried to tell them my mother has a friend there, and that she was very worried about me until her friend reassured her I´d be fine. They thought that was amusing. I wrote a note in the albergue book thanking Fernando for his kindness, and headed out at 7:15.
The Camino was different today. The meseta is, indeed, softly undulating wheat fields that stretch on to the horizon in all directions, and at times, the sky was beautiful, with its wispy cirrus clouds and impossible blues. The temperature this morning was like summer in Tahoe...crisp and cold, much colder in the shade than in the sun. The mornings are always cold, but a fleece is too much within ten minutes and I´m stopping to stuff it in my bag (though, in fact, I´ve gotten quite adept at taking it off around my backpack without breaking my stride...a feat that amazed Felix the other day when I also was able to put it back on without stopping...ha ha).
But alone...all the winds are headwinds. All the rocks reach up to trip you. Your muscles get tired sooner, and the pain of your feet goes to the forefront of your mind. Your pack is heavier and your hat won´t stay on, forcing you to carry it. You walk constantly in your own shadow, which takes the sunlight away from the rocks of the path and makes it harder for you to judge where to step. It takes longer between towns. The Camino is no longer a game...no longer a quick daily segment from beginning (breakfast with friends, grousing over whoever takes longest to be ready) to end (beers and companionship before bedtime), but an endless plain of nothingness, Santiago impossibly far away. It is a very intimidating place today.
But I charged on. Hornillos del Camino was a nice little hamlet, tucked into a valley. The road dropped suddenly from in front of me, and the valley ahead, and the road apparently climbing up the other side had me feeling like Mr. Potato Head in Toy Story 2, when he sees all the bags in the airport and loses all his stuff out his back trapdoor. But the man in the first store in Hornillos gave me an apple, a diet Coke, a bag of peanuts, and a good sized bocadillo for 5.80...which was beautiful.
Onward. More wheat fields. Life of Pi on the iPod for a while, till I felt guilty, like I should be thinking deep searching thoughts about my life and not escaping or mooning over lost Camino friends. More wheat fields. MORE wheat fields. Gradually they changed into something else...barley, perhaps? Definitely not corn, like the book said. No other walkers. NO other walkers. Only bicyclists today. I think many pilgrims skip the meseta (actually, I know they do, which makes me feel a bit like a badass and lifts my spirits momentarily). Lots of cyclists. They holler ¨Hola!¨ or ¨Buen Camino¨ as they speed by, and inside, I laugh as I think about Skip, who would curse viciously at the cyclists when they blew by us, wishing them flat tires and seats that fall off at inopportune times.
San Bol. San Bol has an interesting story. It is now nothing but a lone albergue in the middle of endless wheat fields. It was a hamlet but was deserted in 1503 by its inhabitants, my book says ¨for unknown reasons,¨ but I believe it was probably plague. It´s worth a quick detour to look around. No electricity, no running water...campground and spring in the grove below. I say hello to the hospitalero and ask for a stamp. When he gives it to me, it is in red, and is the Masonic symbol...the square and compass. I ask him why, but he doesn´t know...he just started there recently. He asks me what the Masons are, and with his limited English (he is German), I am hard put to explain it. I tell him they are vaguely related to the Templars, and he nods. I move on.
Hontanas. I sit on a bench next to yet another German, an older man. After a long silence, I ask him where he has come from today. He looks at me for a minute. ¨I sleep in the bed below you.¨ I am an idiot yet again. I try to explain that I was miserable last night and didn´t want to interact with anyone, even look at anyone.
A chipper looking girl with bleach blonde hair comes out of nowhere, offering us a piece of a baguette she has. We both refuse. She is Kate, from Southampton, and we instantly fall to talking about the Titanic...the first English conversation I´ve had since yesterday morning.
Suddely, Mimi and Jocelyn emerge from a bar!! They´re staying in Hontanas tonight, but it´s only noon, and I want to go far today. I update them on whoever I can, as best I can, and tell them their pictures are on my blog. Mimi laughs like a schoolgirl when Jocelyn translates that I put up her picture with her grass hat.
(Sidenote: the bar I´m in right this moment has a bloodhound and a tabby cat in it. The Rescuers, anyone?)
Kate asks how far I´m going; I tell her Castrojeriz. 10km from here, 22 behind me. She muses over that for a moment, and I invite her to walk with me. She says yes. Off we go.
Kate is British, reminds me of Jen Partridge, is of a completely unreadable age, and prattles away unceasingly as we walk, all in this chirpy, singsong British accent, and it is incessant and it is beautiful. After my miserable evening the day before and my miserable morning missing the crowd and flinging myself into solitude, I feel I´ve earned pleasant company. She is a true free spirit, and I really enjoy walking with her.
We go 6km of rather more pleasant meseta, with random groves of trees and a path that cuts into a hillside...it´s a bit less monotonous. Her chatter keeps my mind off my feet. We make it to San Antón before we know it.
She has done the Camino before, but only to Astorga, and says that San Antón is beautiful. I am intrigued by the story of animal blessings each January, the mystical cure of St. Anthony´s disease (result of wheat parasites nonexistent in Spain, which led to the belief that pilgrims were ¨cured¨ of a disease they simply had no more exposure to at this point) and the fact that it´s a ruined monastery. And it is truly beautiful. Some walls are standing, the ceiling is open to the sky, there are tiny little figures in alcoves in the walls. The albergue is in the ruins...a tarp standing as the only wall between the sleeping area and the outside. The kitchen is still set for breakfast (at noon) and little dishes of yellow pellets here and there hold innumerable dead flies.
The hospitaleros are not welcoming at all. They stamp our passports begrudgingly. We go across the courtyard to sit on a bench away; my German bedfellow shows up a few minutes later. Kate expresses a bad feeling, and suddenly, my eyes fall on something strange.
Above the kitchen, on a high wall, there is a string hanging from the top down to the roof below, stopping a few inches above the roof. There is a pigeon hanging from the string. By its neck. It is dead. It swings back and forth in the breeze.
I call attention to it...everyone is shocked. Kate goes to ask why it´s there. They don´t know. It appeared, they say, some three days ago, both pigeon and string. They believe the pigeon got entangled by mistake. They seem unconcerned.
Kate, who had thought of staying there, and I suddenly agreed that this was an ominous sign and gave us the creeps. Combined with the standoffishness of the staff, we decided to leave right away. We headed out. Thankfully, Castrojeriz was almost immediately in view.
It is a long, long town, wrapping around the side of a hillside topped with the ruins of a small castle. It´s very charming looking. It takes us a long time to find the albergue, and when we check in, about 600 dreadlocked Germans (okay, 7) push their way in front of us, causing a great deal of ado about a small dog that is not allowed inside and has bandaged feet and keeps trying to creep into the foyer. There is no washing machine...damn, I´m out of socks. There is no internet, but we passed a place here and there along the way.
I go back to an albergue we passed up because of a high price...wandered looking for the hospitalero and ran into HANK!! He is there. We spoke briefly. He tells me the German boys are some 15k on from here. =( I was happy to see him, but got the feeling I needed to distance myself from familiarity...this is my next stage of the Camino. I use the computer for only a few minutes before it crashes.
I go find Kate. She is having a bottle of wine...an entire bottle of wine...in the bar across from our albergue. We have a wonderful conversation that lasts for hours...literature, America, England, movies, teaching, the stages of the Camino, signs, our reasons for being here...everything. She is delightful. She was a hospitalera in San Bol for the previous week, has chopped off all her hair to avoid male attention, and is heading to Thailand in December to see what will find her there. We talk a lot about travel vs. family. She is 35. The kid thing comes up and we understand each other.
As she talks, I glance out the window of the bar, and who is passing by....
SKIP!!!!!!
I cannot help myself, I explode out the doors and tackle him, and he tackles back, laughing his head off and giving me the ¨Of all the gin joints¨ line. I demand he join us for a beer...he checks into our albergue...I go back in to Kate and try to explain my dismay over seeing him.
I am THRILLED to see Skip...but I just got primed for this alone thing this morning. Now, here he is. No coordination, just appeared. Doesn´t that mean the Camino threw us back together, and I should follow that? I tell Kate I feel like I need to stay away from him tomorrow, to continue alone. She asks if I´m Catholic. That makes me laugh. I said no, just a Marine´s kid. She says, ¨Ah, that´s why you´re so obsessed with making life tough for yourself....¨
So...we finish drinking, and I head here for this café, where the internet is a bit cheaper than the first place, trying to concentrate while Hank talks at the next table with a woman with very painstaking English and who has NO awareness of her vocal volume. I keep waiting for this cat to get a beer. The smoke is making my eyes hurt. And I think I´m finally caught up.
I did tell Skip I felt torn by his appearance...that I was thrilled to have a friendly face after the last day or two, but that I felt like my crucible had just begun and I needed to let it sink in. He reminded me that we can walk for hours with no speaking at all, and that it´s no big deal. But it does change things. Today was hard, but it was priming. Trial by endless wheatfields.
I dunno. Someone here has perfume that is absolutely cloying and making my head hurt. Off to bed. We´ll see what happens tomorrow....
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
The Camino - The Pyrenees to Burgos
Beginning my Camino. This is in St. Jean, right outside the hostel.
I don´t know if you can tell, but this is STEEP AS HELL.
View from the top of the world.
This is Mimi and Jocelyn...Mimi is French and Jocelyn is from Quebec. They are 62 and 58 and are lovely. Mimi is the one with the grass hat she made herself. They saved me on the Pyrenees when I was trying to keep up with Hank and they said, ¨Slow down! He´s too fast for you.¨
Yeah. I´m a badass.
This is Hank (Karel, the Belgian) and Christa from Austria at the Fontaine de Rolánd on the Pyrenees.
Michael from Idaho, and Florian (Kasey Kahne) in Arres.
Felix and ¨our puppy¨ outside Arres.
This is at 9am on a Sunday morning in Pamplona. THESE people know how to party. This was taken about 20 minutes after the bull running.
Like any good American, I got a picture of this guy, who had just gotten somewhat mauled by the bulls.
Me and the sculptures in the Alto del Perdon above Pamplona.
The indomitable, the illustrious, the irrepressible Skip (Aussie, Aussie Ausbourne, Skip Norris, Brad Ball of Perth). =) And Michael from Idaho.
These seldom seem accurate, but they´re nice to see....
I´ve just used all my strength to push a needle through the leather of Skip´s heel, trying to pop a blister. The ones I popped were NOT the one that got infected, by the way....
My German boys and Skip. =)
Performing first aid on Skip´s broken pack strap.
Our puppy!! Isn´t she tiny??
Pilgrims spend a lot of time doing this. Skip and Felix.
¨So an Australian, and Austrian, and an American walk into a bar....¨ This is me, Christa, and Skip pointing out our homes on a map in a bar in Villamayor.
Kasey Kahne, Christa, Felix, me, Skip, and the Pamplonan king in Villamayor.
The monks heading out of Villamayor. The awesome shot I got of them in front of the building didn´t download, for some reason, so I´ll have to post it another time.
Al...the devil himself. =)
Skip, Kasey Kahne, and Felix (the German boys) as we sat and had a beer by the river in Nájera.
Me. =)
German boys doing what they do best. Kasey Kahne and Felix.
The Camino stretching into the distance behind me.
View from the bell tower at the church in Santo Domingo de la Calzada.
A mother-daughter team from Poland. How ´bout it, Mom?? =) This was the communal dinner in the church tower in Grañón.
Nico and Maelle, the French couple.
The Hungarian buccanneer.
Francois from Quebec and Federico from Florence. Federico is always happy, always laughing, always kissing your cheek...every bit the Italian.
This is pretty gross but I had to put Skip´s ankle in here....
Atop the Montes de Oca, heading up out of Villafranca.
Hiking...this was yesterday heading out of Atapuerca.
Yesterday in old-city Burgos.
These are the yellow arrows we follow. They show up on trees, rocks, buildings...they are our lifeline.
In the cities, the yellow arrows give way to these, which line the walkways along the Camino.
This was a welcome sight yesterday in Atapuerca, though I´m still 5k from its accurate point.Well, that´s all for now, I suppose. This is the Camino up to this point. I´ve been in this café for 3 hours now...time to see this cathedral and get the hell outta Dodge. Stay tuned for yesterday´s report below.
Love you all and hope you enjoyed the pictures. =)
Agés to Burgos
WHAT a day yesterday was. Agés was a lovely albergue...one of the best I´ve been in so far. We stayed at El Pajar, and everyone was there except Hank and Skip. The German boys, Mimi and Jocelyn, Al, and the Spice Girls (I hope they don´t get offended if they read this...you come up with names for people and groups in your head...besides, one of them calls me Miss America). We got there pretty late in the afternoon..about 7pm. So we didn´t get a real early start, but not too late either.
I decided to sit and have a cup of tea and hope that Christa hadn´t passed by yet. She hadn´t. They boys took off before she and I did, and the Spice Girls stayed behind, so Christa and I headed out alone. It was good to walk with her again. We get along so well...and her English is very pronounced and precise, with a British accent, which makes so much of what she says SO funny in a way I just can´t describe.
The initial walk from Agés to Atapuerca was beautiful. Atapuerca is noteworthy because back in 1994, they found the remains of the oldest verified European human. There are statues and pictures of a Neanderthal looking guy all over the little town. Unfortunately, the albergue was closed and we didn´t get a stamp, nor was the museum-welcoming-center place open, and we had to get to Burgos and couldn´t wait. There are tours that take you to the site, apparently, but this is just another example of how the Camino is a purpose for me (at least this time) and the sights take a backseat to the goal. Perhaps my priorities are out of order, but the fact remains that I have 17 days now to reach Santiago and I just can´t afford to wait. (At the moment, I am sacrificing a morning to upload photos to a Snapfish album! I was hoping to go back through my posts and add photos, but it takes SOOOO long, so Snapfish is processing as I write. There are five or six in the posts entitled Made It! and The Pyrenees, but that´s all. This café is expensive, so my grand plan will just have to wait.)
So on through Atapuerca and up a steep, rocky incline past a sheep enclosure with about 100 sheep and the requisite few black ones, ha ha.
At the top of the mountain was a cross, framed beautifully with a half moon in the background. I got a great shot and am hoping Mom´s Photoshop magic can edit out the bikers in bright yellow jerseys who just REFUSED TO MOVE. On from the cross was a great circle of little rocks...several concentric ones, actually. I suddenly realized it was probably a labryinth, like my Chartes labyrinth medallion!! Christa and I tried to walk it, but it was hard to see the paths and it might have just been circles. Anyway...the boys caught us there...had apparently stopped for coffee in a café in Atapuerca that had somehow eluded our notice.
That was pretty much the end of the beautiful views between Agés and Burgos. The way down was long and rocky, but not difficult, and we could see for miles and miles, including a city that seemed too close to be Burgos, but was (Burgos) and was not (close). We stopped a few times for brunch and ice cream (which I always spill on myself, can´t take me anywhere...).
We split up when the book stated there were two roads into Burgos...a nasty one and a relatively pretty one. The boys wanted to bus in and see the city. I am still firmly anti-transport...13 days of moving your body entirely under its own power, nearly 300k, no less...I want a shirt with a boot on the front and a wheel with a circle-slash on the back. Ha ha. So Christa and I took what was supposed to be the pretty route that promised a riverside walk.
NOT SO.
We ended up in a goddamn industrial zone. MISERABLE. Dust. Rocks. Beating sun. Dodging dump trucks every two minutes, either lumbering up behind us or looming before us. Sporadic yellow arrows were maddening, as they would disappear when we needed them to be there, and the book was no help, and all we had were a few random points and hollers from the dump truck drivers. I am floored and incensed that the Camino takes us through there...it´s not safe and I felt the whole time like we were trespassing in a place where we´d end up with a free ride to the local police station...or government detention. The zone bordered a fenced airport-like area, and the whole thing had me feeling like Mulder and Scully sniffing along the borders of Area 51...with dump trucks.
GRRRR!!! We were furious. But at least we were together. We said several times later in the day how happy we were to have had each other through that leg, because each of us would´ve been sure we were lost and probably would´ve ended up in frustrated hysterics.
But we made it. It dumped us out on the highway. We sat and changed shoes and tried to restore our spirits and figure out how to proceed. Another crossroads. The mythical river supposedly lay ahead of us, on an alternative route called the Camino de Santa Marina, and though a woman on the street assured me it existed, we were in no mood to chase shadows any longer, as it was 1pm at this point and we were on the outskirts of what looked to be a very large city.
So we headed up the highway and into the burbs.
The burbs lasted FOREVER. No cafés. I could tell what kind of territory we were in by the prevalence of auto body shops and cigarette stores. We stopped into a place called Dulces Milagros, and as promised by the store name, we did have a sweet miracle in a sugar-coated, cream-filled eclair, which we split...and a Diet Coke, which we also split, to make up for it. (Like any of us are worried about weight on this trip.) Headed on.
Walking. Lots of walking. Lots of sun. Ahead, SPIRES!! The Cathedral!! It was far, but it was in sight. But the trek towards it reminded me of my pursuit of the Arc de Triomphe up the Champs Elyseés a few years ago in Paris, where I toiled uphill like a linebacker through an endless stream of opposing pedestrians while the Arc retreated before me. We lost the spires in the maze of hideous new apartment buildings in truly obnoxious shades of red and yellow. They looked like Legos.
But another oasis appeared. A MALL!! =) With a post office!! We headed in and got lost in cheap discount dress stores. We each found one for about 15€ and realized in the dressing rooms (I am sure to the saleslady´s dismay) just how sweaty and disgusting we both were. It was ludicrous to try on cute little sundresses in our boots and sports bras, too lazy to bother to take our trousers off, shuffling back and forth to display this one and that one to each other with our pants around our boots.
Post office, stamps for post cards, mailed a few I´d written days ago in Santo Domingo, and to our delight realized that the hour spent in the mall had taken all thoughts of foot pain out of our heads. Tired of walking? Shop. Of course.
Onward. Directions from a very kind security guard. I´m starting to understand directions better. The new city gradually loosened its grip on us as more and more old stonework came into view, and we finally entered the walls of the old city.
Burgos is a beautiful old city. Narrow little cobblestone streets and shopfronts, stonework, gargoyles...bronze statues here and there...one of a pilgrim looking very destitute (I got a shot of myself consoling him). And just as we were starting to grouse about the lack of cathedral spires and welcoming committees of our friends, THERE IT WAS.
If you´ve seen a proper, 1000 year old, European cathedral, you already know that they defy description. I´m glad I got a few postcards of it, because there´s no way it´s going to fit in a camera shot. It´s gorgeous. And enormous. We came upon it along a high walkway, with about six million steps leading down into a grand square. Christa had gotten a text from Yasmeen that they were down there, and I told her to make damn sure ¨down there¨ was where we thought it was, because there was no way in hell I was coming back up these steps. We thought about going to the albergue first to drop our things, but eventually went down the steps after finding out it was another 2k away. No.
We headed across the square and saw a dude in a green bandana taking pictures of...the Spice Girls. I hollered ¨AUSSIEEEEEEE!!¨ Skip is back and better than ever. He still has a little pork sausage for a foot, and had to go back to the doctor last night, where they bypassed the oral antibiotics for intravenous ones (they don´t mess around here) and sent him on his way. The German boys were there too, as were Mimi and Jocelyn. (Jocelyn told me the other night in Grañón... ¨That first day on the mountains, you should have seen your face, it was so white...and I thought to myself, she will not do the Camino.¨ HAH! Defied the odds. Is anyone surprised? lol!) They had seen Hank and Al and a few others, and there were plans to meet back for dinner at 8pm.
Hitch. The albergues were full. Everyone was getting hostel rooms. Double rooms were 50€. To make matters worse, Yasmeen offered Christa the other bed in her room. Which left me odd man out. DAMN. Lots of indecision, lots of poll-taking about the prices of this place or that place, and in the end, I had to suck it up and get my own double for 45€. Ouch. But there was no way around it. I was a little pissed off because I am hanging onto my budget by my fingernails, but on the upside, it was the first privacy I´d had in two weeks, and it was nice to unpack my entire rucksack and re-organize...take a LONG, HOT, HARD shower...take leisurely stock of foot and skin issues...and just be alone for a little while. (Two pillows last night was divine too.) So be it.
So we came back for dinner, all ¨dressed up,¨ and the entire crowd was there...everyone I´d met since the Pyrenees. A lot of people were talking about staying in Burgos for the next day and taking a break. I won´t...so this might be it for us all, or it might not. We drank some and wandered around a LOT looking for a suitable place for 15 people to eat, and eventually the group broke down into smaller pieces and we ate at a place called Estrella de Galicia, which had a very good combination ¨de la tierra¨ plate...which most of us ordered (or ¨del mar¨) because we couldn´t figure out what any of the individual dishes were. Good company, good food.
The German boys had found a pub right outside our hostel (they ended up in the same one we girls were in) called Munich and had already put down four or five beers before dinner, so pack mentality took over and we all ended up back there for beers. Georgie sprung for Jägermeister shots for her, Skip, the boys, and me before I knew what was going on...which, as it turns out this morning, was probably a pretty bad idea. But we were a little drunk on freedom, too...it was 11pm and we were finally getting to see some Spanish nightlife! The albergues hustle us all in behind closed doors before dark, so it was our first night that we could stay out late.
We had a blast, and the lights came on (at 12:30am!!) for last call, and I was ready for it. Way past my bedtime.
Which brings us to this morning..when the melodious sounds of the jackhammer outside my window at 7am made me grateful I was on a budget that had me drinking far less than my friends...but still not quite in tiptop shape. This morning´s frustration was that both this internet café and the cathedral didn´t open till 10am...so I showered and repacked and killed time and had a cup of tea and scrawled out a calendar in my journal and tried to figure out how to hit Santiago by August 9th... found out the café would be another half hour late in opening...ran into Gunna, a Dutch expat who´s been living in Melbourne, Aus for 35 years, who I had met last night (he and Hank make two elementary school principals in our little gang, and his news that his Camino was for free under a professional enrichment plan at his school system in Melbourne has me making a mental note to GO TEACH IN MELBOURNE). We sat and killed time till the café opened, and then found to my dismay that my camera cable won´t upload my pictures.
But the guy running this joint speaks pretty good English and has a card reader. So I now have a Snapfish album. I´m not sure I¨ll be able to afford the time it takes this morning to link to it here, and it´s taking a small forever to upload photos 20 at a time, and it´s 3€ an hour here, pretty pricey. I was hoping to go back through my blog and put a couple pictures on each post, but that took a long time too. I´ll try to get some people up there, though, so you can see what everyone looks like.
I have no idea where anyone else is. That´s good. I didn´t have anyone´s room numbers last night, and though I saw Yens the German and the Spice Girls walk by earlier, I haven´t seen anyone else. I might run into a few in the cathedral, which is my only stop before I head out of town this afternoon. I´ve blown the morning here...it´s now noon...and I won´t get far today, but at least I´ll make a little bit of progress. I don´t want to take a day off. And I´m pretty sure I´ll lose everyone today (though I´ve said that before, I guess). Time for me to hit the solo stage of my Camino.
All for now, I suppose. Love you all and hopefully more later tonight...though it´ll be a short day, so maybe not till tomorrow. On with the meseta..grrrrr.
I decided to sit and have a cup of tea and hope that Christa hadn´t passed by yet. She hadn´t. They boys took off before she and I did, and the Spice Girls stayed behind, so Christa and I headed out alone. It was good to walk with her again. We get along so well...and her English is very pronounced and precise, with a British accent, which makes so much of what she says SO funny in a way I just can´t describe.
The initial walk from Agés to Atapuerca was beautiful. Atapuerca is noteworthy because back in 1994, they found the remains of the oldest verified European human. There are statues and pictures of a Neanderthal looking guy all over the little town. Unfortunately, the albergue was closed and we didn´t get a stamp, nor was the museum-welcoming-center place open, and we had to get to Burgos and couldn´t wait. There are tours that take you to the site, apparently, but this is just another example of how the Camino is a purpose for me (at least this time) and the sights take a backseat to the goal. Perhaps my priorities are out of order, but the fact remains that I have 17 days now to reach Santiago and I just can´t afford to wait. (At the moment, I am sacrificing a morning to upload photos to a Snapfish album! I was hoping to go back through my posts and add photos, but it takes SOOOO long, so Snapfish is processing as I write. There are five or six in the posts entitled Made It! and The Pyrenees, but that´s all. This café is expensive, so my grand plan will just have to wait.)
So on through Atapuerca and up a steep, rocky incline past a sheep enclosure with about 100 sheep and the requisite few black ones, ha ha.
At the top of the mountain was a cross, framed beautifully with a half moon in the background. I got a great shot and am hoping Mom´s Photoshop magic can edit out the bikers in bright yellow jerseys who just REFUSED TO MOVE. On from the cross was a great circle of little rocks...several concentric ones, actually. I suddenly realized it was probably a labryinth, like my Chartes labyrinth medallion!! Christa and I tried to walk it, but it was hard to see the paths and it might have just been circles. Anyway...the boys caught us there...had apparently stopped for coffee in a café in Atapuerca that had somehow eluded our notice.
That was pretty much the end of the beautiful views between Agés and Burgos. The way down was long and rocky, but not difficult, and we could see for miles and miles, including a city that seemed too close to be Burgos, but was (Burgos) and was not (close). We stopped a few times for brunch and ice cream (which I always spill on myself, can´t take me anywhere...).
We split up when the book stated there were two roads into Burgos...a nasty one and a relatively pretty one. The boys wanted to bus in and see the city. I am still firmly anti-transport...13 days of moving your body entirely under its own power, nearly 300k, no less...I want a shirt with a boot on the front and a wheel with a circle-slash on the back. Ha ha. So Christa and I took what was supposed to be the pretty route that promised a riverside walk.
NOT SO.
We ended up in a goddamn industrial zone. MISERABLE. Dust. Rocks. Beating sun. Dodging dump trucks every two minutes, either lumbering up behind us or looming before us. Sporadic yellow arrows were maddening, as they would disappear when we needed them to be there, and the book was no help, and all we had were a few random points and hollers from the dump truck drivers. I am floored and incensed that the Camino takes us through there...it´s not safe and I felt the whole time like we were trespassing in a place where we´d end up with a free ride to the local police station...or government detention. The zone bordered a fenced airport-like area, and the whole thing had me feeling like Mulder and Scully sniffing along the borders of Area 51...with dump trucks.
GRRRR!!! We were furious. But at least we were together. We said several times later in the day how happy we were to have had each other through that leg, because each of us would´ve been sure we were lost and probably would´ve ended up in frustrated hysterics.
But we made it. It dumped us out on the highway. We sat and changed shoes and tried to restore our spirits and figure out how to proceed. Another crossroads. The mythical river supposedly lay ahead of us, on an alternative route called the Camino de Santa Marina, and though a woman on the street assured me it existed, we were in no mood to chase shadows any longer, as it was 1pm at this point and we were on the outskirts of what looked to be a very large city.
So we headed up the highway and into the burbs.
The burbs lasted FOREVER. No cafés. I could tell what kind of territory we were in by the prevalence of auto body shops and cigarette stores. We stopped into a place called Dulces Milagros, and as promised by the store name, we did have a sweet miracle in a sugar-coated, cream-filled eclair, which we split...and a Diet Coke, which we also split, to make up for it. (Like any of us are worried about weight on this trip.) Headed on.
Walking. Lots of walking. Lots of sun. Ahead, SPIRES!! The Cathedral!! It was far, but it was in sight. But the trek towards it reminded me of my pursuit of the Arc de Triomphe up the Champs Elyseés a few years ago in Paris, where I toiled uphill like a linebacker through an endless stream of opposing pedestrians while the Arc retreated before me. We lost the spires in the maze of hideous new apartment buildings in truly obnoxious shades of red and yellow. They looked like Legos.
But another oasis appeared. A MALL!! =) With a post office!! We headed in and got lost in cheap discount dress stores. We each found one for about 15€ and realized in the dressing rooms (I am sure to the saleslady´s dismay) just how sweaty and disgusting we both were. It was ludicrous to try on cute little sundresses in our boots and sports bras, too lazy to bother to take our trousers off, shuffling back and forth to display this one and that one to each other with our pants around our boots.
Post office, stamps for post cards, mailed a few I´d written days ago in Santo Domingo, and to our delight realized that the hour spent in the mall had taken all thoughts of foot pain out of our heads. Tired of walking? Shop. Of course.
Onward. Directions from a very kind security guard. I´m starting to understand directions better. The new city gradually loosened its grip on us as more and more old stonework came into view, and we finally entered the walls of the old city.
Burgos is a beautiful old city. Narrow little cobblestone streets and shopfronts, stonework, gargoyles...bronze statues here and there...one of a pilgrim looking very destitute (I got a shot of myself consoling him). And just as we were starting to grouse about the lack of cathedral spires and welcoming committees of our friends, THERE IT WAS.
If you´ve seen a proper, 1000 year old, European cathedral, you already know that they defy description. I´m glad I got a few postcards of it, because there´s no way it´s going to fit in a camera shot. It´s gorgeous. And enormous. We came upon it along a high walkway, with about six million steps leading down into a grand square. Christa had gotten a text from Yasmeen that they were down there, and I told her to make damn sure ¨down there¨ was where we thought it was, because there was no way in hell I was coming back up these steps. We thought about going to the albergue first to drop our things, but eventually went down the steps after finding out it was another 2k away. No.
We headed across the square and saw a dude in a green bandana taking pictures of...the Spice Girls. I hollered ¨AUSSIEEEEEEE!!¨ Skip is back and better than ever. He still has a little pork sausage for a foot, and had to go back to the doctor last night, where they bypassed the oral antibiotics for intravenous ones (they don´t mess around here) and sent him on his way. The German boys were there too, as were Mimi and Jocelyn. (Jocelyn told me the other night in Grañón... ¨That first day on the mountains, you should have seen your face, it was so white...and I thought to myself, she will not do the Camino.¨ HAH! Defied the odds. Is anyone surprised? lol!) They had seen Hank and Al and a few others, and there were plans to meet back for dinner at 8pm.
Hitch. The albergues were full. Everyone was getting hostel rooms. Double rooms were 50€. To make matters worse, Yasmeen offered Christa the other bed in her room. Which left me odd man out. DAMN. Lots of indecision, lots of poll-taking about the prices of this place or that place, and in the end, I had to suck it up and get my own double for 45€. Ouch. But there was no way around it. I was a little pissed off because I am hanging onto my budget by my fingernails, but on the upside, it was the first privacy I´d had in two weeks, and it was nice to unpack my entire rucksack and re-organize...take a LONG, HOT, HARD shower...take leisurely stock of foot and skin issues...and just be alone for a little while. (Two pillows last night was divine too.) So be it.
So we came back for dinner, all ¨dressed up,¨ and the entire crowd was there...everyone I´d met since the Pyrenees. A lot of people were talking about staying in Burgos for the next day and taking a break. I won´t...so this might be it for us all, or it might not. We drank some and wandered around a LOT looking for a suitable place for 15 people to eat, and eventually the group broke down into smaller pieces and we ate at a place called Estrella de Galicia, which had a very good combination ¨de la tierra¨ plate...which most of us ordered (or ¨del mar¨) because we couldn´t figure out what any of the individual dishes were. Good company, good food.
The German boys had found a pub right outside our hostel (they ended up in the same one we girls were in) called Munich and had already put down four or five beers before dinner, so pack mentality took over and we all ended up back there for beers. Georgie sprung for Jägermeister shots for her, Skip, the boys, and me before I knew what was going on...which, as it turns out this morning, was probably a pretty bad idea. But we were a little drunk on freedom, too...it was 11pm and we were finally getting to see some Spanish nightlife! The albergues hustle us all in behind closed doors before dark, so it was our first night that we could stay out late.
We had a blast, and the lights came on (at 12:30am!!) for last call, and I was ready for it. Way past my bedtime.
Which brings us to this morning..when the melodious sounds of the jackhammer outside my window at 7am made me grateful I was on a budget that had me drinking far less than my friends...but still not quite in tiptop shape. This morning´s frustration was that both this internet café and the cathedral didn´t open till 10am...so I showered and repacked and killed time and had a cup of tea and scrawled out a calendar in my journal and tried to figure out how to hit Santiago by August 9th... found out the café would be another half hour late in opening...ran into Gunna, a Dutch expat who´s been living in Melbourne, Aus for 35 years, who I had met last night (he and Hank make two elementary school principals in our little gang, and his news that his Camino was for free under a professional enrichment plan at his school system in Melbourne has me making a mental note to GO TEACH IN MELBOURNE). We sat and killed time till the café opened, and then found to my dismay that my camera cable won´t upload my pictures.
But the guy running this joint speaks pretty good English and has a card reader. So I now have a Snapfish album. I´m not sure I¨ll be able to afford the time it takes this morning to link to it here, and it´s taking a small forever to upload photos 20 at a time, and it´s 3€ an hour here, pretty pricey. I was hoping to go back through my blog and put a couple pictures on each post, but that took a long time too. I´ll try to get some people up there, though, so you can see what everyone looks like.
I have no idea where anyone else is. That´s good. I didn´t have anyone´s room numbers last night, and though I saw Yens the German and the Spice Girls walk by earlier, I haven´t seen anyone else. I might run into a few in the cathedral, which is my only stop before I head out of town this afternoon. I´ve blown the morning here...it´s now noon...and I won´t get far today, but at least I´ll make a little bit of progress. I don´t want to take a day off. And I´m pretty sure I´ll lose everyone today (though I´ve said that before, I guess). Time for me to hit the solo stage of my Camino.
All for now, I suppose. Love you all and hopefully more later tonight...though it´ll be a short day, so maybe not till tomorrow. On with the meseta..grrrrr.
Monday, July 21, 2008
Belorado to Agés
Well, when I left off, I was about to go wake up Skip to head to the other albergue in Belorado. TRAGEDY. I came into the room and he just pulled a corner of the tape away from his ankle. His whole foot was swelled up like a hamhock, he had a red rash just above the ankle, and the blisters we popped in Estella...well, one looked like a giant purple leech crawling across the back of his foot. BAD news.
We hobbled to the other albergue, and by then, he was getting hot and cold chills. We bundled him up into bed and the Germans (who seem to be a walking pharmacy) gave him something that Felix´s mother (on the phone) swore would break his fever. He was out for about two hours.
Federico from Florence was there, along with Francois from Quebec. Ladies, all of you who said I´d meet some incredibly suave Italian dude on the Camino...meet Federico. I have pictures, never fear. (I´ve decided to make a Men of the Camino calendar when I get back. Skip wants September, Hungary wants June, and Kasey Kahne has GOT to be February.) And we found Al, too. Dinner was full by the time Skip and I arrived, so I had to fend for myself while he passed out. Met two girls...Georgie is from Leeds, England and Daniella is from South Africa/Zimbabwe/Germany/London. They were a lot of fun. It makes me dizzy to hear Daniella switch back and forth from fluent British English to fluent German.
Dinner was uneventful (except that the old guy behind the bar went on and on about America and tried to kiss me when we left), and when we got back, Skip was revived and one of the hospitaleros was giving the girls and me a bottle of red wine on the house. When in Rome.... We talked a lot of politics...everyone wants to know who I think will win the election, and all I really have to say about it is I´m glad I´m not at home right now because I HATE election years!! They go on and on and on....
Anyway...turns out that there is a translator in the albergue, and the doctor could see Skip NOW...like 8pm on a SUNDAY. (Providence, making us change albergues, ha ha.) They even got an ambulance to transport him. So off he went and came back about an hour or so later. They cut open his blisters and drained them, and declared the rash and the swelling due to a spider bite. Blood blisters AND a spider bite. Only an Aussie...only a relative of Chuck Norris would get infected blood blisters AND an infected spider bite ON THE SAME FOOT. The man comes from the land of poisonous killer bizarre animals and has to come to Spain to get waylaid by a spider. Anyway, Skip´s out for two days. Back in Belorado. Hopefully he will catch a bus tomorrow night to meet us in Burgos. He got the boys´ cellphone numbers...which I gotta say, is kinda cheating. I tracked the boys down the old fashioned way last night, and it seems like it interferes with the power of the Camino somehow to orchestrate a reunion when it should happen or not happen according to the laws of the universe. But I´m not really complaining because it´s nice to know we´re quite likely to see him again.
I didn´t mention...it´s been overcast since we left Grañón and it got COLD overnight. We almost died of the heat approaching Grañón, and the next day we´ve got sweaters on. I FROZE MY BUTT OFF LAST NIGHT. I have a silk sleeping sack, and it´s always been okay for me, but last night I was dying. And today was cold, too, even though the clouds dissipated and the sun was out. So, be forewarned...it CAN be cold in Spain in mid-July, even on a sunny day. Who´da thunk?
It sucked to leave Skip behind this morning, but we pushed out around 8. Couple of small towns on our way...very pretty walk today as the sun came out behind us and shone on the wheat-covered hills ahead of us, with a purple sky behind them. The towns we passed were all shuttered and closed...we only see old, old people in the small towns, never young or middle-aged people, and almost NEVER children. What do they DO? What do these people subsist on? A couple of towns later, we stopped outside a cafe because I declared that their sign said they opened at 10. So we waited 25 minutes. Around minute 24, I realized I´d read the wrong sign and it was an advertisement for a tour of Atapuerca, our first town tomorrow and the site of the 1994 finding of the oldest European human. I did NOT tell the boys we´d waited 25 min for nothing. Ha ha.
The next town was open and had a very nice lady who made us bocadillos (sandwiches) even though it was too early for them. This jamón and queso thing is growing on me. It´s ham, but it´s like bacon, and it´s tough and gamey and salty and WONDERFUL. I got a second one for the road.
While we ate, the girls caught up with us. Hmm....
I walked behind the group at my own pace the rest of the day, which was nice. They were very loud, and I wanted peace and quiet. I have to get through a book or two before the school year starts, so today was a couple hours of Life of Pi, which is a very good book, by the way, and read well by a guy who has just enough of an Indian accent to be very amusing.
The scenery was gorgeous today. Yesterday, I realized, was blasé not just because it was blasé, but because it was cloudy, too. Today we had a very steep ascent into the Oca Mountains and walked for a long time on high ground through forests that our guidebook said used to be inhabited by bandits who would attack pilgrims. Today´s big bummer was going through Villafranca Monte de Oca, where the church was supposed to have a very ¨striking¨ statue of St. James and a huge scallop shell donated by the Philippines. The church was closed for apparently NO reason at all, and nearly besieged by indignant pilgrims of all nationalities (one family of whom offered me a sandwich about two seconds after I appeared...what nice people...Polish, perhaps?).
So up we climbed. The walk was uneventful, I was absorbed in my book, and the others walked ahead of me. We stopped by the road a few times for sandwiches and other things we´d brought in our packs. Very pleasant.
We reached San Juan de Ortega, which is on EVERY Camino map, and so seems to be a large town. No. Population 26. That´s TWENTY-SIX. The church was beautiful (they all are, of course). The guidebook says ¨a pilgrimage to this church was the last hope of childless women.¨ Hmm, indeed. It was beautiful inside, and I´ve made a mental note to return on either the autumnal or the vernal equinox, as on those days, the sun strikes a capital in one of the naves, illuminating a sculpture of the Annunciation. (I hope I got that right.) Intriguing.
The Americans were there. They´re hopping a bus tomorrow in Burgos and going nearly to the end of the route. Jason, the leader, says that the fireworks/pyrotechnics display at the facade of the cathedral in Santiago on Feast Day (July 25) beats every fireworks display he´s ever seen, or ever will see, COMBINED. Wow. Gonna have to come back one day. (Holy years are when 7/25 falls on a Sunday...the next one is 2010 and the Camino is packed on those years.) So we´ll lose them after today. They go to mass EVERY DAY. Wow.
So there we are, lounging under a tree outside the church, eating and contemplating another 5k to Agés so that tomorrow won´t have to be a full 30k...when around the corner of the church comes....
CHRISTA FROM AUSTRIA!!!
I hollered ¨AUSTRIA!!!¨ and she hollered ¨VIRGINIA...IS THAT REALLY YOU?¨ and it was awesome. She did 37K today!!! Wow. She couldn´t do another step. I should have stayed behind with her, but the siren call of internet and washing machine was too much. We sat and caught up (it´s been about a week) and got stories of Estelle and told stories of Skip and Hank and the boys, and then headed out. It was a beautiful walk through forests and fields to Agés, and we were surrounded by panoramic mountain views.
Christa´s walk today, though, got me thinking. She did 37k today. I need to be stepping it up, maybe not 37k worth, but definitely need to start averaging closer to 30 instead of close to 23. I´ve got to get down this road. Burgos feels like 1/3 of the way, and if I don´t have to take the train, I don´t want to. (There´s talk of doing the meseta by night, since it´ll beat the heat and it´s some of the easiest days as far as wayfinding. We´ll see.) I need to spend some time route planning tonight. And I might need to break away from my little crowd. They´re comforting and I love them, but I have a purpose here and they might be a bit in the way. Perhaps it´s time to move on. Skip would definitely agree with that...he´s quite a guru. Christa too. Neither of them loses focus of the purpose of their trip. Christa has more time and can take her time...but Skip has a deadline. (Did I tell you? He´s walking to mark the 10th anniversary of his brother´s death, and Aussie cop who died in the line of duty. I believe it´s Aug 8...?)
It´s always good to see Al and Mimi and Jocelyn and other familiar faces in the evenings...they´re outside now, though we seem to have lost Hank...but it might be time to head out alone. I thought my walk would be much more introspective than it´s been so far, and perhaps there are revelations waiting for me in solitude. I will meet other people, of course, but I need to stop basing the night´s stop on where my friends will be. I came here for a reason, and I´m losing sight of it, and that´s not good.
Tomorrow morning I´ll wait for Christa...5km behind, she´ll be here in 45 minutes from whenever she leaves, and I´m sure I won´t be ready before then. We´ll probably still stop in Burgós tomorrow night, since it´s a big city, but after that, I´ll see if she wants to knock out some big days with me and get on down this road. If not, perhaps I´ll go alone. Either way, there´s some decision making to do tonight. It´s MY Camino. Skip has his, the boys have theirs, Christa has hers, and I think you do yourself a disservice if you allow your Camino to become someone else´s.
So that´s the deal. We´ll see how the next couple days play out.
Anyway. Notes for the prospective pilgrim. Toilets here don´t always have seats. Apparently, sitting on the porcelain is not a big deal. It skeeves me out.
They also sometimes flush with the approximate force of Class 5 hurricanes. Apparently, that is not a big deal either.
The first cold shower I´ve had to take was this morning in Belorado, after a REALLY cold night. I was not pleased. This is not an indictment on the albergue, which was lovely and had a beautiful garden.
AND A POOL. On a day that felt like about 50 degrees (F). Figures. I´ve been dreaming of swimming pools for DAYS and we finally find one on the day I´m freezing my butt off.
The bocadillos get smaller the farther you go. In Navarra, 3€ gets you a sandwich as long as your arm. You quarter it with your pocketknife, ask for papel, and it lasts all day. By the time you hit Castilla y León (our current province), they are smaller. Still good, though. I´m already trying to figure out how to get this kind of ham in the States.
Condiments are overrated. You order a jamón sandwich, and it is jamón, heavy on the fat, on a baguette. THAT´S IT. And it grows on you. Get some cheese on it. And if anyone knows the word for butter, please pass it along. I need that. Please also send ¨May I have this sandwich wrapped up to go?¨
8 minutes left...what else to say. Not much. My sweater is in the wash and it´s COLD. Not good.
There are girls who come walk the Camino in cute clothes and makeup and look none the worse for wear. This makes me want to call them bad names I should not say in a blog my grandmother reads. I have to keep telling myself I didn´t come here to look cute. But it burns my butt a little bit anyway.
Everyone else´s gear always looks better and more efficient than yours, and often you are surprised when you find out how much someone else´s backpack, in fact, sucks. HAH.
All for now. I´m out of things to say. Tomorrow, Burgós. Anyone got a remedy for SERIOUSLY stinky backpack straps? This will NOT get better in the next three weeks....
Please keep commenting. Love you all.
We hobbled to the other albergue, and by then, he was getting hot and cold chills. We bundled him up into bed and the Germans (who seem to be a walking pharmacy) gave him something that Felix´s mother (on the phone) swore would break his fever. He was out for about two hours.
Federico from Florence was there, along with Francois from Quebec. Ladies, all of you who said I´d meet some incredibly suave Italian dude on the Camino...meet Federico. I have pictures, never fear. (I´ve decided to make a Men of the Camino calendar when I get back. Skip wants September, Hungary wants June, and Kasey Kahne has GOT to be February.) And we found Al, too. Dinner was full by the time Skip and I arrived, so I had to fend for myself while he passed out. Met two girls...Georgie is from Leeds, England and Daniella is from South Africa/Zimbabwe/Germany/London. They were a lot of fun. It makes me dizzy to hear Daniella switch back and forth from fluent British English to fluent German.
Dinner was uneventful (except that the old guy behind the bar went on and on about America and tried to kiss me when we left), and when we got back, Skip was revived and one of the hospitaleros was giving the girls and me a bottle of red wine on the house. When in Rome.... We talked a lot of politics...everyone wants to know who I think will win the election, and all I really have to say about it is I´m glad I´m not at home right now because I HATE election years!! They go on and on and on....
Anyway...turns out that there is a translator in the albergue, and the doctor could see Skip NOW...like 8pm on a SUNDAY. (Providence, making us change albergues, ha ha.) They even got an ambulance to transport him. So off he went and came back about an hour or so later. They cut open his blisters and drained them, and declared the rash and the swelling due to a spider bite. Blood blisters AND a spider bite. Only an Aussie...only a relative of Chuck Norris would get infected blood blisters AND an infected spider bite ON THE SAME FOOT. The man comes from the land of poisonous killer bizarre animals and has to come to Spain to get waylaid by a spider. Anyway, Skip´s out for two days. Back in Belorado. Hopefully he will catch a bus tomorrow night to meet us in Burgos. He got the boys´ cellphone numbers...which I gotta say, is kinda cheating. I tracked the boys down the old fashioned way last night, and it seems like it interferes with the power of the Camino somehow to orchestrate a reunion when it should happen or not happen according to the laws of the universe. But I´m not really complaining because it´s nice to know we´re quite likely to see him again.
I didn´t mention...it´s been overcast since we left Grañón and it got COLD overnight. We almost died of the heat approaching Grañón, and the next day we´ve got sweaters on. I FROZE MY BUTT OFF LAST NIGHT. I have a silk sleeping sack, and it´s always been okay for me, but last night I was dying. And today was cold, too, even though the clouds dissipated and the sun was out. So, be forewarned...it CAN be cold in Spain in mid-July, even on a sunny day. Who´da thunk?
It sucked to leave Skip behind this morning, but we pushed out around 8. Couple of small towns on our way...very pretty walk today as the sun came out behind us and shone on the wheat-covered hills ahead of us, with a purple sky behind them. The towns we passed were all shuttered and closed...we only see old, old people in the small towns, never young or middle-aged people, and almost NEVER children. What do they DO? What do these people subsist on? A couple of towns later, we stopped outside a cafe because I declared that their sign said they opened at 10. So we waited 25 minutes. Around minute 24, I realized I´d read the wrong sign and it was an advertisement for a tour of Atapuerca, our first town tomorrow and the site of the 1994 finding of the oldest European human. I did NOT tell the boys we´d waited 25 min for nothing. Ha ha.
The next town was open and had a very nice lady who made us bocadillos (sandwiches) even though it was too early for them. This jamón and queso thing is growing on me. It´s ham, but it´s like bacon, and it´s tough and gamey and salty and WONDERFUL. I got a second one for the road.
While we ate, the girls caught up with us. Hmm....
I walked behind the group at my own pace the rest of the day, which was nice. They were very loud, and I wanted peace and quiet. I have to get through a book or two before the school year starts, so today was a couple hours of Life of Pi, which is a very good book, by the way, and read well by a guy who has just enough of an Indian accent to be very amusing.
The scenery was gorgeous today. Yesterday, I realized, was blasé not just because it was blasé, but because it was cloudy, too. Today we had a very steep ascent into the Oca Mountains and walked for a long time on high ground through forests that our guidebook said used to be inhabited by bandits who would attack pilgrims. Today´s big bummer was going through Villafranca Monte de Oca, where the church was supposed to have a very ¨striking¨ statue of St. James and a huge scallop shell donated by the Philippines. The church was closed for apparently NO reason at all, and nearly besieged by indignant pilgrims of all nationalities (one family of whom offered me a sandwich about two seconds after I appeared...what nice people...Polish, perhaps?).
So up we climbed. The walk was uneventful, I was absorbed in my book, and the others walked ahead of me. We stopped by the road a few times for sandwiches and other things we´d brought in our packs. Very pleasant.
We reached San Juan de Ortega, which is on EVERY Camino map, and so seems to be a large town. No. Population 26. That´s TWENTY-SIX. The church was beautiful (they all are, of course). The guidebook says ¨a pilgrimage to this church was the last hope of childless women.¨ Hmm, indeed. It was beautiful inside, and I´ve made a mental note to return on either the autumnal or the vernal equinox, as on those days, the sun strikes a capital in one of the naves, illuminating a sculpture of the Annunciation. (I hope I got that right.) Intriguing.
The Americans were there. They´re hopping a bus tomorrow in Burgos and going nearly to the end of the route. Jason, the leader, says that the fireworks/pyrotechnics display at the facade of the cathedral in Santiago on Feast Day (July 25) beats every fireworks display he´s ever seen, or ever will see, COMBINED. Wow. Gonna have to come back one day. (Holy years are when 7/25 falls on a Sunday...the next one is 2010 and the Camino is packed on those years.) So we´ll lose them after today. They go to mass EVERY DAY. Wow.
So there we are, lounging under a tree outside the church, eating and contemplating another 5k to Agés so that tomorrow won´t have to be a full 30k...when around the corner of the church comes....
CHRISTA FROM AUSTRIA!!!
I hollered ¨AUSTRIA!!!¨ and she hollered ¨VIRGINIA...IS THAT REALLY YOU?¨ and it was awesome. She did 37K today!!! Wow. She couldn´t do another step. I should have stayed behind with her, but the siren call of internet and washing machine was too much. We sat and caught up (it´s been about a week) and got stories of Estelle and told stories of Skip and Hank and the boys, and then headed out. It was a beautiful walk through forests and fields to Agés, and we were surrounded by panoramic mountain views.
Christa´s walk today, though, got me thinking. She did 37k today. I need to be stepping it up, maybe not 37k worth, but definitely need to start averaging closer to 30 instead of close to 23. I´ve got to get down this road. Burgos feels like 1/3 of the way, and if I don´t have to take the train, I don´t want to. (There´s talk of doing the meseta by night, since it´ll beat the heat and it´s some of the easiest days as far as wayfinding. We´ll see.) I need to spend some time route planning tonight. And I might need to break away from my little crowd. They´re comforting and I love them, but I have a purpose here and they might be a bit in the way. Perhaps it´s time to move on. Skip would definitely agree with that...he´s quite a guru. Christa too. Neither of them loses focus of the purpose of their trip. Christa has more time and can take her time...but Skip has a deadline. (Did I tell you? He´s walking to mark the 10th anniversary of his brother´s death, and Aussie cop who died in the line of duty. I believe it´s Aug 8...?)
It´s always good to see Al and Mimi and Jocelyn and other familiar faces in the evenings...they´re outside now, though we seem to have lost Hank...but it might be time to head out alone. I thought my walk would be much more introspective than it´s been so far, and perhaps there are revelations waiting for me in solitude. I will meet other people, of course, but I need to stop basing the night´s stop on where my friends will be. I came here for a reason, and I´m losing sight of it, and that´s not good.
Tomorrow morning I´ll wait for Christa...5km behind, she´ll be here in 45 minutes from whenever she leaves, and I´m sure I won´t be ready before then. We´ll probably still stop in Burgós tomorrow night, since it´s a big city, but after that, I´ll see if she wants to knock out some big days with me and get on down this road. If not, perhaps I´ll go alone. Either way, there´s some decision making to do tonight. It´s MY Camino. Skip has his, the boys have theirs, Christa has hers, and I think you do yourself a disservice if you allow your Camino to become someone else´s.
So that´s the deal. We´ll see how the next couple days play out.
Anyway. Notes for the prospective pilgrim. Toilets here don´t always have seats. Apparently, sitting on the porcelain is not a big deal. It skeeves me out.
They also sometimes flush with the approximate force of Class 5 hurricanes. Apparently, that is not a big deal either.
The first cold shower I´ve had to take was this morning in Belorado, after a REALLY cold night. I was not pleased. This is not an indictment on the albergue, which was lovely and had a beautiful garden.
AND A POOL. On a day that felt like about 50 degrees (F). Figures. I´ve been dreaming of swimming pools for DAYS and we finally find one on the day I´m freezing my butt off.
The bocadillos get smaller the farther you go. In Navarra, 3€ gets you a sandwich as long as your arm. You quarter it with your pocketknife, ask for papel, and it lasts all day. By the time you hit Castilla y León (our current province), they are smaller. Still good, though. I´m already trying to figure out how to get this kind of ham in the States.
Condiments are overrated. You order a jamón sandwich, and it is jamón, heavy on the fat, on a baguette. THAT´S IT. And it grows on you. Get some cheese on it. And if anyone knows the word for butter, please pass it along. I need that. Please also send ¨May I have this sandwich wrapped up to go?¨
8 minutes left...what else to say. Not much. My sweater is in the wash and it´s COLD. Not good.
There are girls who come walk the Camino in cute clothes and makeup and look none the worse for wear. This makes me want to call them bad names I should not say in a blog my grandmother reads. I have to keep telling myself I didn´t come here to look cute. But it burns my butt a little bit anyway.
Everyone else´s gear always looks better and more efficient than yours, and often you are surprised when you find out how much someone else´s backpack, in fact, sucks. HAH.
All for now. I´m out of things to say. Tomorrow, Burgós. Anyone got a remedy for SERIOUSLY stinky backpack straps? This will NOT get better in the next three weeks....
Please keep commenting. Love you all.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Azofra to Grañón to Belorado
I´m here! I´m alive! I´m back!
Ha ha. Sorry no post yesterday...no internet where I was.
Azofra finished out beautifully. After posting, the boys made dinner. Skip is a chef and had a hankerin for some mashed potatoes, so he made a huge pot of them with tomatoes and garlic and God knows what else...added to the enormous skillet of tomato pasta the boys made...I volunteered dish duty in exchange for my dinner. I think we each had three plates´ worth and still had leftovers. This was the first night I actually got to see nighttime in Spain. It doesn´t get all-the-way dark till 11pm, and we´re always locked in by 10 or so, so we never see the stars. But the hospitalero here was pretty laid-back and we sat in the courtyard late and talked.
In the morning, we set out for Grañón. We got a bit of a late start because there was a full-blown TRAGEDY. Felix committed Camino Suicide last night. He had a blister on the side of the ball of his foot, and GOD only knows why, but he CUT AWAY THE TOP SKIN. We wanted to strangle him. He says he doesn´t know what he was thinking. Of course, he couldn´t walk today. When Skip and I were leaving, the boys were talking about staying behind for the day...?
NEVER wash all your socks at once, by the way. This rule is a subset of one of the primary rules of the Camino: never trust the dryers. Have I mentioned that before? Sidenote on washing: I have not yet had to wash anything by hand. Those who know me know that means I have NOT washed anything by hand. And even if you plan to use the machines, they usually have soap there for you to use. Don´t bring detergent...you don´t need it. But anyway, Skip decided he was in charge of laundry last night (we´re an old married couple...he drinks half my beers and I make him put sunscreen on his neck and we do our laundry together) and thought the dryer looked trustworthy. And today we had a tub full of wet clothes. I had two shirts and six socks hanging off my pack, with a pair of pants under the topcase. Luckily my stuff dries fast and I had held some socks and a shirt back. But if they´d all been wet, I would´ve been in bad shape. Lesson learned the easy way.
We´re running out of vineyards. Another day and we´ll be out of La Rioja. We stopped at a recreation area near this little stone house-type thing. I don´t remember what it´s called, but it´s basically a circular column of stones topped with a stone dome, so it looks like a little stone helmet in the middle of the plain. There was a sign that says it was for guarding crops...someone is inside it and makes sure no one bothers the fields, maybe?
On our stops, it´s funny how in tune Skip and I are. It happens all the time. We stop, rummage through our packs in silence till we figure out whatever we need to figure out...sometimes one or both of us is jotting down notes we want to remember for later, or taking pictures of scenery...then we´re both ready to go at the exact same time. No conversation, just zips and straps and packs on and we walk out. It happens during lunch breaks, too. Everyone seems to know when it´s time to go.
We´re in wheat fields now, and so the hills are golden, broken with dark green splotches of forest. Apparently, these hills were all forest, centuries ago, but Santo Domingo ordered them cut down and tilled into fields. Suddenly, in the midst of the wheat fields, off in the distance, I saw...a golf cart?? Yes. A golf course. In the middle of Spanish Nowhere. Strange sight.
Up at the top of a tall hill was a resting place, and there was Kasey Kahne. He´d beaten us there, somehow...but no Felix. Apparently he was going to take the bus. Good for him. They were talking about stopping in Santo Domingo de la Calzada, which is too close for us to stop...we want to go to Grañón and have heard it´s a church hostel, which we want to try. Hmm....
My iPod died after 30 min. Didn´t charge it. Damn.
We pulled into Santo Domingo de la Calzada around midday. The plan was to wait out the heat of the day till about 4pm, and then do the last hour and a half to Grañón. As we were coming into town, Kasey got far ahead, and we didn´t see him again when we got into the town proper. We saw Yasmeen, though, and she showed us around a bit. We climbed the belfry in the church in SD...it was beautiful. Lots of bells, all different sizes. The half-hour one rang while we were up there and scared the crap out of us. We did some poking around in the markets and hit a sidewalk cafe for lunch. Yasmeen joined us. We were there forever, writing postcards and catching up on journals.
Skip has a niece who´s 11 years old. He stole her teddy bear before he left, and has been taking pictures of it all the way from Australia to Pamplona. Teddy ran with the bulls. Unfortunately, Teddy stayed behind in Pamplona, but he´s been racking up bar tabs all over the Camino ever since! He´s a very friendly guy, but he´s kind of a lush and he´s out of money. So...see where this is going? Skip has been getting all kinds of people to write postcards back to his niece in Australia, some from Teddy, and some from people Teddy has met and talked into paying his bar tab, promising that Brianna would cover them. So I wrote one...Jocelyn wrote one in French...Yasmeen invited them both to Austria...he sent an envelope full of bar tabs to her...it´s pretty funny. I can´t wait till Eric is older and I can do the same thing.
My packstraps are really starting to stink. That should be fun in another two weeks.... Also getting sick of my clothes. And really resenting the pressure to be feminine under these kinds of conditions. Almost as much as I resent the gorgeous women we walk with.
There is a Hungarian couple who rival the French couple of a few days ago in sheer collective beauty. He is a buccanneer if I ever saw one. He is tall and lanky, with a long dark ponytail and a goatee. He wears these tan trousers that are about castaway length, mid-calf, and a white buttondown shirt that billows in the wind. He has a black hip pack that looks like a swordbelt. Black boots, sometimes sandals. Black broad-brimmed hat, pinned up at the sides...tall wooden walking stick...pack trimmed in red. I swear if he had a red bandana on his head, he´d be a full-blown pirate. He speaks very good English...I call him Hungary and he calls me America. SHE speaks almost no English. She is all slender limbs and a body no bigger than her pack, so when we walk behind her it looks like a walking backpack. She walks in hiking boots like models do in three inch heels and fashion shows. It´s bizarre. Like Maelle the French girl, she is effortlessly breathtaking, and I am jealous to the point of viciousness. Ha ha...I´m not really, but you know what I mean. How do they DO it?? And on the Camino!!!
We spent forever in SD. Yasmeen said she´d send the boys if she found them. No luck. We finally left. I´d asked the girl behind the bar if I could charge my iPod, and after about an hour and a half, I found out I´d used the wrong converter...which fits the holes, but apparently doesn´t charge. GRRRR!! It was hotter than JEEZUS when we left.
Here´s our problem. All of Europe is on one time zone. I already said that it´s still half-light out at 10pm. So while waiting till 4pm usually cuts out the heat of the day in a normal US time zone, and might work in Eastern Europe...in Spain, we really decided to walk out of SD at around 2 or 3 in the afternoon, which is actually the HEIGHT of the heat. Sigh. Aussie nearly overheated before we reached Grañón. It was a long afternoon. Just wheat fields on one side and roads on the other. Miserable. Plus, we knew the boys had probably stayed behind in SD.
The albergue in Grañón advertised a pool. A KILOMETER AWAY. No thanks. It was an old Romanesque church where we stayed. Donations only. Leather sleeping mats on the floor, about 2¨ thick, not bad. I searched the boots area for the boys´ shoes...did not see the shoelaces I lent to Felix the other day when his broke. As they stamped us in, I was crushed. I missed them already. Even thought we´d lost Hank and Mimi and Jocelyn...however, we saw them moments later.
Skip and the Hungarian are like young bucks sharpening their antlers against trees, eyeing each other, trading barbs and jokes with daggers behind their smiles. The Hungarian has his wife and two other young women with him, and strides the Camino like a lord parading his wife and daughters before the gentry with a haughty and possessive swagger.
But the spirit of this place was just beautiful. There was a communal mass (which we skipped) and a communal dinner for THIRTY-FOUR PEOPLE. Tiny little kitchen, more people working in it than you´d believe. An Italian named Roderigo was making homemade potato chips as we all sat down...they were soooooooo good. Dinner was VATS of pasta with tuna, tomato, peas, and lots of oil. I think one of the things I´ll learn on this trip is how to savor food. I am an eat-to-live person, not a live-to-eat person. But everything is magnified on the Camino, especially the taste of really good food after a long, hard day. We had a blessing in three languages before we ate, bottles of red wine (which I passed up in favor of glass after glass of water...GOD even the water is divine...), breadbaskets...Mimi and Jocelyn had made a fruit salad for dessert. I jumped on the dish-drying team to earn my supper...Skip and the other guys were on table-assembly and breakdown duty. Everyone pitched in. The walls were lined with Camino artifacts and pictures. There was a beautiful white jug up on a shelf with wheat stalks in it. It really felt like the Camino.
As we were doing the dishes, the window outside had this strange yellow glow...there was a storm brewing and I´ve never seen clouds like this in all my life. I can´t even describe them. It looked like a helluva storm coming. But I don´t think it ever did rain. By that time, it was nearly 10 and we headed to bed. A few of us stole extra sleeping mats. =)
The church bells rang as we fell asleep. It was lovely.
Absolutely nothing remarkable about the walk today from Grañón to Belorado. Tiny little towns, populations in the 40s, no one about. Sunday...everything in Spain shuts down on Sunday. We walked in silence. Skip is hurting. His ankle is terribly swollen and tonight he found out his blisters are infected. He will probably take the bus tomorrow, and hates feeling like a wuss, but knows that if his ankle and blisters get worse, he´s out of the game. He´s right.
We stopped only 16km out from our start today...done by 12:30, and walked into an albergue the color of orange sherbet. It looked very commercial...bar and huge eating area, pool tables, TV lounge...surly young woman behind the bar...180 from last night´s peace and camaraderie. I didn´t like it, but we wanted to stop, so we got beds. I was trying to remember a message from John...¨under no circumstances should you stay at the first albergue in...?¨ Couldn´t remember. What the hell. We figured the Germans would be here soon...the other towns were so small. The American CCM group came not long after and said they´d seen the boys this morning. We asked them to watch for them and headed into town in search of a doctor or a pharmacy.
No luck. Found the square and some sort of motorbike exhibition...everyone in the town was there. The Americans came and said they saw our Germans but they went to another albergue. Skip put me on the hunt and went back to crash and nurse his ankle.
Ten minutes later I found the fourth albergue in the town, and it was open. It took me five minutes to try to explain to the guy that I was looking for two friends and could I see his list, please? THERE THEY WERE!! I did a lot more gesturing with bad Spanish and hustled upstairs. Felix tackled me when he saw me. =)
So here we are. I have five minutes left, then I´m waking up Skip and we´re moving. This albergue just has a bad feel to it. The other one is nice, is donation only, and is having a communal dinner, and is right off the town square. Felix says Al is there too.
So, better go. Sorry I was out yesterday. We´re now in step with our guidebooks, and will hit San Juan de Ortega tomorrow, and hopefully Burgos on Tuesday. The meseta, my possible train trip, is about two days later. We´ll see how that goes.
Carolyn - the scallop shell is the symbol of Saint James on the Camino. Google Camino de Santiago...there is a .uk site that is wonderful.
Not much else to report. Love you all.
Ha ha. Sorry no post yesterday...no internet where I was.
Azofra finished out beautifully. After posting, the boys made dinner. Skip is a chef and had a hankerin for some mashed potatoes, so he made a huge pot of them with tomatoes and garlic and God knows what else...added to the enormous skillet of tomato pasta the boys made...I volunteered dish duty in exchange for my dinner. I think we each had three plates´ worth and still had leftovers. This was the first night I actually got to see nighttime in Spain. It doesn´t get all-the-way dark till 11pm, and we´re always locked in by 10 or so, so we never see the stars. But the hospitalero here was pretty laid-back and we sat in the courtyard late and talked.
In the morning, we set out for Grañón. We got a bit of a late start because there was a full-blown TRAGEDY. Felix committed Camino Suicide last night. He had a blister on the side of the ball of his foot, and GOD only knows why, but he CUT AWAY THE TOP SKIN. We wanted to strangle him. He says he doesn´t know what he was thinking. Of course, he couldn´t walk today. When Skip and I were leaving, the boys were talking about staying behind for the day...?
NEVER wash all your socks at once, by the way. This rule is a subset of one of the primary rules of the Camino: never trust the dryers. Have I mentioned that before? Sidenote on washing: I have not yet had to wash anything by hand. Those who know me know that means I have NOT washed anything by hand. And even if you plan to use the machines, they usually have soap there for you to use. Don´t bring detergent...you don´t need it. But anyway, Skip decided he was in charge of laundry last night (we´re an old married couple...he drinks half my beers and I make him put sunscreen on his neck and we do our laundry together) and thought the dryer looked trustworthy. And today we had a tub full of wet clothes. I had two shirts and six socks hanging off my pack, with a pair of pants under the topcase. Luckily my stuff dries fast and I had held some socks and a shirt back. But if they´d all been wet, I would´ve been in bad shape. Lesson learned the easy way.
We´re running out of vineyards. Another day and we´ll be out of La Rioja. We stopped at a recreation area near this little stone house-type thing. I don´t remember what it´s called, but it´s basically a circular column of stones topped with a stone dome, so it looks like a little stone helmet in the middle of the plain. There was a sign that says it was for guarding crops...someone is inside it and makes sure no one bothers the fields, maybe?
On our stops, it´s funny how in tune Skip and I are. It happens all the time. We stop, rummage through our packs in silence till we figure out whatever we need to figure out...sometimes one or both of us is jotting down notes we want to remember for later, or taking pictures of scenery...then we´re both ready to go at the exact same time. No conversation, just zips and straps and packs on and we walk out. It happens during lunch breaks, too. Everyone seems to know when it´s time to go.
We´re in wheat fields now, and so the hills are golden, broken with dark green splotches of forest. Apparently, these hills were all forest, centuries ago, but Santo Domingo ordered them cut down and tilled into fields. Suddenly, in the midst of the wheat fields, off in the distance, I saw...a golf cart?? Yes. A golf course. In the middle of Spanish Nowhere. Strange sight.
Up at the top of a tall hill was a resting place, and there was Kasey Kahne. He´d beaten us there, somehow...but no Felix. Apparently he was going to take the bus. Good for him. They were talking about stopping in Santo Domingo de la Calzada, which is too close for us to stop...we want to go to Grañón and have heard it´s a church hostel, which we want to try. Hmm....
My iPod died after 30 min. Didn´t charge it. Damn.
We pulled into Santo Domingo de la Calzada around midday. The plan was to wait out the heat of the day till about 4pm, and then do the last hour and a half to Grañón. As we were coming into town, Kasey got far ahead, and we didn´t see him again when we got into the town proper. We saw Yasmeen, though, and she showed us around a bit. We climbed the belfry in the church in SD...it was beautiful. Lots of bells, all different sizes. The half-hour one rang while we were up there and scared the crap out of us. We did some poking around in the markets and hit a sidewalk cafe for lunch. Yasmeen joined us. We were there forever, writing postcards and catching up on journals.
Skip has a niece who´s 11 years old. He stole her teddy bear before he left, and has been taking pictures of it all the way from Australia to Pamplona. Teddy ran with the bulls. Unfortunately, Teddy stayed behind in Pamplona, but he´s been racking up bar tabs all over the Camino ever since! He´s a very friendly guy, but he´s kind of a lush and he´s out of money. So...see where this is going? Skip has been getting all kinds of people to write postcards back to his niece in Australia, some from Teddy, and some from people Teddy has met and talked into paying his bar tab, promising that Brianna would cover them. So I wrote one...Jocelyn wrote one in French...Yasmeen invited them both to Austria...he sent an envelope full of bar tabs to her...it´s pretty funny. I can´t wait till Eric is older and I can do the same thing.
My packstraps are really starting to stink. That should be fun in another two weeks.... Also getting sick of my clothes. And really resenting the pressure to be feminine under these kinds of conditions. Almost as much as I resent the gorgeous women we walk with.
There is a Hungarian couple who rival the French couple of a few days ago in sheer collective beauty. He is a buccanneer if I ever saw one. He is tall and lanky, with a long dark ponytail and a goatee. He wears these tan trousers that are about castaway length, mid-calf, and a white buttondown shirt that billows in the wind. He has a black hip pack that looks like a swordbelt. Black boots, sometimes sandals. Black broad-brimmed hat, pinned up at the sides...tall wooden walking stick...pack trimmed in red. I swear if he had a red bandana on his head, he´d be a full-blown pirate. He speaks very good English...I call him Hungary and he calls me America. SHE speaks almost no English. She is all slender limbs and a body no bigger than her pack, so when we walk behind her it looks like a walking backpack. She walks in hiking boots like models do in three inch heels and fashion shows. It´s bizarre. Like Maelle the French girl, she is effortlessly breathtaking, and I am jealous to the point of viciousness. Ha ha...I´m not really, but you know what I mean. How do they DO it?? And on the Camino!!!
We spent forever in SD. Yasmeen said she´d send the boys if she found them. No luck. We finally left. I´d asked the girl behind the bar if I could charge my iPod, and after about an hour and a half, I found out I´d used the wrong converter...which fits the holes, but apparently doesn´t charge. GRRRR!! It was hotter than JEEZUS when we left.
Here´s our problem. All of Europe is on one time zone. I already said that it´s still half-light out at 10pm. So while waiting till 4pm usually cuts out the heat of the day in a normal US time zone, and might work in Eastern Europe...in Spain, we really decided to walk out of SD at around 2 or 3 in the afternoon, which is actually the HEIGHT of the heat. Sigh. Aussie nearly overheated before we reached Grañón. It was a long afternoon. Just wheat fields on one side and roads on the other. Miserable. Plus, we knew the boys had probably stayed behind in SD.
The albergue in Grañón advertised a pool. A KILOMETER AWAY. No thanks. It was an old Romanesque church where we stayed. Donations only. Leather sleeping mats on the floor, about 2¨ thick, not bad. I searched the boots area for the boys´ shoes...did not see the shoelaces I lent to Felix the other day when his broke. As they stamped us in, I was crushed. I missed them already. Even thought we´d lost Hank and Mimi and Jocelyn...however, we saw them moments later.
Skip and the Hungarian are like young bucks sharpening their antlers against trees, eyeing each other, trading barbs and jokes with daggers behind their smiles. The Hungarian has his wife and two other young women with him, and strides the Camino like a lord parading his wife and daughters before the gentry with a haughty and possessive swagger.
But the spirit of this place was just beautiful. There was a communal mass (which we skipped) and a communal dinner for THIRTY-FOUR PEOPLE. Tiny little kitchen, more people working in it than you´d believe. An Italian named Roderigo was making homemade potato chips as we all sat down...they were soooooooo good. Dinner was VATS of pasta with tuna, tomato, peas, and lots of oil. I think one of the things I´ll learn on this trip is how to savor food. I am an eat-to-live person, not a live-to-eat person. But everything is magnified on the Camino, especially the taste of really good food after a long, hard day. We had a blessing in three languages before we ate, bottles of red wine (which I passed up in favor of glass after glass of water...GOD even the water is divine...), breadbaskets...Mimi and Jocelyn had made a fruit salad for dessert. I jumped on the dish-drying team to earn my supper...Skip and the other guys were on table-assembly and breakdown duty. Everyone pitched in. The walls were lined with Camino artifacts and pictures. There was a beautiful white jug up on a shelf with wheat stalks in it. It really felt like the Camino.
As we were doing the dishes, the window outside had this strange yellow glow...there was a storm brewing and I´ve never seen clouds like this in all my life. I can´t even describe them. It looked like a helluva storm coming. But I don´t think it ever did rain. By that time, it was nearly 10 and we headed to bed. A few of us stole extra sleeping mats. =)
The church bells rang as we fell asleep. It was lovely.
Absolutely nothing remarkable about the walk today from Grañón to Belorado. Tiny little towns, populations in the 40s, no one about. Sunday...everything in Spain shuts down on Sunday. We walked in silence. Skip is hurting. His ankle is terribly swollen and tonight he found out his blisters are infected. He will probably take the bus tomorrow, and hates feeling like a wuss, but knows that if his ankle and blisters get worse, he´s out of the game. He´s right.
We stopped only 16km out from our start today...done by 12:30, and walked into an albergue the color of orange sherbet. It looked very commercial...bar and huge eating area, pool tables, TV lounge...surly young woman behind the bar...180 from last night´s peace and camaraderie. I didn´t like it, but we wanted to stop, so we got beds. I was trying to remember a message from John...¨under no circumstances should you stay at the first albergue in...?¨ Couldn´t remember. What the hell. We figured the Germans would be here soon...the other towns were so small. The American CCM group came not long after and said they´d seen the boys this morning. We asked them to watch for them and headed into town in search of a doctor or a pharmacy.
No luck. Found the square and some sort of motorbike exhibition...everyone in the town was there. The Americans came and said they saw our Germans but they went to another albergue. Skip put me on the hunt and went back to crash and nurse his ankle.
Ten minutes later I found the fourth albergue in the town, and it was open. It took me five minutes to try to explain to the guy that I was looking for two friends and could I see his list, please? THERE THEY WERE!! I did a lot more gesturing with bad Spanish and hustled upstairs. Felix tackled me when he saw me. =)
So here we are. I have five minutes left, then I´m waking up Skip and we´re moving. This albergue just has a bad feel to it. The other one is nice, is donation only, and is having a communal dinner, and is right off the town square. Felix says Al is there too.
So, better go. Sorry I was out yesterday. We´re now in step with our guidebooks, and will hit San Juan de Ortega tomorrow, and hopefully Burgos on Tuesday. The meseta, my possible train trip, is about two days later. We´ll see how that goes.
Carolyn - the scallop shell is the symbol of Saint James on the Camino. Google Camino de Santiago...there is a .uk site that is wonderful.
Not much else to report. Love you all.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Navarette to Azofra
Dunno how this blog is gonna turn out. I´m buzzing pretty hard at the moment. Just got off a wine tour. Ask me how much it cost. How much did it cost, Christine? Glad you asked. ONE EURO. ONE. Of course...it was kinda short...but I drank a LOT of rosé. Ahem.
Anyway. Got a nice late start today out of Navarette, as you know, since I blogged this morning after the boys went on. I chased the boys all day. One thing I found out, though...alone, I am FAST. And I don´t stop.
First...the sandals. Not good to start with. Too hard on the muscles. So about ten minutes out, it was on with the boots. I´m trying to tough it out like Mike and Drew say to, but they are KILLING ME!!!! At this point, the muscles are fine, the knee is GOLDEN, and even the blisters are fine. Now it´s a heel issue...some extra bone on the back of my right heel. Swear to God, if it´s not one thing, it´s another. (And speaking of random issues, I´ve never had so many skin problems...new reaction every day, and I am NOT an allergen-prone person.) So anyway...I made it two hours with the boots, and then it was back to the sandal-shoes. Sorry, but they just feel better, and when you´re pushing out 23km on your own, trying to catch up with three boys, you don´t give a crap as long as it doesn´t hurt. The range of foot motion is a joy. I can actually flex my feet and use my toes to push off. They´re a trade off, of course...I feel every rock under me, and the cushioning isn´t as great, so the afternoon still hurts...but they don´t throw me sideways when I take a wrong step, and I´m not hobbling. So I think I´ll keep trying boots in the morning until I can´t stand it anymore. Hey. You do what works.
I am so not kidding...I BOOKED it today. The Germans left 15 or 20 minutes before me, and when I got to the breakfast stop in Ventosa, 7km away, they were just leaving. There is this dish in Spain called tortilla de patatas...it´s like a cross between a quiche and a potato pancake. GOOD. That stop was fifteen minutes. And in less than 4 hours since my start time in Navarette, I pulled into Najera, 17km away. I was at full-on, neighborhood walking, no weight, power walking speed. It was awesome. The pack is an afterthought right now. All I concentrate on is my feet. Baby plums outside of Ventosa...almost didn´t try them, but learned from the other day when Skip turned us on to locuts, so I picked one, brushed it off, and bit into it. It was beautiful.
Speaking of beautiful...THE VIEWS TODAY. I know, maybe it´s getting redundant, but I can´t emphasize enough what beautiful country this is. I don´t care if it´s blisteringly hot and I´m cursing the sun with every step...it doesn´t change the fact that it´s beautiful. Today was a blue sky like (I swear) I haven´t seen since 9/12/01. You know, the day the planes were grounded in America. Do you remember the sky that day? The Discovery Channel did a thing about it...how the jetwash from America´s air traffic stirs up the atmosphere and that crystal blue day was something that will only happen in a period of a day or two without air traffic. I´ve just never seen it this blue any other day. Vineyards...I never get tired of them. A million shades of green above russet-seipa, wide-tooth-combed soil below. Yellow wheat fields interrupting...silvery green weeds...cornflowers, red poppies, giant purple thistles, and yellow dandelions. Mountains in the distance, differing shades of purple and blue. ARRRGH! WANT TO POST PICTURES!! Sigh. I´m telling you. DO THIS.
Anyway. The walk from Ventosa to Nájera was really nice, even though I was hurrying. No water from Navarette to Nájera...didn´t know that but had enough for the whole day...those after me, beware. Passed the site of the legendary battle between the French knight Roldán and the giant Farregut. Also a poem or song on the wall, in Spanish, for peregrinos...have pictures of it so I can get someone to translate it for me at home.
Nájera was really nice. There was a new town and an old town. At first I was poking my head into every bar, looking for my boys. Finally found the Germans right before I crossed the bridge into the old town...across the bridge were sidewalk cafes along a shallow river with a bed that looked like cobblestones...green grass on each side...gorgeous view...and there was Skip Norris, sitting at one of the tables. We hollered, got there, and suddenly a waitress showed up with four tall beers. Bless that boy. We sat for a while as the boys tried to figure out how to mack on the hot Spanish girl next to us. When we finally went for lunch, the bartender was really happy to hear I was American; he´d been to Utah. We headed out of town and got all the way up the hill (about 10 minutes´ walk) when I realized I forgot my stick AGAIN. In the bar. GRRRRR!!! Went back. He was just closing but I got it.
It was hotter than Jesus when I got back up the hill. No sign of the boys. Walked another 10 minutes before I saw them, huddled in the shade of a broken down old barn that was the only spot of shade in all of Spain, it seemed, at that point. Bless their hearts. Though we didn´t talk much or walk together, really, the rest of the way to Azofra. It was HOT. Did I mention it was hot?? My brilliant shoulder-sunblock plan did not include my calves today, and I am now paying the price. Lesson learned.
Made it to Azofra, which seems like a kind of oasis in the desert. THIS GUY KNOWS HOW TO RUN AN ALBERGUE. One of the things I hate MOST is when they try to give you the grand tour on the way to your rooms, when all you care about is putting down your pack. Sometimes it´s even worse: you have to take your boots off before you do ANYTHING, including pay!! But THIS guy. ¨Put all your things down, and go relax.¨ Courtyard. Tables with umbrellas. Hank and Mimi and Jocelyn. FOOT POOL. Seriously. About 12´ square, a foot deep, fountain in the middle. Heaven. When we felt like it, we came back to the counter and paid. Small rooms with two twin beds apiece (I´m afraid I won´t fit...they´re blocked in by shelves). THIS guy INSISTED ON CARRYING MY PACK UP TO MY ROOM. WOW.
Shower, journal, a Coke, more foot pool, lots of lotion, no new blisters (YAY!), and then a wine tour leaving at 8. It was short...you get what you pay for...but according to the guy, it´s supposed to be longer than it was. Still, it was deep underground, walking through earthen tunnels...we peeked into giant CEMENT wine tanks in the old section, and climbed into giant steel wine casks in the new part. We got to try a red and a rosé. No one seemed to care how much we took, so I topped up on the rosé several times. =)
Decided I´m spending too much...can´t keep eating in bars, even on the menú peregrino. So today I bought a kind of rice-a-roni type thing, but as I was trying to figure it out, the wine tour was leaving. So I abandoned ship. Hey, I missed the wine fountain...wasn´t about to miss a 1€ tour.
I have never appreciated a blue sky so much as I do on this trip. I mean, when all you have to do is walk, a beautiful blue sky, under the sunshine, early in the morning, is a joy.
It takes about 8 days till your face, without makeup, looks right to you, and not like it´s missing something vital. After 8 days, you look in the mirror and stop thinking ACK I NEED MAKEUP and start thinking...MAN I look healthy.... =)
Al is here. Ten minutes after I arrived, he burst into my room and seized me in a bear hug. Al ROCKS.
I missed the boys today and was so happy we´re all together. I wonder how much longer that will last. I told myself at the outset that I needed to be quick to associate with people, but had to be just as quick to leave them, so as to allow others to take their place. But I love these guys. And we never know if we´ll see Hank and Al and Jocelyn and Mimi each night, but when we appear on the scene and they´re all sitting around with wine and beer (they leave MUCH earlier than we do), everyone hollers with joy. It´s a good, good group. You MUST walk your own Camino, and you can´t wait or push for anyone else...but it´s so hard not to. Friendships cement so fast here....
Drew...I assure you, there is no easy way out here. =) Stepping it out is key, and fun on days like today when you want to see how fast you can go for how long...but it´s gorgeous countryside, and speed and endurance takes a backseat to beautiful churches and numberless pictures of vineyard-and-mountain panoramas. You know what I mean. But trust me...this is a hump to die for.
Mike, tell Eric that. Give him kisses for me. I miss him and show his picture to everyone who will stand still long enough.
Ian and Rosie...you know MePhiMe?? HOW??? =)
Everyone I don´t know following this blog...thank you for your interest. I hope my information is helpful in some way.
Tomorrow...Santo Domingo de la Calzada, and stopping perhaps in Redecilla del Camino? Any info ahead of that is welcome, as I won´t check again till tomorrow night. I know the Santo Domingo legends...you will find plenty if you check. Tell me what´s after that if you choose.
merlintoes@hotmail.com...emails welcome.
Love you all!! Think Skip Norris is roundhousing the kitchen, so must go.
Anyway. Got a nice late start today out of Navarette, as you know, since I blogged this morning after the boys went on. I chased the boys all day. One thing I found out, though...alone, I am FAST. And I don´t stop.
First...the sandals. Not good to start with. Too hard on the muscles. So about ten minutes out, it was on with the boots. I´m trying to tough it out like Mike and Drew say to, but they are KILLING ME!!!! At this point, the muscles are fine, the knee is GOLDEN, and even the blisters are fine. Now it´s a heel issue...some extra bone on the back of my right heel. Swear to God, if it´s not one thing, it´s another. (And speaking of random issues, I´ve never had so many skin problems...new reaction every day, and I am NOT an allergen-prone person.) So anyway...I made it two hours with the boots, and then it was back to the sandal-shoes. Sorry, but they just feel better, and when you´re pushing out 23km on your own, trying to catch up with three boys, you don´t give a crap as long as it doesn´t hurt. The range of foot motion is a joy. I can actually flex my feet and use my toes to push off. They´re a trade off, of course...I feel every rock under me, and the cushioning isn´t as great, so the afternoon still hurts...but they don´t throw me sideways when I take a wrong step, and I´m not hobbling. So I think I´ll keep trying boots in the morning until I can´t stand it anymore. Hey. You do what works.
I am so not kidding...I BOOKED it today. The Germans left 15 or 20 minutes before me, and when I got to the breakfast stop in Ventosa, 7km away, they were just leaving. There is this dish in Spain called tortilla de patatas...it´s like a cross between a quiche and a potato pancake. GOOD. That stop was fifteen minutes. And in less than 4 hours since my start time in Navarette, I pulled into Najera, 17km away. I was at full-on, neighborhood walking, no weight, power walking speed. It was awesome. The pack is an afterthought right now. All I concentrate on is my feet. Baby plums outside of Ventosa...almost didn´t try them, but learned from the other day when Skip turned us on to locuts, so I picked one, brushed it off, and bit into it. It was beautiful.
Speaking of beautiful...THE VIEWS TODAY. I know, maybe it´s getting redundant, but I can´t emphasize enough what beautiful country this is. I don´t care if it´s blisteringly hot and I´m cursing the sun with every step...it doesn´t change the fact that it´s beautiful. Today was a blue sky like (I swear) I haven´t seen since 9/12/01. You know, the day the planes were grounded in America. Do you remember the sky that day? The Discovery Channel did a thing about it...how the jetwash from America´s air traffic stirs up the atmosphere and that crystal blue day was something that will only happen in a period of a day or two without air traffic. I´ve just never seen it this blue any other day. Vineyards...I never get tired of them. A million shades of green above russet-seipa, wide-tooth-combed soil below. Yellow wheat fields interrupting...silvery green weeds...cornflowers, red poppies, giant purple thistles, and yellow dandelions. Mountains in the distance, differing shades of purple and blue. ARRRGH! WANT TO POST PICTURES!! Sigh. I´m telling you. DO THIS.
Anyway. The walk from Ventosa to Nájera was really nice, even though I was hurrying. No water from Navarette to Nájera...didn´t know that but had enough for the whole day...those after me, beware. Passed the site of the legendary battle between the French knight Roldán and the giant Farregut. Also a poem or song on the wall, in Spanish, for peregrinos...have pictures of it so I can get someone to translate it for me at home.
Nájera was really nice. There was a new town and an old town. At first I was poking my head into every bar, looking for my boys. Finally found the Germans right before I crossed the bridge into the old town...across the bridge were sidewalk cafes along a shallow river with a bed that looked like cobblestones...green grass on each side...gorgeous view...and there was Skip Norris, sitting at one of the tables. We hollered, got there, and suddenly a waitress showed up with four tall beers. Bless that boy. We sat for a while as the boys tried to figure out how to mack on the hot Spanish girl next to us. When we finally went for lunch, the bartender was really happy to hear I was American; he´d been to Utah. We headed out of town and got all the way up the hill (about 10 minutes´ walk) when I realized I forgot my stick AGAIN. In the bar. GRRRRR!!! Went back. He was just closing but I got it.
It was hotter than Jesus when I got back up the hill. No sign of the boys. Walked another 10 minutes before I saw them, huddled in the shade of a broken down old barn that was the only spot of shade in all of Spain, it seemed, at that point. Bless their hearts. Though we didn´t talk much or walk together, really, the rest of the way to Azofra. It was HOT. Did I mention it was hot?? My brilliant shoulder-sunblock plan did not include my calves today, and I am now paying the price. Lesson learned.
Made it to Azofra, which seems like a kind of oasis in the desert. THIS GUY KNOWS HOW TO RUN AN ALBERGUE. One of the things I hate MOST is when they try to give you the grand tour on the way to your rooms, when all you care about is putting down your pack. Sometimes it´s even worse: you have to take your boots off before you do ANYTHING, including pay!! But THIS guy. ¨Put all your things down, and go relax.¨ Courtyard. Tables with umbrellas. Hank and Mimi and Jocelyn. FOOT POOL. Seriously. About 12´ square, a foot deep, fountain in the middle. Heaven. When we felt like it, we came back to the counter and paid. Small rooms with two twin beds apiece (I´m afraid I won´t fit...they´re blocked in by shelves). THIS guy INSISTED ON CARRYING MY PACK UP TO MY ROOM. WOW.
Shower, journal, a Coke, more foot pool, lots of lotion, no new blisters (YAY!), and then a wine tour leaving at 8. It was short...you get what you pay for...but according to the guy, it´s supposed to be longer than it was. Still, it was deep underground, walking through earthen tunnels...we peeked into giant CEMENT wine tanks in the old section, and climbed into giant steel wine casks in the new part. We got to try a red and a rosé. No one seemed to care how much we took, so I topped up on the rosé several times. =)
Decided I´m spending too much...can´t keep eating in bars, even on the menú peregrino. So today I bought a kind of rice-a-roni type thing, but as I was trying to figure it out, the wine tour was leaving. So I abandoned ship. Hey, I missed the wine fountain...wasn´t about to miss a 1€ tour.
I have never appreciated a blue sky so much as I do on this trip. I mean, when all you have to do is walk, a beautiful blue sky, under the sunshine, early in the morning, is a joy.
It takes about 8 days till your face, without makeup, looks right to you, and not like it´s missing something vital. After 8 days, you look in the mirror and stop thinking ACK I NEED MAKEUP and start thinking...MAN I look healthy.... =)
Al is here. Ten minutes after I arrived, he burst into my room and seized me in a bear hug. Al ROCKS.
I missed the boys today and was so happy we´re all together. I wonder how much longer that will last. I told myself at the outset that I needed to be quick to associate with people, but had to be just as quick to leave them, so as to allow others to take their place. But I love these guys. And we never know if we´ll see Hank and Al and Jocelyn and Mimi each night, but when we appear on the scene and they´re all sitting around with wine and beer (they leave MUCH earlier than we do), everyone hollers with joy. It´s a good, good group. You MUST walk your own Camino, and you can´t wait or push for anyone else...but it´s so hard not to. Friendships cement so fast here....
Drew...I assure you, there is no easy way out here. =) Stepping it out is key, and fun on days like today when you want to see how fast you can go for how long...but it´s gorgeous countryside, and speed and endurance takes a backseat to beautiful churches and numberless pictures of vineyard-and-mountain panoramas. You know what I mean. But trust me...this is a hump to die for.
Mike, tell Eric that. Give him kisses for me. I miss him and show his picture to everyone who will stand still long enough.
Ian and Rosie...you know MePhiMe?? HOW??? =)
Everyone I don´t know following this blog...thank you for your interest. I hope my information is helpful in some way.
Tomorrow...Santo Domingo de la Calzada, and stopping perhaps in Redecilla del Camino? Any info ahead of that is welcome, as I won´t check again till tomorrow night. I know the Santo Domingo legends...you will find plenty if you check. Tell me what´s after that if you choose.
merlintoes@hotmail.com...emails welcome.
Love you all!! Think Skip Norris is roundhousing the kitchen, so must go.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Viana to Navarette 2
Wow. Okay. Thanks for all the opinions on how wimpy trekking sandals are, but YOU ARE NOT HERE. And I got ´em yesterday before everyone started yelling at me for them. But first things first.
Viana is a black hole. A beautiful one, but a black hole. Things get to Viana in your pack and when you leave, they are gone. Sigh. No one stole stuff, we just left stuff behind. Felix lost his pilgrim´s passport, and now has a sad little booklet with ONE stamp to show for eight days´ walking, and it´s not even frameable. Poor guy. They even slept at the church´s donation-refugio, where they paid 2€ to sleep on the floor. Rough night.
Us too. Skip wanted to get an early start so we could get to Logroño and get some things we decided we needed. We both had gotten third level bunks, which were awful, not only because it was such a hassle to get to things and there was no floor space, but the mattresses were really thin and there were no pillows. Pout pout. Stuffed all my clothes into my fleece and made do. Anyway...we were trying to be out by 6:30 and made it out by 7...not bad. Twenty minutes outside of town, he looks at me and goes, ¨You DID get your walking stick...?¨ ARRRRRRRRRRRRGH!!!!! No. He told me he´d wait if I wanted to make a run for it, but after an agonizing couple minutes, I decided that was against the rules. Both going back and making someone else wait. I feel awful because it was a gift from Christa AustriaMozartNoKangaroos, and now I´ve gone and left it behind. But I guess someone else is supposed to pick it up now.
The walk to Logroño was quiet and unremarkable. Lots of construction on the outskirts of town...kind of jarring. The scenery is nice, but then you hear a far-off jackhammer that totally undoes the whole feeling of the last eight days. I mean, we´ve barely even seen much car traffic, much less modern-day construction. Our little towns may as well have been in the 12th century, by the looks of them. Suddenly we have highway traffic and cranes and construction. The sky was purple in front of us for the longest time, and we were sure we´d get rain, but lucked out and it disappated in the late morning.
Skip was hurting...needed a bathroom. After what seemed like hours, we passed a little hut on the side of the road advertising a stamp for our passports. We stopped and I asked if they had a RR for him...she said ¨No tengo un baño. Campo. Campo.¨ I´m not sure, but campo = FIELD??? Lol. We got a stamp and walked on. After about three more false starts looking for some relief, I finally accosted a guy in a blue jumpsuit (ubiquitous here...work uniform?) sitting outside the doorway of a building marked ¨CREMATORIO MUNICIPAL.¨ He was VERY nice and apparently there was one on the other side of the graveyard. Skip said the plots were family plots, not individual graves. Just a spot of land or a memorial with a last name, and the first names listed under. I didn´t go in.
Planeta Aqua was the goal. Hiking-camping-fishing store. YES, I got the sandals. Even managed to score a pilgrim´s discount and a stick. Skip got sandals too and a new pack. It was kind of a production, and very disheartening. I did a lot of homework on my boots before I got them, and I did break them in, but when you´re hobbling every step and can´t walk and have no freedom of foot movement, you´re MISERABLE and so is this trip. Screw it. I dropped the money and got the sandals. (DS, quit chewing my ass. :-p) I hate it that they were expensive (even without the exchange rate), but they´ll last a long time and this won´t be my last trekking trip. I just couldn´t stand hobbling through another day. Besides, a lot of the mountain stuff is either behind me or far ahead. Right now we have a lot of footpaths...don´t necessarily need the boots at the moment.
I did NOT, however, send the boots ahead. Didn´t want to need them and not have them. Skip tossed his boots after he bought the sandals and is now more miserable than before...loves his pack, but hates his sandals (at least for our purposes now). Poor guy. He even offloaded about 5kilos at the post office...either ahead on the Camino or back to Perth. Good for him. It probably took him 45 minutes to sort through everything in his giant pack and downsize it to the new one...we had just hit a bookstore and got guidebooks, and I chattered away with facts about things ahead and behind while he fumed over how much stuff he had. When he was done, we tried to throw away his big bag, and this OLD old man came up to me and got REALLY excited about the pack, so I gave it to him. He hobbled off to the cathedral with it...God only knows what he´s going to do with it.
The Cathedral in Logroño is BEAUTIFUL. Two huge spires...storks nests on them. STORKS. They´re huge and everywhere...and they make this strange, loud clacking noise with their beaks, for about 20 seconds in a row. They´re really pretty!! We got through the church...lots of paintings and statues and things that would be more interesting if I knew what they were all about. After that, hit the post office and the BAR (Skip´s foray in the post office was about 45 minutes too, so we really dropped some time in Logroño and needed a beer before we headed out). The bartender was very helpful in getting us back en route, and it was good to get some food in us.
The walk to Navarette was really beautiful. It took us through a park along a lakeside. People were fishing...there were campsites and a little cafe with ice creams (WONDERFUL). The trail wound for a while between fields, the lake, and vineyards, and Skip started to get farther and farther behind, so I went ahead. The rise in the path gave a gorgeous panorama of how far we´d walked that day. At one point, Logroño was sitting in the sunlight while everything else was in shadow...that was cool.
After that, the walkway was on the other side of a chain link fence, high up above a freeway. People had woven sticks into the chain link, making crosses. Hundreds of them. Don´t know why. Like my buddy John told me, there´s a huge black billboard silhouette of a bull high above the town as you approach it. Again, no idea why. Nice walk into town, lots of climbing to the albergue.
Found my boys. =) And Hank and Yasmeen. Al went another 5km ahead, =(. Hank is sure we´ll see him tomorrow. When I got to the albergue, there were apparently only 4 beds left, and they wouldn´t let me reserve one for Skip...but he hobbled in an hour later and made it anyway. The French couple from yesterday are here...dunno if I´ve mentioned them. Nico has a mass of brown dreadlocks down his back, lots of earrings, and is quite possibly the most beautiful man I´ve ever seen. Not a whisker on his face...beauty mark down near his jawline, chiseled features, long and lean...he should be a model. His girlfriend, Maelle, is, if possible, even more beautiful. She´s one of those girls who has such perfect features that she doesn´t need a drop of makeup. She has a surface piercing between her eyes...a vertical barbell with two small silver balls above and below her browline. They are very nice, smoke a lot, don´t speak much English, and I have a hard time not staring at them. GORGEOUS people. We met them yesterday and I had the presence of mind to take a picture of them talking to Skip.
The albergue here got 3 scallop shells (out of 3) in my guidebook, but it was only okay. FOUR flights of stairs. First time I haven´t been in a bunk bed. Sometimes they let you pick a bed; sometimes you get assigned one. I came in right after this old guy, and got a bed about 3 inches away from his. WEIRD. When I finally got to sleep, it was very strange...so I tossed my pillow down to the other end and slept the other way. Ha ha. =)
Last night, there was an Englishman and a Frenchman talking with Hank at dinnertime. Michele and Sean. They had started in St. Jean Pied de Port FIVE DAYS AGO. 164 km in FIVE DAYS. These guys are powerhouses. And neither of them is a day under 50, perhaps not under 60. WOW.
All for now...gotta get on the road. All three of the boys have gone on ahead. Felix came in a few minutes ago and said there´s a change of plans...we´re going to Azofra today...1 hour longer on the road. That will take us...598.2 miles from Santiago. UNDER 600KM!! YAAAAY!!! =)
Love you all and thanks again for the comments. So glad to hear from my bro...Drew, thanks for the advice and inspiration...a lot of it I´ve already learned on my own...quit chewing my ass about the other stuff. =)
Mom...kept forgetting to say, thanks for fixing my trunk!! Dad, good luck in the golf tournament. =)
Viana is a black hole. A beautiful one, but a black hole. Things get to Viana in your pack and when you leave, they are gone. Sigh. No one stole stuff, we just left stuff behind. Felix lost his pilgrim´s passport, and now has a sad little booklet with ONE stamp to show for eight days´ walking, and it´s not even frameable. Poor guy. They even slept at the church´s donation-refugio, where they paid 2€ to sleep on the floor. Rough night.
Us too. Skip wanted to get an early start so we could get to Logroño and get some things we decided we needed. We both had gotten third level bunks, which were awful, not only because it was such a hassle to get to things and there was no floor space, but the mattresses were really thin and there were no pillows. Pout pout. Stuffed all my clothes into my fleece and made do. Anyway...we were trying to be out by 6:30 and made it out by 7...not bad. Twenty minutes outside of town, he looks at me and goes, ¨You DID get your walking stick...?¨ ARRRRRRRRRRRRGH!!!!! No. He told me he´d wait if I wanted to make a run for it, but after an agonizing couple minutes, I decided that was against the rules. Both going back and making someone else wait. I feel awful because it was a gift from Christa AustriaMozartNoKangaroos, and now I´ve gone and left it behind. But I guess someone else is supposed to pick it up now.
The walk to Logroño was quiet and unremarkable. Lots of construction on the outskirts of town...kind of jarring. The scenery is nice, but then you hear a far-off jackhammer that totally undoes the whole feeling of the last eight days. I mean, we´ve barely even seen much car traffic, much less modern-day construction. Our little towns may as well have been in the 12th century, by the looks of them. Suddenly we have highway traffic and cranes and construction. The sky was purple in front of us for the longest time, and we were sure we´d get rain, but lucked out and it disappated in the late morning.
Skip was hurting...needed a bathroom. After what seemed like hours, we passed a little hut on the side of the road advertising a stamp for our passports. We stopped and I asked if they had a RR for him...she said ¨No tengo un baño. Campo. Campo.¨ I´m not sure, but campo = FIELD??? Lol. We got a stamp and walked on. After about three more false starts looking for some relief, I finally accosted a guy in a blue jumpsuit (ubiquitous here...work uniform?) sitting outside the doorway of a building marked ¨CREMATORIO MUNICIPAL.¨ He was VERY nice and apparently there was one on the other side of the graveyard. Skip said the plots were family plots, not individual graves. Just a spot of land or a memorial with a last name, and the first names listed under. I didn´t go in.
Planeta Aqua was the goal. Hiking-camping-fishing store. YES, I got the sandals. Even managed to score a pilgrim´s discount and a stick. Skip got sandals too and a new pack. It was kind of a production, and very disheartening. I did a lot of homework on my boots before I got them, and I did break them in, but when you´re hobbling every step and can´t walk and have no freedom of foot movement, you´re MISERABLE and so is this trip. Screw it. I dropped the money and got the sandals. (DS, quit chewing my ass. :-p) I hate it that they were expensive (even without the exchange rate), but they´ll last a long time and this won´t be my last trekking trip. I just couldn´t stand hobbling through another day. Besides, a lot of the mountain stuff is either behind me or far ahead. Right now we have a lot of footpaths...don´t necessarily need the boots at the moment.
I did NOT, however, send the boots ahead. Didn´t want to need them and not have them. Skip tossed his boots after he bought the sandals and is now more miserable than before...loves his pack, but hates his sandals (at least for our purposes now). Poor guy. He even offloaded about 5kilos at the post office...either ahead on the Camino or back to Perth. Good for him. It probably took him 45 minutes to sort through everything in his giant pack and downsize it to the new one...we had just hit a bookstore and got guidebooks, and I chattered away with facts about things ahead and behind while he fumed over how much stuff he had. When he was done, we tried to throw away his big bag, and this OLD old man came up to me and got REALLY excited about the pack, so I gave it to him. He hobbled off to the cathedral with it...God only knows what he´s going to do with it.
The Cathedral in Logroño is BEAUTIFUL. Two huge spires...storks nests on them. STORKS. They´re huge and everywhere...and they make this strange, loud clacking noise with their beaks, for about 20 seconds in a row. They´re really pretty!! We got through the church...lots of paintings and statues and things that would be more interesting if I knew what they were all about. After that, hit the post office and the BAR (Skip´s foray in the post office was about 45 minutes too, so we really dropped some time in Logroño and needed a beer before we headed out). The bartender was very helpful in getting us back en route, and it was good to get some food in us.
The walk to Navarette was really beautiful. It took us through a park along a lakeside. People were fishing...there were campsites and a little cafe with ice creams (WONDERFUL). The trail wound for a while between fields, the lake, and vineyards, and Skip started to get farther and farther behind, so I went ahead. The rise in the path gave a gorgeous panorama of how far we´d walked that day. At one point, Logroño was sitting in the sunlight while everything else was in shadow...that was cool.
After that, the walkway was on the other side of a chain link fence, high up above a freeway. People had woven sticks into the chain link, making crosses. Hundreds of them. Don´t know why. Like my buddy John told me, there´s a huge black billboard silhouette of a bull high above the town as you approach it. Again, no idea why. Nice walk into town, lots of climbing to the albergue.
Found my boys. =) And Hank and Yasmeen. Al went another 5km ahead, =(. Hank is sure we´ll see him tomorrow. When I got to the albergue, there were apparently only 4 beds left, and they wouldn´t let me reserve one for Skip...but he hobbled in an hour later and made it anyway. The French couple from yesterday are here...dunno if I´ve mentioned them. Nico has a mass of brown dreadlocks down his back, lots of earrings, and is quite possibly the most beautiful man I´ve ever seen. Not a whisker on his face...beauty mark down near his jawline, chiseled features, long and lean...he should be a model. His girlfriend, Maelle, is, if possible, even more beautiful. She´s one of those girls who has such perfect features that she doesn´t need a drop of makeup. She has a surface piercing between her eyes...a vertical barbell with two small silver balls above and below her browline. They are very nice, smoke a lot, don´t speak much English, and I have a hard time not staring at them. GORGEOUS people. We met them yesterday and I had the presence of mind to take a picture of them talking to Skip.
The albergue here got 3 scallop shells (out of 3) in my guidebook, but it was only okay. FOUR flights of stairs. First time I haven´t been in a bunk bed. Sometimes they let you pick a bed; sometimes you get assigned one. I came in right after this old guy, and got a bed about 3 inches away from his. WEIRD. When I finally got to sleep, it was very strange...so I tossed my pillow down to the other end and slept the other way. Ha ha. =)
Last night, there was an Englishman and a Frenchman talking with Hank at dinnertime. Michele and Sean. They had started in St. Jean Pied de Port FIVE DAYS AGO. 164 km in FIVE DAYS. These guys are powerhouses. And neither of them is a day under 50, perhaps not under 60. WOW.
All for now...gotta get on the road. All three of the boys have gone on ahead. Felix came in a few minutes ago and said there´s a change of plans...we´re going to Azofra today...1 hour longer on the road. That will take us...598.2 miles from Santiago. UNDER 600KM!! YAAAAY!!! =)
Love you all and thanks again for the comments. So glad to hear from my bro...Drew, thanks for the advice and inspiration...a lot of it I´ve already learned on my own...quit chewing my ass about the other stuff. =)
Mom...kept forgetting to say, thanks for fixing my trunk!! Dad, good luck in the golf tournament. =)
Viana to Navarette
YAAAAY!!! Am totally high on comments and support and emails. Thanks so much for the following!!! =)=)=)
Unbelievably rushed at the moment. Stayed too long outside the albergue drinking La Rioja´s finest wine (mostly beer, but I do have a glass of wine beside me) and didn´t realize it was quarter to ten because it stays light so late here...found out that´s because all of Europe is on ONE time zone!!! ??? Anyway, I have now 7 minutes till I get locked out of the albergue next door, and the internet is here at the bar. So I have 18 minutes left on the computer but can only use 7. The up'side is that I wrote in my journal today. Decided to make the journal quick notes so I can be more organized when I´m actually on the computer, and not trying to remember everything that happened during the day. So tomorrow I should be fine to tell the story.
Short version: Good day today. Just for me. The boys were miserable. Spent several hours midday in Logroño doing a scavenger hunt with Skip Norris the Aussie. Accomplished all missions and made it to the stop point today to catch up with Hank, Mimi, Jocelyn (the French women from day one, been with us most nights, haven´t mentioned them).
Will have to update this one in the morning. Easy day tomorrow to Nájera, so I´ll take time before I leave to write, as long as the bar is open in the morning. We´ll see. Skip Norris´s feet hurt so bad now, he moves pretty slow, so I might let him go ahead and catch up with him later. I beat him here today by about 45 minutes.
John: I found your bull and got lots of pictures. Very confusing since you said it was outside Logroño and it is outside Navarette. Cannot get on Facebook. Also not trying Myspace anymore because it keeps crashing computers.
Gotta go. More in the morning or tomorrow night. Thanks again for all the love, and G&G...so glad you´re comment-able now!!! =)
PS - I got permission to announce...Byron is having a BOY!!!! =)=)=)=)=)
Unbelievably rushed at the moment. Stayed too long outside the albergue drinking La Rioja´s finest wine (mostly beer, but I do have a glass of wine beside me) and didn´t realize it was quarter to ten because it stays light so late here...found out that´s because all of Europe is on ONE time zone!!! ??? Anyway, I have now 7 minutes till I get locked out of the albergue next door, and the internet is here at the bar. So I have 18 minutes left on the computer but can only use 7. The up'side is that I wrote in my journal today. Decided to make the journal quick notes so I can be more organized when I´m actually on the computer, and not trying to remember everything that happened during the day. So tomorrow I should be fine to tell the story.
Short version: Good day today. Just for me. The boys were miserable. Spent several hours midday in Logroño doing a scavenger hunt with Skip Norris the Aussie. Accomplished all missions and made it to the stop point today to catch up with Hank, Mimi, Jocelyn (the French women from day one, been with us most nights, haven´t mentioned them).
Will have to update this one in the morning. Easy day tomorrow to Nájera, so I´ll take time before I leave to write, as long as the bar is open in the morning. We´ll see. Skip Norris´s feet hurt so bad now, he moves pretty slow, so I might let him go ahead and catch up with him later. I beat him here today by about 45 minutes.
John: I found your bull and got lots of pictures. Very confusing since you said it was outside Logroño and it is outside Navarette. Cannot get on Facebook. Also not trying Myspace anymore because it keeps crashing computers.
Gotta go. More in the morning or tomorrow night. Thanks again for all the love, and G&G...so glad you´re comment-able now!!! =)
PS - I got permission to announce...Byron is having a BOY!!!! =)=)=)=)=)
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Los Arcos to Viana
I´m completely floored. Go to the comments at the bottom of yesterday´s blog and follow the link there. People I don´t know are reading this. (YAY!! Thank you, Rosie and Ian...I was so confused because I thought I knew you and couldn´t figure out who you were...thanks for spreading my ¨fame...¨ and for reading. Ha ha)
WELL. Didn´t make it to Logroño. First time I haven´t reached my goal, but it was a flimsy one, and I just didn´t have it in me to go 29km today. Nor would I have been able to go 28km tomorrow. I think I need to be okay with about 20km per day for the time being...so what I hoped would be two days will become three. It´s okay.
Let me backtrack to last night. When Felix said he´d cook dinner, I thought he meant he´d cook DINNER. Felix cooked DESSERT. For like 10 people. Make that for like 10 KINGS. This stuff was SOOOOOO good. It was like a really, really thick pancake cooked in a huge skillet, then cut up into big chunks, and topped with a syrupy, crystallized type of peach topping that was just to DIE for. Everyone in Germany/Austria/Hungary knows what it is, and so people kept popping by to scoop out heaps of it onto little plates and they were all really excited about it. Go Felix! =)
Al...Donk...the SS Officer / should-be-an-Australian-rugby-captain guy...loves me. Turns out he´s been putting us on. His English might be better than mine. I asked what he did, and here comes this entire paragraph about corporate logos and marketing designs and exhibitions and on and on and on. We hung out a lot last night. It´s starting to get really bad, my frustration with not being able to post pictures. I want to show you everything and everyone I´m talking about!!!
Got some laundry processed last night. You can usually trust the washers, but don´t count on the dryers. Thanks to good pre'trip planning, I have nothing cotton with me and all my stuff got dry, but Brad (whose new name is Skip Norris, Chuck´s younger Australian half-brother) has a lot of cotton and cammo stuff and it just doesn´t get done. Plus, it´s heavier. NO COTTON on the Camino!!!
About Skip Norris. Skip or Skippy, in case you´ve never met an Aussie, is what they call kangaroos in Australia. And amongst our group, we´ve developed an obsession with Chuck Norris. Lauren, if you´re reading, I need those lists that were on your classroom door about Chuck. Every time we come across a situation, we try to figure out how Chuck would handle it. Example:
Felix: I´m hungry.
Brad: What would Chuck do if he were here and he got hungry?
Kasey Kahne: ...(quietly beginning to sing part of some random song in broken English containing a random word said somewhere in the conversation)
Me: Chuck would eat the tree bark.
Brad: Aw, yeah! Chuck would walk up to the trees and they would just drop their bark in fear!
Felix: Chuck would peek up zeh tree and carry it witt heem.
Me: Chuck would will a tree to grow up from the bare ground.
Kasey Kahne: ...(still singing)
And on and on and on.
Kasey Kahne does that a lot. But he looks like Kasey Kahne, so pretty much anything he does is okay by me.
We made GREAT time this morning. I was listening to MePhiMe and hit a killer stride. We probably did 6 miles in the first two hours, which is nothing if you´re walking your neighborhood in sneakers without blisters or thirty pounds on your back, but if you´re cutting across country and up and down hills and are loaded down like we are, it´s pretty damn good time. Walking out of a beautiful little village, we saw some kind of fruit tree. Skip Norris said they were locuts (?) and that they were really sweet...and he was right. We picked four. They were like hard little peaches, really juicy.
Lots of olive trees today. Lots of vineyards, some more wheat...the hills weren´t too bad. But no one tells you that you go about 12km between Torres del Rio and Viana with NO WATER FOUNTAINS. All three of the boys ran out. The Camelback is KING. Especially if you can sweet talk the lady behind the bar at the lunch spot to give you some ice to put in it. =) Today was a banner day for lunch...we just went ahead and bought bocadillos at a bar and I learned how to ask for mayo and mustard...so that way it wasn´t just ham on a dry hoagie. Thank GOD.
Not much else interesting to say about today. The pack has vanished. I no longer notice it on my back. My feet, however, cannot be similarly convinced, and are screaming pain by the end of the day.
Here´s a concern...open to solutions...I have lost all skin sensation on the front of my right arm from my shoulder to halfway down my upper arm. I noticed it yesterday afternoon...it didn´t come back last night...and it´s still that way today. Today my left big toe went the same way. Is this normal???
Viana isn´t a pretty town from far off. You do a lot of the approach on the side of the highway, which is also not pretty, nor are the cranes all over the new part of town. But the refugios are in the old part of town, with A MAGNIFICENT church. The church is also a refugio, but it´s barebones and donations. The Germans, Hank, and Al are all there, and they said they donated about 2€ because there are no beds, they´re sleeping on mats on the floor. (And just yesterday I was grumbling about the pound my sleeping mat, thus far unneeded, was adding to my pack.) That didn´t sound to good to Skip Norris and I, so we went looking for another one. This one looks like it´s in a castle. Just outside the windows in the hall is a great ruined abbey type structure, currently being rebuilt. There are TRIPLE decker beds this time...we are both on the top...that sucks...but the shutters open up to a view that you would happily pay 300 bucks for on a Spanish vacation. I´m not kidding. Got a picture of the valley and the olive trees in the courtyard and the 11th century stonework framing it all. TO DIE FOR.
We sat with the old crowd on the street outside the church and had a few beers. Dinner was a kind of fried egg sandwich...interesting. The second one was better...had sausage in it. Skip Norris and I went to look at the facade of the church and immediately decided to grab our beers and sit just inside the churchyard gates so we could just stare up at it. It was in a beautiful square...nearly deserted at first except for our group and a crowd of about eight German speedbikers...but gradually filled up the closer it got to Mass time. Before Mass I went in and looked around. It was as good as any church I´ve seen in England, except maybe Salisbury or Westminster Abbey. It´s just so frustrating not to know what you´re looking at!! We´ve vowed not to leave Logroño without a guidebook.
Early to bed tonight. We want to leave at 6am tomorrow and get to Logroño by 9am...hunt around in some shoe shops...Skip needs a new pack (the one I sewed the strap back onto yesterday is the worst one in the WORLD) and I and my pinkie toe are seriously considering some trekking sandals that you can wear socks with. The only problem with this plan is, if I´m not wearing my boots, I have to carry them. So we´re going to take our time in Logroño and hopefully make it to Navarette tomorrow...about 25km.
I popped the pinkie toe nipple-horn-blister thing about an hour ago and wrapped it up in Compeed. Hopefully it will get better tomorrow. I wish I hadn´t thrown out the original insoles a few days back, but oh well...they didn´t have near enough padding, and I´d still be dying, even if my toes had more room.
Swimming pools are becoming a daily obsession.
My hat works great...as long as I stitch up the back of the brim, otherwise it hits my pack. Second day the sewing kit has come to the rescue.
The Germans are like Abbott and Costello. Today I kept sending them onward because if they kept chattering all around me, I´d kill ´em. I love ´em, but they´d have to die. Too much idiot slapstick American pop culture humor. Jeeeeeez.
Skip Norris is a great walking buddy. Sometimes I´m way ahead, sometimes he is. We keep a good pace. Sometimes his headphones are on, sometimes mine are, sometimes both. Think I´ll stick with him a while. We don´t ever see Hank or Yasmeen or Al on the trail, but we usually find them in the evenings. Yasmeen is quite a large Austrian girl...did I mention her before?...attacked by a bull in Santo Domingo last time she tried...? Found out tonight to my disappointment that a large part of her Camino is by bus. Shame. Yet, why should we judge her? Interesting thoughts.
My pants fit looser. Need to keep tightening the belt and the hipstrap on my pack.
We saw our puppy today!! She´s still going....
Pack organization is now a science...approaching a ballet.
If you´re reading this and thinking of doing the Camino, DO IT. You need NO preparation. Today I took a picture of a German couple...he is 70, she is 67. They´re doing the same route. I had NO hiking experience as of 8 days ago. You see all kinds of footwear. Every night I´ve had a hot shower...many places have a washer (and they give you soap)...and this is my first time without a pillow (sent it home from Puenta, dammit). ONE night without Internet. Cheap days (as long as you don´t buy knee braces and if you can keep your drinking to a minimum...or help Australians drain their blisters and then they buy beer for you). It´s a sweet, sweet, simple life. All you do is walk. My group has NO drama. You want to walk at a different pace, off you go. You want to skip ahead, more people are waiting for you. Helps on the trail to speak German. The Farmacia is the candy store...you can´t help but go in, looking for ¨body repair¨ items. Simple pleasures become joys. Bring a digital camera...and ALWAYS TAKE THE PICTURE. You can delete it later if it´s crap, but if this three-monk one is good when I get home, it´s getting sent to NatGeo. And get a guidebook. It sucks not to know what you´re looking at when you see something cool, and it´s not enough to go home and read about what you saw and try to remember the good parts.
DO IT. It´s the cheapest, most rewarding vacation you´ve ever had. I´m on day 8 of 35 and I already know this. It doesn´t matter what size you are, what shape you´re in, or how old you are. Just do it. And if you can...do it alone. Let St. James send you some of the most amazing friends you´ll ever have...don´t insulate yourself with a friend, or godforbid, a significant other...at least, not if you´re young. The old couples are cute and kind of touching, but no one talks to the young couples. They don´t seem to need anyone else, which I think violates the spirit of the Camino. But to each his own.
All for now. Thanks again for reading...I love the comments, so please do...and tomorrow, hopefully Navarette. If you find something interesting to see there or just beyond, email me...though I hope to have a guidebook by 10am tomorrow.
Love you all.
WELL. Didn´t make it to Logroño. First time I haven´t reached my goal, but it was a flimsy one, and I just didn´t have it in me to go 29km today. Nor would I have been able to go 28km tomorrow. I think I need to be okay with about 20km per day for the time being...so what I hoped would be two days will become three. It´s okay.
Let me backtrack to last night. When Felix said he´d cook dinner, I thought he meant he´d cook DINNER. Felix cooked DESSERT. For like 10 people. Make that for like 10 KINGS. This stuff was SOOOOOO good. It was like a really, really thick pancake cooked in a huge skillet, then cut up into big chunks, and topped with a syrupy, crystallized type of peach topping that was just to DIE for. Everyone in Germany/Austria/Hungary knows what it is, and so people kept popping by to scoop out heaps of it onto little plates and they were all really excited about it. Go Felix! =)
Al...Donk...the SS Officer / should-be-an-Australian-rugby-captain guy...loves me. Turns out he´s been putting us on. His English might be better than mine. I asked what he did, and here comes this entire paragraph about corporate logos and marketing designs and exhibitions and on and on and on. We hung out a lot last night. It´s starting to get really bad, my frustration with not being able to post pictures. I want to show you everything and everyone I´m talking about!!!
Got some laundry processed last night. You can usually trust the washers, but don´t count on the dryers. Thanks to good pre'trip planning, I have nothing cotton with me and all my stuff got dry, but Brad (whose new name is Skip Norris, Chuck´s younger Australian half-brother) has a lot of cotton and cammo stuff and it just doesn´t get done. Plus, it´s heavier. NO COTTON on the Camino!!!
About Skip Norris. Skip or Skippy, in case you´ve never met an Aussie, is what they call kangaroos in Australia. And amongst our group, we´ve developed an obsession with Chuck Norris. Lauren, if you´re reading, I need those lists that were on your classroom door about Chuck. Every time we come across a situation, we try to figure out how Chuck would handle it. Example:
Felix: I´m hungry.
Brad: What would Chuck do if he were here and he got hungry?
Kasey Kahne: ...(quietly beginning to sing part of some random song in broken English containing a random word said somewhere in the conversation)
Me: Chuck would eat the tree bark.
Brad: Aw, yeah! Chuck would walk up to the trees and they would just drop their bark in fear!
Felix: Chuck would peek up zeh tree and carry it witt heem.
Me: Chuck would will a tree to grow up from the bare ground.
Kasey Kahne: ...(still singing)
And on and on and on.
Kasey Kahne does that a lot. But he looks like Kasey Kahne, so pretty much anything he does is okay by me.
We made GREAT time this morning. I was listening to MePhiMe and hit a killer stride. We probably did 6 miles in the first two hours, which is nothing if you´re walking your neighborhood in sneakers without blisters or thirty pounds on your back, but if you´re cutting across country and up and down hills and are loaded down like we are, it´s pretty damn good time. Walking out of a beautiful little village, we saw some kind of fruit tree. Skip Norris said they were locuts (?) and that they were really sweet...and he was right. We picked four. They were like hard little peaches, really juicy.
Lots of olive trees today. Lots of vineyards, some more wheat...the hills weren´t too bad. But no one tells you that you go about 12km between Torres del Rio and Viana with NO WATER FOUNTAINS. All three of the boys ran out. The Camelback is KING. Especially if you can sweet talk the lady behind the bar at the lunch spot to give you some ice to put in it. =) Today was a banner day for lunch...we just went ahead and bought bocadillos at a bar and I learned how to ask for mayo and mustard...so that way it wasn´t just ham on a dry hoagie. Thank GOD.
Not much else interesting to say about today. The pack has vanished. I no longer notice it on my back. My feet, however, cannot be similarly convinced, and are screaming pain by the end of the day.
Here´s a concern...open to solutions...I have lost all skin sensation on the front of my right arm from my shoulder to halfway down my upper arm. I noticed it yesterday afternoon...it didn´t come back last night...and it´s still that way today. Today my left big toe went the same way. Is this normal???
Viana isn´t a pretty town from far off. You do a lot of the approach on the side of the highway, which is also not pretty, nor are the cranes all over the new part of town. But the refugios are in the old part of town, with A MAGNIFICENT church. The church is also a refugio, but it´s barebones and donations. The Germans, Hank, and Al are all there, and they said they donated about 2€ because there are no beds, they´re sleeping on mats on the floor. (And just yesterday I was grumbling about the pound my sleeping mat, thus far unneeded, was adding to my pack.) That didn´t sound to good to Skip Norris and I, so we went looking for another one. This one looks like it´s in a castle. Just outside the windows in the hall is a great ruined abbey type structure, currently being rebuilt. There are TRIPLE decker beds this time...we are both on the top...that sucks...but the shutters open up to a view that you would happily pay 300 bucks for on a Spanish vacation. I´m not kidding. Got a picture of the valley and the olive trees in the courtyard and the 11th century stonework framing it all. TO DIE FOR.
We sat with the old crowd on the street outside the church and had a few beers. Dinner was a kind of fried egg sandwich...interesting. The second one was better...had sausage in it. Skip Norris and I went to look at the facade of the church and immediately decided to grab our beers and sit just inside the churchyard gates so we could just stare up at it. It was in a beautiful square...nearly deserted at first except for our group and a crowd of about eight German speedbikers...but gradually filled up the closer it got to Mass time. Before Mass I went in and looked around. It was as good as any church I´ve seen in England, except maybe Salisbury or Westminster Abbey. It´s just so frustrating not to know what you´re looking at!! We´ve vowed not to leave Logroño without a guidebook.
Early to bed tonight. We want to leave at 6am tomorrow and get to Logroño by 9am...hunt around in some shoe shops...Skip needs a new pack (the one I sewed the strap back onto yesterday is the worst one in the WORLD) and I and my pinkie toe are seriously considering some trekking sandals that you can wear socks with. The only problem with this plan is, if I´m not wearing my boots, I have to carry them. So we´re going to take our time in Logroño and hopefully make it to Navarette tomorrow...about 25km.
I popped the pinkie toe nipple-horn-blister thing about an hour ago and wrapped it up in Compeed. Hopefully it will get better tomorrow. I wish I hadn´t thrown out the original insoles a few days back, but oh well...they didn´t have near enough padding, and I´d still be dying, even if my toes had more room.
Swimming pools are becoming a daily obsession.
My hat works great...as long as I stitch up the back of the brim, otherwise it hits my pack. Second day the sewing kit has come to the rescue.
The Germans are like Abbott and Costello. Today I kept sending them onward because if they kept chattering all around me, I´d kill ´em. I love ´em, but they´d have to die. Too much idiot slapstick American pop culture humor. Jeeeeeez.
Skip Norris is a great walking buddy. Sometimes I´m way ahead, sometimes he is. We keep a good pace. Sometimes his headphones are on, sometimes mine are, sometimes both. Think I´ll stick with him a while. We don´t ever see Hank or Yasmeen or Al on the trail, but we usually find them in the evenings. Yasmeen is quite a large Austrian girl...did I mention her before?...attacked by a bull in Santo Domingo last time she tried...? Found out tonight to my disappointment that a large part of her Camino is by bus. Shame. Yet, why should we judge her? Interesting thoughts.
My pants fit looser. Need to keep tightening the belt and the hipstrap on my pack.
We saw our puppy today!! She´s still going....
Pack organization is now a science...approaching a ballet.
If you´re reading this and thinking of doing the Camino, DO IT. You need NO preparation. Today I took a picture of a German couple...he is 70, she is 67. They´re doing the same route. I had NO hiking experience as of 8 days ago. You see all kinds of footwear. Every night I´ve had a hot shower...many places have a washer (and they give you soap)...and this is my first time without a pillow (sent it home from Puenta, dammit). ONE night without Internet. Cheap days (as long as you don´t buy knee braces and if you can keep your drinking to a minimum...or help Australians drain their blisters and then they buy beer for you). It´s a sweet, sweet, simple life. All you do is walk. My group has NO drama. You want to walk at a different pace, off you go. You want to skip ahead, more people are waiting for you. Helps on the trail to speak German. The Farmacia is the candy store...you can´t help but go in, looking for ¨body repair¨ items. Simple pleasures become joys. Bring a digital camera...and ALWAYS TAKE THE PICTURE. You can delete it later if it´s crap, but if this three-monk one is good when I get home, it´s getting sent to NatGeo. And get a guidebook. It sucks not to know what you´re looking at when you see something cool, and it´s not enough to go home and read about what you saw and try to remember the good parts.
DO IT. It´s the cheapest, most rewarding vacation you´ve ever had. I´m on day 8 of 35 and I already know this. It doesn´t matter what size you are, what shape you´re in, or how old you are. Just do it. And if you can...do it alone. Let St. James send you some of the most amazing friends you´ll ever have...don´t insulate yourself with a friend, or godforbid, a significant other...at least, not if you´re young. The old couples are cute and kind of touching, but no one talks to the young couples. They don´t seem to need anyone else, which I think violates the spirit of the Camino. But to each his own.
All for now. Thanks again for reading...I love the comments, so please do...and tomorrow, hopefully Navarette. If you find something interesting to see there or just beyond, email me...though I hope to have a guidebook by 10am tomorrow.
Love you all.
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Estella to Los Arcos
I was mad all day that I got rushed off the computer so quickly. When I walk I think of so many things I wish I´d posted. Downside to keeping the blog...it´s been three days since I wrote anything but quotes from Aussie Ausbourne (Brad) in my journal. I wanted to describe so much more, and the next day, a whole 20km later, it fades so quickly....
Aussie calls me Sigourney Weaver. HAH!!!!
Well, today suuuuuuuuuuuuuuucked. Actually, only the second half. Today I walked with the Germans, Felix the Cat and Kasey Kahne and Aussie Ausbourne. (Sidenote on Aussie: DREW SWIFT - if you took me seriously and are actually reading this thing, you need to know that this Australian guy Brad is your Aussie alter ego. HE IS YOU. I´m pretty sure that´s gonna irk you, but I can´t help it. In fact, I´ve met a few people so far who seem SO CLOSE to people I know from other areas of my life. It´s strange.)
We took our time leaving Estella. I wouldn´t have minded spending the day there for a rest, but we pushed on anyway. Lots of hills out of town.
A lesson I´ve learned on the Camino...maybe I´ve said this already. Never underestimate the ability of the road to continue to go UP. BUT...also, never underestimate the beauty of the view you´re going to get at the top. Just when you reach the point where you´re cursing the waymakers, and looking bitterly down the dropoff to the road that went AROUND this hill instead of over it, you look out over a valley or at a church or a keep or SOMETHING and learn to shut up and trust St. James. The inclines are there for a reason. The Camino will have nothing to do with tunnels, shortcuts, or the path of least resistance, and all it asks of you is to trust it. Your reward is to breathe in the panorama and soak up the picture postcard you´re walking in for a solid month.
On our way out of Estella, we realized we were in some pretty serious wine country. Here is where my mother, Lynn, and everyone in Monterey is going to get really mad at me. We walked up this hill past a wine tour and decided not to wait for it because we had a long way to go today. But we also walked past a WINE FOUNTAIN. Someone had a picture later on and three other people swore to it, a FOUNTAIN OF RED WINE ON A WALL. And somehow an American and an Australian walked right by it without our alcohol homing devices going off. Byron, Ben, Grace...you would never have made such a mistake, and it will probably take me years to live this down. But, like the running of the bulls I narrowly missed, it just means I¨ll have to come back one day.
The first half of the day, from Estella to Villamayor de Monjardin, wasn´t that bad. Footpaths past vineyards. I picked a teensy little grape and it was pretty bitter. =) Soon after we left Estella and the wine castle (I don´t know how else to describe that building), we saw this kind of keep WAY UP HIGH on a REALLY HIGH MOUNTAIN. And I thought, GOD please don´t make us walk up there.... But it kept getting closer and closer, and Kasey Kahne´s map told us that Villamayor was the high point of today´s trek. Turns out Villamayor is the town just below the crest of that mountain, and is built on a sort of outcropping of it. We got to the albergue there, got a stamp, and found Christa from AustriaMozartNoKangaroos. YAY! (Michael from Idaho left the Camino today...it´s his second trip...if you do the Camino in the next few years, look for the albergue he wants to start somewhere along the way.) We had a long, leisurely lunch...Aussie and I had made sandwiches again, and the Germans found some German beer, and I had an ice cream straight from Heaven. On the square where we sat was the bust of a person. I found out it was the king of Pamplona from the early 900s, and he is looking up over the rooftop to the keep at the top of the hill. And the plaque says that he´s interred in that keep!! His eyes looked so realistic...it was chilling. I LOVE it when statues do that...look out towards something significant, like where their body is or where they died. Like King Charles (I or II I don´t know) who looks down Whitehall in London, where he was later beheaded. We got some pictures with the King.
In Villamayor, we saw three pilgrims dressed in long black cassocks with white collars. Big broad black brimmed hats and glasses. I asked to take their picture and IT IS AWESOME. Can´t wait to see that one blown up. They were very tolerant and were easily able to guess where I was from. I suppose my request was a little impertinent, but I couldn´t help it. It was a BOMB ASS PICTURE. And hey, you do the Camino in this heat in a long black robe, you´re gonna get some attention.
We left Christa from AustriaMozartNoKangaroos in Villamayor because she decided to take an easy day and rest, since she´d planned to stop in Pamplona and therefore was a day ahead of her schedule. I´m sorry to see her go. When you get off a day on the Camino, it´s pure chance or coincidence or Providence (pick one) whether you meet again.
After Villamayor, the only good thing were the views behind as we headed out of town. The church spires, the keep on the mountain, the town itself, the vineyards surrounding...beautiful. On the Camino, YOU MUST LOOK BEHIND YOU FROM TIME TO TIME. If you don´t, you miss some of the most amazing views available to you, and a lot of people don´t. In fact, it´s hard to even look AROUND you sometimes; you get so preoccupied with staring at your footing on the rocky trails. But you have to stop and look at what you just left. Sometimes it´s painful to do so...you feel like you´ve walked so far and what you left seems so close...but far more often, it´s breathtaking.
The rest of the day was hot sun beating down...misery. Not a spot of shade. Long gravely paths through wheat fields and vineyards and flocks of sheep. I STILL didn´t have a hat, and was hurting pretty bad until it occurred to me to use my towel and my headband to make an Arab style headpiece (which looked pretty badass, ha ha). I had to stop four times today for sunblock, but I¨m peeling tonight anyway. When I say it was hot sun beating down, you simply can´t imagine. This is why I want to skip the meseta up ahead.
Sometimes my knee was fine, and other times, it was all I could do not to scream. I don´t know why it comes and goes like that. My blisters are manageable...Compeed gelpads are straight from God...and muscle aches are still shifting. I would give my kingdom for another half inch across the toe of my left boot. My left pinkie gets mashed under the toe next to it, and as a result, has formed into a callous/blister type thing that´s something between a horn and some kind of weird nipple. I have sore spots on my collarbones from my packstraps.
About packstraps. I am the Pack Strap Queen. No one seems to know how to balance their packs, and a lot of people don´t know the top straps, the stabilizers, even exist. I now have a reputation for being able to fix people´s straps, and the looks on their faces when I´m done are kind of like someone getting a massage. Ha ha. LOVE being useful. I am also the best communicator in our group...in Spanish...everyone gets fluent in Gesture within a couple days.
Part of today was about tapping into anger. I got so pissed off at being stuck out on that endless prairie that I finally just took off. Realized that babying my sores and injuries didn´t hurt much less than stepping it out, so I got mad, cranked up the iPod, and booked it. It felt pretty empowering. Good experience. Aussie did the same thing soon after. =)
By the time we finally made it into Los Arcos, I was practically hallucinating visions of swimming pools. The Germans had reserved us all beds at an Austrian albergue in Los Arcos. DUDE. FOOT POOL. A tiled trench with a bench next to it, with ice packs floating in about three inches of water. HEAVEN. Such simple pleasures become so friggin´ amazing on the Camino. Sitting down is paradise. Cold water on your feet is beyond paradise. Crisp morning air. The nectarine I had this morning came from the Garden of Eden and would´ve been worth the exile.
Tonight we´re washing clothes. Aussie and I ran into each other in the town square after hunting down ATMs and hats. He made me buy a round-brimmed lady-type hat that he says makes me look like Mae West. Ha ha. We found him socks and me a new toothbrush, and even scored some after-sun lotion and FANFARE--A KNEE BRACE!! Wish I´d bought it at home when it was cheaper, but c´est la vie. Really excited about it. Met an American expat-type guy who is the head of the English department at the American University in Dubai. Nice conversation with him. Gave him my card.
The American crowd from Arres, the CCM group, is here tonight, but they´re being pretty inconspicuous. =) They´re very nice.
Felix said he´d cook dinner tonight, so I better get back upstairs, because it´s probably already happened.
Thanks for all the comments, especially the one about how I´m mandatory breakfast reading. =) Who is Sagalouts????? Rose G?? Thought that was right, but one is signed Ian??
Tomorrow...Logroño!!! Love you all.
Aussie calls me Sigourney Weaver. HAH!!!!
Well, today suuuuuuuuuuuuuuucked. Actually, only the second half. Today I walked with the Germans, Felix the Cat and Kasey Kahne and Aussie Ausbourne. (Sidenote on Aussie: DREW SWIFT - if you took me seriously and are actually reading this thing, you need to know that this Australian guy Brad is your Aussie alter ego. HE IS YOU. I´m pretty sure that´s gonna irk you, but I can´t help it. In fact, I´ve met a few people so far who seem SO CLOSE to people I know from other areas of my life. It´s strange.)
We took our time leaving Estella. I wouldn´t have minded spending the day there for a rest, but we pushed on anyway. Lots of hills out of town.
A lesson I´ve learned on the Camino...maybe I´ve said this already. Never underestimate the ability of the road to continue to go UP. BUT...also, never underestimate the beauty of the view you´re going to get at the top. Just when you reach the point where you´re cursing the waymakers, and looking bitterly down the dropoff to the road that went AROUND this hill instead of over it, you look out over a valley or at a church or a keep or SOMETHING and learn to shut up and trust St. James. The inclines are there for a reason. The Camino will have nothing to do with tunnels, shortcuts, or the path of least resistance, and all it asks of you is to trust it. Your reward is to breathe in the panorama and soak up the picture postcard you´re walking in for a solid month.
On our way out of Estella, we realized we were in some pretty serious wine country. Here is where my mother, Lynn, and everyone in Monterey is going to get really mad at me. We walked up this hill past a wine tour and decided not to wait for it because we had a long way to go today. But we also walked past a WINE FOUNTAIN. Someone had a picture later on and three other people swore to it, a FOUNTAIN OF RED WINE ON A WALL. And somehow an American and an Australian walked right by it without our alcohol homing devices going off. Byron, Ben, Grace...you would never have made such a mistake, and it will probably take me years to live this down. But, like the running of the bulls I narrowly missed, it just means I¨ll have to come back one day.
The first half of the day, from Estella to Villamayor de Monjardin, wasn´t that bad. Footpaths past vineyards. I picked a teensy little grape and it was pretty bitter. =) Soon after we left Estella and the wine castle (I don´t know how else to describe that building), we saw this kind of keep WAY UP HIGH on a REALLY HIGH MOUNTAIN. And I thought, GOD please don´t make us walk up there.... But it kept getting closer and closer, and Kasey Kahne´s map told us that Villamayor was the high point of today´s trek. Turns out Villamayor is the town just below the crest of that mountain, and is built on a sort of outcropping of it. We got to the albergue there, got a stamp, and found Christa from AustriaMozartNoKangaroos. YAY! (Michael from Idaho left the Camino today...it´s his second trip...if you do the Camino in the next few years, look for the albergue he wants to start somewhere along the way.) We had a long, leisurely lunch...Aussie and I had made sandwiches again, and the Germans found some German beer, and I had an ice cream straight from Heaven. On the square where we sat was the bust of a person. I found out it was the king of Pamplona from the early 900s, and he is looking up over the rooftop to the keep at the top of the hill. And the plaque says that he´s interred in that keep!! His eyes looked so realistic...it was chilling. I LOVE it when statues do that...look out towards something significant, like where their body is or where they died. Like King Charles (I or II I don´t know) who looks down Whitehall in London, where he was later beheaded. We got some pictures with the King.
In Villamayor, we saw three pilgrims dressed in long black cassocks with white collars. Big broad black brimmed hats and glasses. I asked to take their picture and IT IS AWESOME. Can´t wait to see that one blown up. They were very tolerant and were easily able to guess where I was from. I suppose my request was a little impertinent, but I couldn´t help it. It was a BOMB ASS PICTURE. And hey, you do the Camino in this heat in a long black robe, you´re gonna get some attention.
We left Christa from AustriaMozartNoKangaroos in Villamayor because she decided to take an easy day and rest, since she´d planned to stop in Pamplona and therefore was a day ahead of her schedule. I´m sorry to see her go. When you get off a day on the Camino, it´s pure chance or coincidence or Providence (pick one) whether you meet again.
After Villamayor, the only good thing were the views behind as we headed out of town. The church spires, the keep on the mountain, the town itself, the vineyards surrounding...beautiful. On the Camino, YOU MUST LOOK BEHIND YOU FROM TIME TO TIME. If you don´t, you miss some of the most amazing views available to you, and a lot of people don´t. In fact, it´s hard to even look AROUND you sometimes; you get so preoccupied with staring at your footing on the rocky trails. But you have to stop and look at what you just left. Sometimes it´s painful to do so...you feel like you´ve walked so far and what you left seems so close...but far more often, it´s breathtaking.
The rest of the day was hot sun beating down...misery. Not a spot of shade. Long gravely paths through wheat fields and vineyards and flocks of sheep. I STILL didn´t have a hat, and was hurting pretty bad until it occurred to me to use my towel and my headband to make an Arab style headpiece (which looked pretty badass, ha ha). I had to stop four times today for sunblock, but I¨m peeling tonight anyway. When I say it was hot sun beating down, you simply can´t imagine. This is why I want to skip the meseta up ahead.
Sometimes my knee was fine, and other times, it was all I could do not to scream. I don´t know why it comes and goes like that. My blisters are manageable...Compeed gelpads are straight from God...and muscle aches are still shifting. I would give my kingdom for another half inch across the toe of my left boot. My left pinkie gets mashed under the toe next to it, and as a result, has formed into a callous/blister type thing that´s something between a horn and some kind of weird nipple. I have sore spots on my collarbones from my packstraps.
About packstraps. I am the Pack Strap Queen. No one seems to know how to balance their packs, and a lot of people don´t know the top straps, the stabilizers, even exist. I now have a reputation for being able to fix people´s straps, and the looks on their faces when I´m done are kind of like someone getting a massage. Ha ha. LOVE being useful. I am also the best communicator in our group...in Spanish...everyone gets fluent in Gesture within a couple days.
Part of today was about tapping into anger. I got so pissed off at being stuck out on that endless prairie that I finally just took off. Realized that babying my sores and injuries didn´t hurt much less than stepping it out, so I got mad, cranked up the iPod, and booked it. It felt pretty empowering. Good experience. Aussie did the same thing soon after. =)
By the time we finally made it into Los Arcos, I was practically hallucinating visions of swimming pools. The Germans had reserved us all beds at an Austrian albergue in Los Arcos. DUDE. FOOT POOL. A tiled trench with a bench next to it, with ice packs floating in about three inches of water. HEAVEN. Such simple pleasures become so friggin´ amazing on the Camino. Sitting down is paradise. Cold water on your feet is beyond paradise. Crisp morning air. The nectarine I had this morning came from the Garden of Eden and would´ve been worth the exile.
Tonight we´re washing clothes. Aussie and I ran into each other in the town square after hunting down ATMs and hats. He made me buy a round-brimmed lady-type hat that he says makes me look like Mae West. Ha ha. We found him socks and me a new toothbrush, and even scored some after-sun lotion and FANFARE--A KNEE BRACE!! Wish I´d bought it at home when it was cheaper, but c´est la vie. Really excited about it. Met an American expat-type guy who is the head of the English department at the American University in Dubai. Nice conversation with him. Gave him my card.
The American crowd from Arres, the CCM group, is here tonight, but they´re being pretty inconspicuous. =) They´re very nice.
Felix said he´d cook dinner tonight, so I better get back upstairs, because it´s probably already happened.
Thanks for all the comments, especially the one about how I´m mandatory breakfast reading. =) Who is Sagalouts????? Rose G?? Thought that was right, but one is signed Ian??
Tomorrow...Logroño!!! Love you all.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Puenta la Reina to Estella
WHAT A GREAT DAY. This was the best day I´ve had in a LONG time. 180 from yesterday. Yesterday was the emotional low for the first week...today was a high every second.
Felix´s knee was hurting, so he and Kasey Kahne decided to sleep in. I´d been making a mental inventory for DAYS and finally decided I wasn´t leaving Puenta till I found a post office. I set out alone and asked several people where it was, and they all seemed to point me in different directions...till finally I was adopted by two little old ladies out for a morning constitutional. At four different intersections, they took my map and tried to tell me again where to go, but every time, they ended up just saying ¨Ven¨ and led me to the office themselves. It was an interesting conversation. My package was almost 2 kilos...about 5 pounds. (YAY!) She told me that Santiago would only hold it for 15 days and then send it back to Puenta...so I should send it to Leon for 6€, and then to Santiago for 6€...but then told me that it was 22€ to send it home. So home it goes. Sacrificed a pair of cargo pants, my blow'up pillow, my Coelho book, my hair stuff, and several pairs of liner socks. Worth every penny.
Leaving the post office, I didn´t know the way back to the Camino, but I saw a backpack rounding a corner and hollered ¨Peregrino!¨ several times till he stopped. And that´s how I met Brad the Aussie, who is a friggin´ PRINCE. He´s a night'shift chef on an oil rig off the coast of Western Australia, has a silver front tooth, and seven gypsy earrings in three holes in one earlobe. And he´s awesome. He ran twice with the bulls in Pamplona on a three day bender, and started the Camino from there yesterday. His friends back home have a $5000 bet that he won´t do the whole thing, so he´s very driven.
We stopped about a half hour later and shared some SERIOUSLY strong coffee from his thermos, and walked on. We talked about everything under the sun and had a blast. Australian humor is great...similar to American humor but still foreign enough to be hysterical. We talked about everything from Paul Hogan to politics.
Mid-morning, we ran into Christa from Austria, which was AWESOME, and an hour later, we stopped for lunch and found Idaho, Karl from Belgium, and the Germans. Aussie and I teamed up and bought two baguettes...he got cream cheese and salami, I got sliced cheese and ham...we made two hoagies that were simply to die for. We´re sitting there outside a cafe in a little medieval town on the top of a hill, looking down the winding, geranium-lined streets at the view of the sprawling valley below, with everyone I´d met so far on the Camino, and life just doesn´t get better.
But it does. The views were awesome today. My knee was better, though every now and then, I´d take a wrong step and it would hurt again. Up was hard today, more so than down. Different things are starting to hurt, and old pains are going away. New blisters today. Done with moleskin, bought some Compeed, the gel bandages the Germans gave me. The lighter pack helps. Aussie didn´t have two pairs of socks and I felt awful that I´d sent three pairs of liners home ten seconds before I met him.
We leapfrogged all day with Idaho, the Germans, Austria, and the couple with the little puppy from Los Arres (they DO carry her from time to time). We call her OUR puppy. They don´t speak English so don´t mind.
Once, Aussie and I lost the way and had to cut across a field to get back on track...had to leap a pretty sizeable trench at the end of the field. Lots of wheat today, and haybales. Lots of little towns perched high at the top of steep hills. Why is that?? Lots of towns crested with churches that are just gorgeous. Still no guidebook, so frustrated by not knowing what I´m looking at.
The Camino is nothing if not humanity au naturale. You get used to all kinds of smells. I´ve developed quite a knack for choosing the bathroom stall just vacated by the person with the worst gastrointestinal problems possible...but you just deal. I haven´t quite pinpointed which European countries don´t believe in deoderant, but I´m pretty sure Austria is on the list. The smell of sweaty feet is ubiquitous in the albergues. You deal.
¨So an American, an Austrian, and an Australian walk into a bar....¨ We hit an albergue in a little town and stopped for a stamp and a glass of their advertised fresh lemonade (passing up the sangria on the opposite side of the street). There was a big map of the world on the wall opposite the bar. I pointed to Virginia to show my friends where I was from. Christa pointed to Austria, and Brad pointed to Perth...and we spanned the globe. Suddenly I got an idea...made them do it again, and had the bartender take our picture!! The other two did the same and we got a great laugh out of it. There was a pilgrim´s passport on the wall that was three feet long, full of stamps....WOW.
I know now what Aunt Carolyn meant about leaving your bag lying around, hoping someone might steal it...tired of carrying it....
We hit a bridge over a stream with a rocky bed at one point. Austria, who had gotten ahead of us, was sitting eating lunch, so Brad and I stopped as well. Got some good pictures. THe bridge had a ledge where she was sitting, about 8 feet above the creekbed. When we were ready to leave, I swung my pack onto my shoulders...and thought, a half'second too late...¨Oh CRAP...CAMERA!!¨ Too late. It sailed out over the edge. NOT in the water...thank you, St. James. But broke. It´s now being held together with medical tape and STILL WORKS!! But I´m a dumbass, it´s official. I felt pretty stupid about that one. Sigh.
More walking. By 2pm, you hate life. It´s miserable. Lots of good bridges today, lots of updowns...finally made it to Estella. My Liverpudlian friend hated Estella...I love it. We wandered through town till we found the square, which was just beautiful. Church facade, restaurants with outdoor seating, shops everywhere...we got some beers and kicked back...ALL of us...Karl, Idaho, the Germans, Al, AussieKangaroos, and AustriaNoKangaroos. Dinner was wonderful...and EXPENSIVE. Today was not a good day for the budget. I bought a pack of needles(an adventure in gesture) and popped the Aussie´s blisters (we´re married for the day...he said if I´d had a nurse´s costume, I would´ve had a ring), which earned me three free beers. YAY! We had the best time.
Met a Venitian named Andrea...told us it means ¨male.¨ Ha ha, sorry, Andrea.... =)
SO much more to tell, but the guy who runs the albergue is going to have kittens if I don´t go to bed soon...it´s midnight. The albergue is staffed by people with mental impairments...very nice. NO HOT WATER AFTER 10. GRRRR.
I love the comments I get, but PLEASE sign your name!! I can´t tell who you are!!!
Love you all and miss you. Not much today, honestly...but still. =) If there are more days like today, I may never come home.
My toast tonight at dinner: ¨This is for all my friends back home who couldn´t be here because they have husbands, kids, and year'round jobs.¨ Sorry!! =)=)=)
Felix´s knee was hurting, so he and Kasey Kahne decided to sleep in. I´d been making a mental inventory for DAYS and finally decided I wasn´t leaving Puenta till I found a post office. I set out alone and asked several people where it was, and they all seemed to point me in different directions...till finally I was adopted by two little old ladies out for a morning constitutional. At four different intersections, they took my map and tried to tell me again where to go, but every time, they ended up just saying ¨Ven¨ and led me to the office themselves. It was an interesting conversation. My package was almost 2 kilos...about 5 pounds. (YAY!) She told me that Santiago would only hold it for 15 days and then send it back to Puenta...so I should send it to Leon for 6€, and then to Santiago for 6€...but then told me that it was 22€ to send it home. So home it goes. Sacrificed a pair of cargo pants, my blow'up pillow, my Coelho book, my hair stuff, and several pairs of liner socks. Worth every penny.
Leaving the post office, I didn´t know the way back to the Camino, but I saw a backpack rounding a corner and hollered ¨Peregrino!¨ several times till he stopped. And that´s how I met Brad the Aussie, who is a friggin´ PRINCE. He´s a night'shift chef on an oil rig off the coast of Western Australia, has a silver front tooth, and seven gypsy earrings in three holes in one earlobe. And he´s awesome. He ran twice with the bulls in Pamplona on a three day bender, and started the Camino from there yesterday. His friends back home have a $5000 bet that he won´t do the whole thing, so he´s very driven.
We stopped about a half hour later and shared some SERIOUSLY strong coffee from his thermos, and walked on. We talked about everything under the sun and had a blast. Australian humor is great...similar to American humor but still foreign enough to be hysterical. We talked about everything from Paul Hogan to politics.
Mid-morning, we ran into Christa from Austria, which was AWESOME, and an hour later, we stopped for lunch and found Idaho, Karl from Belgium, and the Germans. Aussie and I teamed up and bought two baguettes...he got cream cheese and salami, I got sliced cheese and ham...we made two hoagies that were simply to die for. We´re sitting there outside a cafe in a little medieval town on the top of a hill, looking down the winding, geranium-lined streets at the view of the sprawling valley below, with everyone I´d met so far on the Camino, and life just doesn´t get better.
But it does. The views were awesome today. My knee was better, though every now and then, I´d take a wrong step and it would hurt again. Up was hard today, more so than down. Different things are starting to hurt, and old pains are going away. New blisters today. Done with moleskin, bought some Compeed, the gel bandages the Germans gave me. The lighter pack helps. Aussie didn´t have two pairs of socks and I felt awful that I´d sent three pairs of liners home ten seconds before I met him.
We leapfrogged all day with Idaho, the Germans, Austria, and the couple with the little puppy from Los Arres (they DO carry her from time to time). We call her OUR puppy. They don´t speak English so don´t mind.
Once, Aussie and I lost the way and had to cut across a field to get back on track...had to leap a pretty sizeable trench at the end of the field. Lots of wheat today, and haybales. Lots of little towns perched high at the top of steep hills. Why is that?? Lots of towns crested with churches that are just gorgeous. Still no guidebook, so frustrated by not knowing what I´m looking at.
The Camino is nothing if not humanity au naturale. You get used to all kinds of smells. I´ve developed quite a knack for choosing the bathroom stall just vacated by the person with the worst gastrointestinal problems possible...but you just deal. I haven´t quite pinpointed which European countries don´t believe in deoderant, but I´m pretty sure Austria is on the list. The smell of sweaty feet is ubiquitous in the albergues. You deal.
¨So an American, an Austrian, and an Australian walk into a bar....¨ We hit an albergue in a little town and stopped for a stamp and a glass of their advertised fresh lemonade (passing up the sangria on the opposite side of the street). There was a big map of the world on the wall opposite the bar. I pointed to Virginia to show my friends where I was from. Christa pointed to Austria, and Brad pointed to Perth...and we spanned the globe. Suddenly I got an idea...made them do it again, and had the bartender take our picture!! The other two did the same and we got a great laugh out of it. There was a pilgrim´s passport on the wall that was three feet long, full of stamps....WOW.
I know now what Aunt Carolyn meant about leaving your bag lying around, hoping someone might steal it...tired of carrying it....
We hit a bridge over a stream with a rocky bed at one point. Austria, who had gotten ahead of us, was sitting eating lunch, so Brad and I stopped as well. Got some good pictures. THe bridge had a ledge where she was sitting, about 8 feet above the creekbed. When we were ready to leave, I swung my pack onto my shoulders...and thought, a half'second too late...¨Oh CRAP...CAMERA!!¨ Too late. It sailed out over the edge. NOT in the water...thank you, St. James. But broke. It´s now being held together with medical tape and STILL WORKS!! But I´m a dumbass, it´s official. I felt pretty stupid about that one. Sigh.
More walking. By 2pm, you hate life. It´s miserable. Lots of good bridges today, lots of updowns...finally made it to Estella. My Liverpudlian friend hated Estella...I love it. We wandered through town till we found the square, which was just beautiful. Church facade, restaurants with outdoor seating, shops everywhere...we got some beers and kicked back...ALL of us...Karl, Idaho, the Germans, Al, AussieKangaroos, and AustriaNoKangaroos. Dinner was wonderful...and EXPENSIVE. Today was not a good day for the budget. I bought a pack of needles(an adventure in gesture) and popped the Aussie´s blisters (we´re married for the day...he said if I´d had a nurse´s costume, I would´ve had a ring), which earned me three free beers. YAY! We had the best time.
Met a Venitian named Andrea...told us it means ¨male.¨ Ha ha, sorry, Andrea.... =)
SO much more to tell, but the guy who runs the albergue is going to have kittens if I don´t go to bed soon...it´s midnight. The albergue is staffed by people with mental impairments...very nice. NO HOT WATER AFTER 10. GRRRR.
I love the comments I get, but PLEASE sign your name!! I can´t tell who you are!!!
Love you all and miss you. Not much today, honestly...but still. =) If there are more days like today, I may never come home.
My toast tonight at dinner: ¨This is for all my friends back home who couldn´t be here because they have husbands, kids, and year'round jobs.¨ Sorry!! =)=)=)
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Zuribi to Arres to Pamplona to Puenta la Reina....
MAN it sucks when there´s no internet! What a couple of days...and already they start to run together, so it´s gonna be kind of tough for me to go back and detail it all. The only constant is PAIN.
Anyway. Yesterday. Zuribi´s hostel was okay...not great. Good thing: it´s a converted school, and you have to go outside the sleeping rooms to get to bathrooms and showers, so the door doesn´t lock at 10 like usual, and you can come and go all night long. Bad thing: the door doesn´t lock at 10 like usual, so EVERYONE can come and go all night long. But I slept okay.
We rolled out at about 7:20 am, and the goal was to get one town before Pamplona. Because the Feast of St. Fermin is still going on, the refugios in Pamplona are closed and you can´t stay there. So you have to stop one town short or one town past. We decided to stay with the monks at Trinidad de los Arres. It was a relatively easy day...we were there by about 12:30, and they didn´t open until 2, so we went hunting a pelegrino menu for lunch. The walk was mostly on narrow footpaths cut into STEEP hillsides. One wrong step and you´re tumbling down a LONG, LONG WAY. But it never seems very treacherous...it´s easy to stay on the path. It was drizzly all day...my first experience with my ill-preparedness for rain. Dad´s coat worked well...skipped the poncho; everything in the pack was able to get wet. Walked alone for a long time...for a while, was afraid I´d gone the wrong way. At one point, I came through a little town (ps - when I say town, I mean small conglomeration of houses you walk through in three minutes tops), and heard violin music. Bad violin music. Some guys in a very old building across from a church had set up a canopy and had laid out tea, coffee, and breakfast items, and a kid about 16 years old was playing the violin for ambiance while you sat and drank your tea! I stopped in to rest...they spoke a little English and I tried to answer in Spanish as best I could. It started to rain...I hit the church atrium and wrote a while...when it was back to drizzle I continued. It was beautiful the rest of the day, but kinda cold, which I did not expect....
Yesterday´s surprise was that there was NOTHING else to eat the whole day. Every town we stopped in had nothing open. Apparently nothing occurs on the weekends in Spain. I had a half a sandwich from the day before, some trail mix, and two nectarines, so I was set, but some others weren´t, and were ravenous by the time they got to Trinidad...which was a....
FRIGGIN´ HILTON IN A MONASTERY. These guys had it all. Except a grasp of English. ANY grasp of English. They charged us 6€, I think, and the guy who checked us in was a real joker. Since I only catch about 15% of what anyone says to me in Spanish, I got a laugh or two, and everyone else was blank. Anyway...he had an assistant that was kind of like his Igor...a stooped old man who was very eager to help but couldn´t communicate except in Spanish. They led us through the chapel (GORGEOUS) and through an outdoor garden to get to the stone steps leading to the part of the monastery that had our rooms. A couple different rooms for bunks (everywhere has had bunk beds so far...Karl says you always have to choose the bottom bunk because if someone below you farts, it goes upwards...ha ha...that statement is even funnier when said in broken English by a Belgian), kitchen, WASHING MACHINE!!!!, sitting area, vending machine TO INCLUDE HEINEKENS...it was awesome. I POUNCED on the washing machine, much to the envy of my friends. Didn´t think it through and put my pajamas in before I knew if there was a dryer. Didn´t realize there WAS a dryer till 8pm. Put things in the dryer and an hour later found out the dryer was a little shy on heat. So today, 24 hours later, things are still drying....
Anyway. Met a couple German boys. They´re wonderful. Felix and Florian. Florian should move to the United States and make a million dollars as a Kasey Kahne lookalike. (No joke, i have pictures to prove it.) Felix is my mother hen. Even brought me an ice pack for my knee. We sat outside under an overhang to get out of the rain and chatted for hours with Idaho and...
NINE HUNDRED OTHER AMERICANS. Well, only 8, but Americans are like elephants, it doesn´t matter how many of us there are, you´ll know it because you´ll HEAR us a mile away. These are Catholic Campus Ministry folks from colleges across the States. One was from Hyattsville. Ha ha. Another, from CO, lost his passport on the PLANE between London and Madrid and got shuffled back and forth in customs for TWO DAYS, a la Tom Hanks in The Terminal. He had a great story when he finally got there to Trinidad.
We hit a market and bought baguettes and salami and very questionable cheese to make sandwiches for the next day. I found Babybels, the Germans bought two six packs of beer, and I took it upon myself to introduce Florian to Oreos. (He´s now addicted.) Sat up and talked until Igor came and told us it was time for bed. Lots of ¨snorking¨ last night, as Karl calls it.
This morning I lost both Karl and Christa...my first day without them. Christa, bless her heart, gave me one of her Nordic walking sticks. So I have a stick. And Felix gave me a new shell, suitable for my exquisite credential frame job I have in mind. =) I set out with the Germans at 7am, hoping to catch the running of the bulls at 8...
WHICH WE MISSED BY LIKE 3 MINUTES. I´m friggin´ heartbroken. We were three blocks away when we heard two cannon shots. Knew that must be it. Couldn´t get there in time because I´m totally lame in my right knee...wrapped or not. (Felix made me drink magnesium last night AND this morning...hit the Tylenol PM last night...no help.) By the time we got close to the street, people were heading in the other direction.
Now. Americans think we know how to party. But I don´t think even Mardi Gras is happening at 8am on a Sunday morning like the folks in Pamplona do it. It was unbelievable. It was EIGHT AM and it felt like 5pm because EVERYONE was drunk. People were camping out in parks...tents, blow-up matresses, sleeping where they fell...people were roaring drunk...pissing against walls (three guys in 20 yards)...packing the bars...open bottles of vodka, broken beer bottles everywhere, loud, bawdy, obnoxious...everyone had like four inches of the bottoms of their pants dirty with I don´t want to know WHAT...it was unbelievable. Everyone was in white with red bandanas around their necks and red sashes around their waists. There were openings in the streets where they put big wooden posts to make a sort of chute...corral...don´t know what. One on each side of the street. I don´t know if the bulls ran through the chutes or if people were in the chutes and the bulls ran between them...? Dunno. What I DO know is that people who got gored, trampled, wounded however by the bulls were JUST getting first aid as we arrived on the scene. (Like any good American, i got pictures of that.) One guy was being carried out on a stretcher a few minutes later, with a very bloody and bandaged fellow walking after. Everyone was packing the streets...civil workers were trying to sweep and spray away blood and beer and wreckage...they were taking down the chutes...people were packing into bars to watch the running that had JUST happened on TV. To see it on TV is breathtaking...but I´m DEVASTATED that I couldn´t see the real thing. My consolation is that another pilgrim found us in the streets and said she was right there and never saw the bulls because of all the people....
Pamplona was insane. We got away from the crowds and sat and had tea and tried to plan the day. We´d done 5 km into Pamplona and had 24 to go if we wanted to reach Puneta la Reina (the Queen´s Bridge). Because my knee was so bad, I was doubtful, but I´m really afraid I won´t make Santiago, so I´m letting my bravado cloud my judgment, which is either brave or stupid, and probably the latter.
We set out from Pamplona. With two women and two little girls with shells and packs...one was seven. She was cute as hell. We left them behind and headed into the hills.
Scary part for today: stopped at a close albergue outside Pamplona because my new diet caught up to me and I was in a bad way...across the street, two old women were leaning out of their balconies and it turns out they were the owners of the albergue. I pleaded my case as best I could and one disappeared and the other said something that I took to mean ¨you can use ours¨ so I headed closer to the house. And their two chained German sheperds went NUTS. Full-on attack mode. They were both chained, but I´ve never been the target of a guard dog´s rage, when he´s barking as hard as he can, showing every white tooth in his mouth with every bark, and when the other one appeard on the other side of me from around the corner of the building and went berserk as well, all I could do was stand there, frozen, staring at them, and thinking how sharp and perfect and white their teeth were...and it scared the living Christ out of me, and when the lady finally appeared and took me back across the street to the albergue and I got into the bathroom, I broke down and cried and couldn´t stop. Sheesh.
Florian had a paper that shows elevation of each day´s route. Today included Alto de Perdón...and it looked like a teepee. CRAP. The uphill started out gradual as we left the city. At one point, rain was threatening, so we stopped and took about ten minutes to gear up and put on ponchos and raincoats and wrap up our packs. When we finished, the rain had stopped and never started again. Ha ha, God. We walked on dirt footpaths that wound between wheat fields...it was like the opening scene of Gladiator. I tried to run my hands across them like Russell Crowe does...they´re stiff. Every now and then, the wheat fields would be broken up by sunflower fields. With random castles and keeps and churches on hills. It´s BREATHTAKING.
But so was the hill as it got steeper. The German boys left me far behind (which is good...it´s an unspoken Camino rule...you don´t ask people to wait for you...you don´t infringe upon the pace of someone else´s Camino in order to serve the pace of your own...they go or you go and maybe you meet up and maybe you don´t). As I neared the top of the hill at a snail´s pace, I looked down and saw the cars leaving Pamplona heading into a tunnel THROUGH the hill and got REALLY bitter. But about five minutes later, I crested the hill and saw the iron memorial to the pilgrims there. Google ¨Alto de Perdón¨ and hit Images...I still haven´t figured out how to download pictures, but you have to see this memorial.
Suddenly I was crying (again, ha ha). 1) My knee hurt. 2) I had been thinking about the picture of this memorial that I´d seen on Facebook and I didn´t know where on the Camino it was. I was afraid I´d miss it on the train or something, and suddenly, there it was...and it was SO MOVING...they look like they´re suffering through such hardship but still pressing on...kind of like the memorial to the Donner Party in Truckee. It was unbelievable. We´re up here on this cold, windswept hilltop with these huge windmills on one side of us (Don Quixote, anyone?) and this memorial on the other, and in front of us is this view of the valley below that was just amazing and 3) REALLY REALLY FAR. AND REALLY STEEP DOWN. AND REFER TO 1). Bawling. I was a mess. Ha ha. The German boys were still there and we had a sitdown with a sandwich. The Blue Ridge and the Shenandoah Valley have NOTHING on this view. And suddenly I knew why the Camino doesn´t take the tunnel.
The Camino demands that you pay for its beauty. In sweat, in tears, in sore muscles, in blisters, in agonized feet and legs and hips...YOU PAY. But it is WORTH it. Every picture I take is to bring a particle of this beauty to someone else who isn´t here to see it, but the pictures will never do justice to what I´ve seen here. It´s like the bulls...you can see it on television, but to have seen it in the flesh would have been more dramatic to an indescribable degree...like the difference between this panorama from Alto de Perdón and the photographs of it.
And right in front of us was a billboard showing what we were looking at. And Puenta la Reina wasn´t the first town we could see. Or the next. OR THE NEXT. We had another 16 km to go. And opportunities to stop. I was just wondering how the hell I was going to get off that mountain with this knee I have. But there was nothing else to do but start down (and cry, which I did more of). The Germans passed me in about 15 minutes, and eventually Idaho caught up with me and stayed with me for the next three hours, bless his heart.
Found the Germans again, made it through a few more towns...nothing else noteworthy to describe except the pain, which is indescribable. Sometimes it goes away for 10 minutes at a time, equally inexplicable, and comes back, but even when it´s gone, it´s only replaced by sore feet (did I mention the blisters have appeared? And that I can´t get moleskin to stick? And that Felix has these gelpads that are AWESOME?) and sore muscles and sore hips and sore shoulders.
I´ve purged the pack. About 5 pounds worth. Dunno whether to send it home, to Santiago, or to Wendy (who, if you´re reading this, please send your address to merlintoes@hotmail.com ASAP!!). But it has to go and I don´t want to throw it out.
So here we are in Puenta la Reina, as of 5:30pm (10 hour day, KILLER). I wrote postcards while I sat in the bar and watched the bullfights (and then tried NOT to watch the bullfights, as they´re heartbreaking and the bull always gets killed in the end, and made me long for good ol´ American rodeo...more tears...what an emotional day this was). Note: San Miguel beer is pretty good and hits HARD.
Notes on the refugio here...basement of a hotel...SHOWERS TO DIE FOR. Massage settings that come from spouts in the wall along your body. Have had a hot shower in every place I´ve stayed so far. Also washer and dryer here. 6€. Right at the top of where the path comes out. Have not seen the Queen´s Bridge yet, but in no hurry to leave tomorrow. 19km or so to Estrella. I plan to take my time, like I did today. Wait around for a post office to open, maybe.... Felix´s leg is hurting, so I might walk alone tomorrow, for the first time. Lost Karl and Christa and no sign of Idaho. Walking alone should be interesting...and necessary.
It´s been hard, and like I said, today was ridiculously emotional. But I expected that. Maybe even wanted it. I think this is a good thing. I encourage anyone looking for a challenge to try it out. Someone today said you lose about 10kg on the Camino, and if you ask me, this beats the HELL out of spending the summer in a gym (though today I would´ve given my eyeteeth for a poolside margarita).
Okay, I´ve been writing for an hour now, and you´re all caught up, I think, and I have only 7 minutes left. I´ve also crashed the last two computers I tried to access MySpace from, so if you´re trying to write me there, I haven´t gotten it. Also, Mom, I don´t think my email is forwarding...nothing is coming from my Verizon address. Could you check if you have time?
Last story, a funny one. We had this German I call Al. He looks like Donk from Crocodile Dundee...like an Australian rugby captain, like an SS officer. He´s enormous. We think he´s the devil. Can hardly understand him, but you always know he´s up to something. And he eats his french fries with honey. I made a face, and (his English is really bad) he looks at me and holds one out. ¨I am sure you never die,¨ he said. I took that to mean ¨It won´t kill you¨ and popped it in my mouth.
It was awful. =)
Anyway. Yesterday. Zuribi´s hostel was okay...not great. Good thing: it´s a converted school, and you have to go outside the sleeping rooms to get to bathrooms and showers, so the door doesn´t lock at 10 like usual, and you can come and go all night long. Bad thing: the door doesn´t lock at 10 like usual, so EVERYONE can come and go all night long. But I slept okay.
We rolled out at about 7:20 am, and the goal was to get one town before Pamplona. Because the Feast of St. Fermin is still going on, the refugios in Pamplona are closed and you can´t stay there. So you have to stop one town short or one town past. We decided to stay with the monks at Trinidad de los Arres. It was a relatively easy day...we were there by about 12:30, and they didn´t open until 2, so we went hunting a pelegrino menu for lunch. The walk was mostly on narrow footpaths cut into STEEP hillsides. One wrong step and you´re tumbling down a LONG, LONG WAY. But it never seems very treacherous...it´s easy to stay on the path. It was drizzly all day...my first experience with my ill-preparedness for rain. Dad´s coat worked well...skipped the poncho; everything in the pack was able to get wet. Walked alone for a long time...for a while, was afraid I´d gone the wrong way. At one point, I came through a little town (ps - when I say town, I mean small conglomeration of houses you walk through in three minutes tops), and heard violin music. Bad violin music. Some guys in a very old building across from a church had set up a canopy and had laid out tea, coffee, and breakfast items, and a kid about 16 years old was playing the violin for ambiance while you sat and drank your tea! I stopped in to rest...they spoke a little English and I tried to answer in Spanish as best I could. It started to rain...I hit the church atrium and wrote a while...when it was back to drizzle I continued. It was beautiful the rest of the day, but kinda cold, which I did not expect....
Yesterday´s surprise was that there was NOTHING else to eat the whole day. Every town we stopped in had nothing open. Apparently nothing occurs on the weekends in Spain. I had a half a sandwich from the day before, some trail mix, and two nectarines, so I was set, but some others weren´t, and were ravenous by the time they got to Trinidad...which was a....
FRIGGIN´ HILTON IN A MONASTERY. These guys had it all. Except a grasp of English. ANY grasp of English. They charged us 6€, I think, and the guy who checked us in was a real joker. Since I only catch about 15% of what anyone says to me in Spanish, I got a laugh or two, and everyone else was blank. Anyway...he had an assistant that was kind of like his Igor...a stooped old man who was very eager to help but couldn´t communicate except in Spanish. They led us through the chapel (GORGEOUS) and through an outdoor garden to get to the stone steps leading to the part of the monastery that had our rooms. A couple different rooms for bunks (everywhere has had bunk beds so far...Karl says you always have to choose the bottom bunk because if someone below you farts, it goes upwards...ha ha...that statement is even funnier when said in broken English by a Belgian), kitchen, WASHING MACHINE!!!!, sitting area, vending machine TO INCLUDE HEINEKENS...it was awesome. I POUNCED on the washing machine, much to the envy of my friends. Didn´t think it through and put my pajamas in before I knew if there was a dryer. Didn´t realize there WAS a dryer till 8pm. Put things in the dryer and an hour later found out the dryer was a little shy on heat. So today, 24 hours later, things are still drying....
Anyway. Met a couple German boys. They´re wonderful. Felix and Florian. Florian should move to the United States and make a million dollars as a Kasey Kahne lookalike. (No joke, i have pictures to prove it.) Felix is my mother hen. Even brought me an ice pack for my knee. We sat outside under an overhang to get out of the rain and chatted for hours with Idaho and...
NINE HUNDRED OTHER AMERICANS. Well, only 8, but Americans are like elephants, it doesn´t matter how many of us there are, you´ll know it because you´ll HEAR us a mile away. These are Catholic Campus Ministry folks from colleges across the States. One was from Hyattsville. Ha ha. Another, from CO, lost his passport on the PLANE between London and Madrid and got shuffled back and forth in customs for TWO DAYS, a la Tom Hanks in The Terminal. He had a great story when he finally got there to Trinidad.
We hit a market and bought baguettes and salami and very questionable cheese to make sandwiches for the next day. I found Babybels, the Germans bought two six packs of beer, and I took it upon myself to introduce Florian to Oreos. (He´s now addicted.) Sat up and talked until Igor came and told us it was time for bed. Lots of ¨snorking¨ last night, as Karl calls it.
This morning I lost both Karl and Christa...my first day without them. Christa, bless her heart, gave me one of her Nordic walking sticks. So I have a stick. And Felix gave me a new shell, suitable for my exquisite credential frame job I have in mind. =) I set out with the Germans at 7am, hoping to catch the running of the bulls at 8...
WHICH WE MISSED BY LIKE 3 MINUTES. I´m friggin´ heartbroken. We were three blocks away when we heard two cannon shots. Knew that must be it. Couldn´t get there in time because I´m totally lame in my right knee...wrapped or not. (Felix made me drink magnesium last night AND this morning...hit the Tylenol PM last night...no help.) By the time we got close to the street, people were heading in the other direction.
Now. Americans think we know how to party. But I don´t think even Mardi Gras is happening at 8am on a Sunday morning like the folks in Pamplona do it. It was unbelievable. It was EIGHT AM and it felt like 5pm because EVERYONE was drunk. People were camping out in parks...tents, blow-up matresses, sleeping where they fell...people were roaring drunk...pissing against walls (three guys in 20 yards)...packing the bars...open bottles of vodka, broken beer bottles everywhere, loud, bawdy, obnoxious...everyone had like four inches of the bottoms of their pants dirty with I don´t want to know WHAT...it was unbelievable. Everyone was in white with red bandanas around their necks and red sashes around their waists. There were openings in the streets where they put big wooden posts to make a sort of chute...corral...don´t know what. One on each side of the street. I don´t know if the bulls ran through the chutes or if people were in the chutes and the bulls ran between them...? Dunno. What I DO know is that people who got gored, trampled, wounded however by the bulls were JUST getting first aid as we arrived on the scene. (Like any good American, i got pictures of that.) One guy was being carried out on a stretcher a few minutes later, with a very bloody and bandaged fellow walking after. Everyone was packing the streets...civil workers were trying to sweep and spray away blood and beer and wreckage...they were taking down the chutes...people were packing into bars to watch the running that had JUST happened on TV. To see it on TV is breathtaking...but I´m DEVASTATED that I couldn´t see the real thing. My consolation is that another pilgrim found us in the streets and said she was right there and never saw the bulls because of all the people....
Pamplona was insane. We got away from the crowds and sat and had tea and tried to plan the day. We´d done 5 km into Pamplona and had 24 to go if we wanted to reach Puneta la Reina (the Queen´s Bridge). Because my knee was so bad, I was doubtful, but I´m really afraid I won´t make Santiago, so I´m letting my bravado cloud my judgment, which is either brave or stupid, and probably the latter.
We set out from Pamplona. With two women and two little girls with shells and packs...one was seven. She was cute as hell. We left them behind and headed into the hills.
Scary part for today: stopped at a close albergue outside Pamplona because my new diet caught up to me and I was in a bad way...across the street, two old women were leaning out of their balconies and it turns out they were the owners of the albergue. I pleaded my case as best I could and one disappeared and the other said something that I took to mean ¨you can use ours¨ so I headed closer to the house. And their two chained German sheperds went NUTS. Full-on attack mode. They were both chained, but I´ve never been the target of a guard dog´s rage, when he´s barking as hard as he can, showing every white tooth in his mouth with every bark, and when the other one appeard on the other side of me from around the corner of the building and went berserk as well, all I could do was stand there, frozen, staring at them, and thinking how sharp and perfect and white their teeth were...and it scared the living Christ out of me, and when the lady finally appeared and took me back across the street to the albergue and I got into the bathroom, I broke down and cried and couldn´t stop. Sheesh.
Florian had a paper that shows elevation of each day´s route. Today included Alto de Perdón...and it looked like a teepee. CRAP. The uphill started out gradual as we left the city. At one point, rain was threatening, so we stopped and took about ten minutes to gear up and put on ponchos and raincoats and wrap up our packs. When we finished, the rain had stopped and never started again. Ha ha, God. We walked on dirt footpaths that wound between wheat fields...it was like the opening scene of Gladiator. I tried to run my hands across them like Russell Crowe does...they´re stiff. Every now and then, the wheat fields would be broken up by sunflower fields. With random castles and keeps and churches on hills. It´s BREATHTAKING.
But so was the hill as it got steeper. The German boys left me far behind (which is good...it´s an unspoken Camino rule...you don´t ask people to wait for you...you don´t infringe upon the pace of someone else´s Camino in order to serve the pace of your own...they go or you go and maybe you meet up and maybe you don´t). As I neared the top of the hill at a snail´s pace, I looked down and saw the cars leaving Pamplona heading into a tunnel THROUGH the hill and got REALLY bitter. But about five minutes later, I crested the hill and saw the iron memorial to the pilgrims there. Google ¨Alto de Perdón¨ and hit Images...I still haven´t figured out how to download pictures, but you have to see this memorial.
Suddenly I was crying (again, ha ha). 1) My knee hurt. 2) I had been thinking about the picture of this memorial that I´d seen on Facebook and I didn´t know where on the Camino it was. I was afraid I´d miss it on the train or something, and suddenly, there it was...and it was SO MOVING...they look like they´re suffering through such hardship but still pressing on...kind of like the memorial to the Donner Party in Truckee. It was unbelievable. We´re up here on this cold, windswept hilltop with these huge windmills on one side of us (Don Quixote, anyone?) and this memorial on the other, and in front of us is this view of the valley below that was just amazing and 3) REALLY REALLY FAR. AND REALLY STEEP DOWN. AND REFER TO 1). Bawling. I was a mess. Ha ha. The German boys were still there and we had a sitdown with a sandwich. The Blue Ridge and the Shenandoah Valley have NOTHING on this view. And suddenly I knew why the Camino doesn´t take the tunnel.
The Camino demands that you pay for its beauty. In sweat, in tears, in sore muscles, in blisters, in agonized feet and legs and hips...YOU PAY. But it is WORTH it. Every picture I take is to bring a particle of this beauty to someone else who isn´t here to see it, but the pictures will never do justice to what I´ve seen here. It´s like the bulls...you can see it on television, but to have seen it in the flesh would have been more dramatic to an indescribable degree...like the difference between this panorama from Alto de Perdón and the photographs of it.
And right in front of us was a billboard showing what we were looking at. And Puenta la Reina wasn´t the first town we could see. Or the next. OR THE NEXT. We had another 16 km to go. And opportunities to stop. I was just wondering how the hell I was going to get off that mountain with this knee I have. But there was nothing else to do but start down (and cry, which I did more of). The Germans passed me in about 15 minutes, and eventually Idaho caught up with me and stayed with me for the next three hours, bless his heart.
Found the Germans again, made it through a few more towns...nothing else noteworthy to describe except the pain, which is indescribable. Sometimes it goes away for 10 minutes at a time, equally inexplicable, and comes back, but even when it´s gone, it´s only replaced by sore feet (did I mention the blisters have appeared? And that I can´t get moleskin to stick? And that Felix has these gelpads that are AWESOME?) and sore muscles and sore hips and sore shoulders.
I´ve purged the pack. About 5 pounds worth. Dunno whether to send it home, to Santiago, or to Wendy (who, if you´re reading this, please send your address to merlintoes@hotmail.com ASAP!!). But it has to go and I don´t want to throw it out.
So here we are in Puenta la Reina, as of 5:30pm (10 hour day, KILLER). I wrote postcards while I sat in the bar and watched the bullfights (and then tried NOT to watch the bullfights, as they´re heartbreaking and the bull always gets killed in the end, and made me long for good ol´ American rodeo...more tears...what an emotional day this was). Note: San Miguel beer is pretty good and hits HARD.
Notes on the refugio here...basement of a hotel...SHOWERS TO DIE FOR. Massage settings that come from spouts in the wall along your body. Have had a hot shower in every place I´ve stayed so far. Also washer and dryer here. 6€. Right at the top of where the path comes out. Have not seen the Queen´s Bridge yet, but in no hurry to leave tomorrow. 19km or so to Estrella. I plan to take my time, like I did today. Wait around for a post office to open, maybe.... Felix´s leg is hurting, so I might walk alone tomorrow, for the first time. Lost Karl and Christa and no sign of Idaho. Walking alone should be interesting...and necessary.
It´s been hard, and like I said, today was ridiculously emotional. But I expected that. Maybe even wanted it. I think this is a good thing. I encourage anyone looking for a challenge to try it out. Someone today said you lose about 10kg on the Camino, and if you ask me, this beats the HELL out of spending the summer in a gym (though today I would´ve given my eyeteeth for a poolside margarita).
Okay, I´ve been writing for an hour now, and you´re all caught up, I think, and I have only 7 minutes left. I´ve also crashed the last two computers I tried to access MySpace from, so if you´re trying to write me there, I haven´t gotten it. Also, Mom, I don´t think my email is forwarding...nothing is coming from my Verizon address. Could you check if you have time?
Last story, a funny one. We had this German I call Al. He looks like Donk from Crocodile Dundee...like an Australian rugby captain, like an SS officer. He´s enormous. We think he´s the devil. Can hardly understand him, but you always know he´s up to something. And he eats his french fries with honey. I made a face, and (his English is really bad) he looks at me and holds one out. ¨I am sure you never die,¨ he said. I took that to mean ¨It won´t kill you¨ and popped it in my mouth.
It was awful. =)
Friday, July 11, 2008
Roncesvalles to Zuribi
Well, I finally have some time to catch up. Here at this bar where we´ve been since 5 (my companions slugging back vino tinto and then eating a LONG meal), it´s 1 Euro for 12 minutes, but it´s driving me nuts that I´m not getting much time to write in my journal OR online, so I´m gonna drop a little coin and catch up here.
Things I´ve learned:
1. My pack is too heavy. I THINK I asked the waitress if the post office is open tomorrow, and I THINK she said yes, at 7am. But right after that, she brought us the breakfast menu. So we´ll see. At any rate, I´m sending home one outfit, leaving me with two. And anything else I think I can live without. I may just send it to Santiago via general post or to Wendy in Madrid...?
2. My right knee is ANGRY. If yesterday its warning was that of a tense, sniffing dog trying to decide whether or not to bark, today it is a snarling mongrel. We had a lot more downhill today, and though it wasn´t as treacherous as yesterday´s downhill nightmare, the effort it takes to maintain control on your descent is KILLER. And there´s only so many places you can put the impact. If it´s not on your feet, it´s on your knees, constantly flexed and absorbing the impact of your whole body plus about 30 pounds (which, as we´ve already covered, is TOO STINKIN MUCH). If it´s not in your knees, it´s in your hip joints, which are carrying a great deal of the weight of your pack because your collarbone is bruised and your shoulders are sunburned, and so, by the end of the day, they are way too taxed to absorb it either. I have an ACE bandage and I´ll probably wrap it tomorrow. I´m terrified it´s going to give out or whatever knees do when they die...and though I´m past my nightmare of ¨Day One: wrenched knee...flying home,¨ it´s still really early in the trip.
3. I´m really good at the water thing. I seem to always fill up just enough so that when I run dry, I´ve either gotten to a water fountain or to where I´m going. Or, like yesterday, to an old couple up in the mountains with lots of little prayerbooks in different languages, and who dumped an entire bottle of Evian into my Camelback, though we didn´t speak a single word in common. I felt bad about taking their water till my walking buddy told me she thinks that´s the whole purpose of their presence. Reminded me of Charlie´s ¨trail angel¨ he told me about from the AT.
3a. CHARLIE SHOULD DO THIS. Sorry, Lynn. But he´d love it. =) He could walk it with my dad while you and my mom followed in a car, sampling rich Navarran wine all the way. It´s unparalleled and CHEAP.
Okay, on to today´s report. Last night´s refugio was like a great stone church-like building. There isn´t anything in Roncesvalles except an ancient abbey (where monks still practice), the Alburgue, which is like a converted church building, and two hotel/bars. Every night, they hold a Mass where they bless that day´s pilgrims. I went last night. It was in Spanish, and I understood almost nothing, and really resented the parts where we had to stand (since most of the people there had just crossed the friggin´ mountains), but they gave us communion and then at the end, brought us up to the front of the pews for a blessing. He translated a sentence or two into French and English, so I caught at least that part. I bought a scallop shell, but I don´t like it because it has a red Basque cross on it (they all did there), so I´m going to look in Pamplona for another one. Lights went out at 10, and I mean WENT OUT. 120 beds in this big open space and I had to find mine in the dark. They went on again at 6, but most of the pilgrims were stirring by about 5:30 and half were gone when I woke up. We had until 8, so I took my time and caught up from last night´s journal writing.
We left Roncesvalles at about 7:30am. I say we. I mean me. I was, I believe, the last person to leave the alburgue. I had a towel, a loofah, four wool socks, and three pairs of underwear hanging off my backpack. Which is great till you drop your pack face down and it all gets dirty again....
The walk out of Roncesvalles was GORGEOUS. Sunlight slanting through the trees onto a forested pathway with stone cross monuments here and there...lush green fields just on the other side of the fenceline...later giant bales of hay, fields of pale cattle, and ONE black and white cat all alone in her own field on a bed of hay. =) Little towns with white houses and red roofs and the most gorgeous petunia window boxes you´ve ever seen. Some houses have, easily, 30 or 40 pots and windowboxes filled with flowers. Every house´s windows seem to be fitted with holders for these flowerpots. They´re amazing. I have pictures.
We stopped for breakfast and found them showing the running of the bulls in Pamplona. The news station doing the coverage kept showing these cartoon bull icons, like it´s a big joke and PEOPLE DON´T DIE. One cool thing about finally being in Spain is that I´m useful again. In our little crowd, I have the best grasp of Spanish, and while my comprehension of what people say back to me is agonizingly slow, I can usually get across what WE want just fine. So I´m usually in charge when we hit a restaurant or need to speak to a local.
On the Camino, there are some people you meet up with again and again. You don´t always walk together...people go at their own pace. You walk with a friend for 10 minutes or so, and then gradually, you separate, and when you stop to take a break, everyone regroups and the whole thing starts again. My tribe consists of Karl from Belgium, age 51, Michael from Idaho, age 65, and Christa from Austria, 37. Two other Belgians named Jean-Francois and Jean-Charles (or JC and JF) meet us from time to time. It´s a nice crowd. Especially since no one is in a hurry. We take our time. (Too much time today, we agreed.) We took a leisurely lunch and had a sit-down and a SPRAWL in some grassy shade. It´s nice to stop, but sometimes harder to get going again.
On fellow pilgrims: I keep looking for people I think of as ¨in my group.¨ People who began in St. Jean. Sometimes I wish I didn´t have a group. But sometimes it´s nice. Nicknames are inevitable. Michael is simply ¨IdaHOOOOOOO!¨when he appears. There is a French girl I´ve been trying to meet for two days, but don´t know how to say ¨what is your name,¨only ¨My name is...¨ So today I just started with that, and found out her name is Peggy and she speaks NO English or Spanish, so when we see her coming, we holler ¨Le Frances!¨ and it´s our way of encouraging one another.
We had a lot more up-downs today than I was expecting. I´ve gotten REALLY GOOD at the Ups. Which is amazing, because yesterday I was a wreck. Even Karl said so...he was my first walking buddy and left me before long because I kept stopping. Today, we hit an incline and I go to town. (I taught Karl the phrase ¨step it out.¨) I´m usually in the lead when we hit an incline. But the downs are another story. Today I got left in the dust as we finally came into Zuribi, which stunk because I was so far ahead so much of the day.
The mountains are still in view and even the foothills are gorgeous. A lot of the scenery looks like a picture postcard. Green hills with fields and trees and little white farmhouses with red roofs. It´s incredible. I´m taking lots of pictures...I think 50 or so so far.
Today we walked for a little while with a 59 year old woman from Wisconsin whose pack was far too heavy. Idaho said she turned around at one point and went back to the last village. She was very nice, though...and proof that people of all ages and physical conditions do the Camino. I gave her one of my business cards, then gave one to all my buddies...felt a bit silly, but they all thought they were really cool.
A note on turning back...I don´t care WHAT is behind me. Every step on the Camino is a ONE-WAY VALVE. NOTHING will make me retrace steps. Nothing. Each one is too dear.
Not much else to tell about the day except that it was really hard at the end. We started at 7:30 and finished at 4pm...walked about 18km. Yesterday was 27km in about 10.5 hours. My pedometer said yesterday I took 37,860 steps, but that only about 9,000 of them were aerobic. The pedometer people are, in Emily´s words, cordially invited to bite me. Every MUSCLE TWITCH I´ve made in the past two days has been aerobic!!! (Karl says you lose 10kg on the Camino. If you´re counting, that´s 22lbs.)
The flies SUCK. They´re not in swarms, but there´s always a few around, and when one decides it´s in love with you, it´s maddening.
The weather has been perfect. It rained a bit today while we were in the bar, but while we´ve been walking it´s been sunny with a wonderful breeze. I use my fleece for the first hour and then it´s just gorgeous.
My little shampoo-conditioner-bodywash-laundry soap sheets were a miserable failure. I left them behind in Roncesvalles. (There´s two shelves downstairs to leave things on or to pick things up from...after the mountains, people get rid of a lot.) So today, when we got to Zuribi, we found a market, where I bought two nectarines and a travel pack of toiletries, simply because it had a travel-size bottle of shampoo, though it cost more than a full bottle would have. Doesn´t matter. Every ounce counts.
So far, NO BLISTERS. Not even a hotspot. I rule. But I can´t really move my legs very well. I almost cried when I realized the bar bathroom was down about 8 steps.
This is getting long, so final note. I did some route planning today. An average of 20 miles a day has become a more realistic average of 20 km a day...mainly because of hills, which slow you down A LOT. I´ve decided to take a train from Fromista to Leon, which cuts out 117km - 6 days´ walking. Karl says that´s cheating. I say, I REALLY want to see Finisterre if possible, and it´s not as easy for me to ¨just come back¨ as it is for him, and that apparently the entire countryside from Burgos to Leon is flat and barren and shadeless and hot. And even with the train ride, at this pace, I don´t make Santiago till Aug 9 anyway. So Finisterre is STILL a question mark. If I took no train at all, I wouldn´t even make Santiago, and hell if I´m going home without seeing the place I´m walking 500 miles to see! I´m not a pilgrim purist. Besides, I crossed the friggin´ PYRENEES, so I´ll have words with ANYONE who gives me flak about a train ride.... =)
All for now...I´m not sure this had any kind of order to it, but I tried. Hopefully I will sleep well tonight, and my leg will be better in the morning. Tomorrow´s plan is to get just outside Pamplona. With the festival still going on, the refugios are closed, so we can´t stay in the city. But we´ll hopefully be able to see the bulls run early Sunday morning.... I want a red kerchief before we leave there. =) Maybe even a shirt splattered with fake blood. Ha ha. FAKE, Mom, I promise....
Things I´ve learned:
1. My pack is too heavy. I THINK I asked the waitress if the post office is open tomorrow, and I THINK she said yes, at 7am. But right after that, she brought us the breakfast menu. So we´ll see. At any rate, I´m sending home one outfit, leaving me with two. And anything else I think I can live without. I may just send it to Santiago via general post or to Wendy in Madrid...?
2. My right knee is ANGRY. If yesterday its warning was that of a tense, sniffing dog trying to decide whether or not to bark, today it is a snarling mongrel. We had a lot more downhill today, and though it wasn´t as treacherous as yesterday´s downhill nightmare, the effort it takes to maintain control on your descent is KILLER. And there´s only so many places you can put the impact. If it´s not on your feet, it´s on your knees, constantly flexed and absorbing the impact of your whole body plus about 30 pounds (which, as we´ve already covered, is TOO STINKIN MUCH). If it´s not in your knees, it´s in your hip joints, which are carrying a great deal of the weight of your pack because your collarbone is bruised and your shoulders are sunburned, and so, by the end of the day, they are way too taxed to absorb it either. I have an ACE bandage and I´ll probably wrap it tomorrow. I´m terrified it´s going to give out or whatever knees do when they die...and though I´m past my nightmare of ¨Day One: wrenched knee...flying home,¨ it´s still really early in the trip.
3. I´m really good at the water thing. I seem to always fill up just enough so that when I run dry, I´ve either gotten to a water fountain or to where I´m going. Or, like yesterday, to an old couple up in the mountains with lots of little prayerbooks in different languages, and who dumped an entire bottle of Evian into my Camelback, though we didn´t speak a single word in common. I felt bad about taking their water till my walking buddy told me she thinks that´s the whole purpose of their presence. Reminded me of Charlie´s ¨trail angel¨ he told me about from the AT.
3a. CHARLIE SHOULD DO THIS. Sorry, Lynn. But he´d love it. =) He could walk it with my dad while you and my mom followed in a car, sampling rich Navarran wine all the way. It´s unparalleled and CHEAP.
Okay, on to today´s report. Last night´s refugio was like a great stone church-like building. There isn´t anything in Roncesvalles except an ancient abbey (where monks still practice), the Alburgue, which is like a converted church building, and two hotel/bars. Every night, they hold a Mass where they bless that day´s pilgrims. I went last night. It was in Spanish, and I understood almost nothing, and really resented the parts where we had to stand (since most of the people there had just crossed the friggin´ mountains), but they gave us communion and then at the end, brought us up to the front of the pews for a blessing. He translated a sentence or two into French and English, so I caught at least that part. I bought a scallop shell, but I don´t like it because it has a red Basque cross on it (they all did there), so I´m going to look in Pamplona for another one. Lights went out at 10, and I mean WENT OUT. 120 beds in this big open space and I had to find mine in the dark. They went on again at 6, but most of the pilgrims were stirring by about 5:30 and half were gone when I woke up. We had until 8, so I took my time and caught up from last night´s journal writing.
We left Roncesvalles at about 7:30am. I say we. I mean me. I was, I believe, the last person to leave the alburgue. I had a towel, a loofah, four wool socks, and three pairs of underwear hanging off my backpack. Which is great till you drop your pack face down and it all gets dirty again....
The walk out of Roncesvalles was GORGEOUS. Sunlight slanting through the trees onto a forested pathway with stone cross monuments here and there...lush green fields just on the other side of the fenceline...later giant bales of hay, fields of pale cattle, and ONE black and white cat all alone in her own field on a bed of hay. =) Little towns with white houses and red roofs and the most gorgeous petunia window boxes you´ve ever seen. Some houses have, easily, 30 or 40 pots and windowboxes filled with flowers. Every house´s windows seem to be fitted with holders for these flowerpots. They´re amazing. I have pictures.
We stopped for breakfast and found them showing the running of the bulls in Pamplona. The news station doing the coverage kept showing these cartoon bull icons, like it´s a big joke and PEOPLE DON´T DIE. One cool thing about finally being in Spain is that I´m useful again. In our little crowd, I have the best grasp of Spanish, and while my comprehension of what people say back to me is agonizingly slow, I can usually get across what WE want just fine. So I´m usually in charge when we hit a restaurant or need to speak to a local.
On the Camino, there are some people you meet up with again and again. You don´t always walk together...people go at their own pace. You walk with a friend for 10 minutes or so, and then gradually, you separate, and when you stop to take a break, everyone regroups and the whole thing starts again. My tribe consists of Karl from Belgium, age 51, Michael from Idaho, age 65, and Christa from Austria, 37. Two other Belgians named Jean-Francois and Jean-Charles (or JC and JF) meet us from time to time. It´s a nice crowd. Especially since no one is in a hurry. We take our time. (Too much time today, we agreed.) We took a leisurely lunch and had a sit-down and a SPRAWL in some grassy shade. It´s nice to stop, but sometimes harder to get going again.
On fellow pilgrims: I keep looking for people I think of as ¨in my group.¨ People who began in St. Jean. Sometimes I wish I didn´t have a group. But sometimes it´s nice. Nicknames are inevitable. Michael is simply ¨IdaHOOOOOOO!¨when he appears. There is a French girl I´ve been trying to meet for two days, but don´t know how to say ¨what is your name,¨only ¨My name is...¨ So today I just started with that, and found out her name is Peggy and she speaks NO English or Spanish, so when we see her coming, we holler ¨Le Frances!¨ and it´s our way of encouraging one another.
We had a lot more up-downs today than I was expecting. I´ve gotten REALLY GOOD at the Ups. Which is amazing, because yesterday I was a wreck. Even Karl said so...he was my first walking buddy and left me before long because I kept stopping. Today, we hit an incline and I go to town. (I taught Karl the phrase ¨step it out.¨) I´m usually in the lead when we hit an incline. But the downs are another story. Today I got left in the dust as we finally came into Zuribi, which stunk because I was so far ahead so much of the day.
The mountains are still in view and even the foothills are gorgeous. A lot of the scenery looks like a picture postcard. Green hills with fields and trees and little white farmhouses with red roofs. It´s incredible. I´m taking lots of pictures...I think 50 or so so far.
Today we walked for a little while with a 59 year old woman from Wisconsin whose pack was far too heavy. Idaho said she turned around at one point and went back to the last village. She was very nice, though...and proof that people of all ages and physical conditions do the Camino. I gave her one of my business cards, then gave one to all my buddies...felt a bit silly, but they all thought they were really cool.
A note on turning back...I don´t care WHAT is behind me. Every step on the Camino is a ONE-WAY VALVE. NOTHING will make me retrace steps. Nothing. Each one is too dear.
Not much else to tell about the day except that it was really hard at the end. We started at 7:30 and finished at 4pm...walked about 18km. Yesterday was 27km in about 10.5 hours. My pedometer said yesterday I took 37,860 steps, but that only about 9,000 of them were aerobic. The pedometer people are, in Emily´s words, cordially invited to bite me. Every MUSCLE TWITCH I´ve made in the past two days has been aerobic!!! (Karl says you lose 10kg on the Camino. If you´re counting, that´s 22lbs.)
The flies SUCK. They´re not in swarms, but there´s always a few around, and when one decides it´s in love with you, it´s maddening.
The weather has been perfect. It rained a bit today while we were in the bar, but while we´ve been walking it´s been sunny with a wonderful breeze. I use my fleece for the first hour and then it´s just gorgeous.
My little shampoo-conditioner-bodywash-laundry soap sheets were a miserable failure. I left them behind in Roncesvalles. (There´s two shelves downstairs to leave things on or to pick things up from...after the mountains, people get rid of a lot.) So today, when we got to Zuribi, we found a market, where I bought two nectarines and a travel pack of toiletries, simply because it had a travel-size bottle of shampoo, though it cost more than a full bottle would have. Doesn´t matter. Every ounce counts.
So far, NO BLISTERS. Not even a hotspot. I rule. But I can´t really move my legs very well. I almost cried when I realized the bar bathroom was down about 8 steps.
This is getting long, so final note. I did some route planning today. An average of 20 miles a day has become a more realistic average of 20 km a day...mainly because of hills, which slow you down A LOT. I´ve decided to take a train from Fromista to Leon, which cuts out 117km - 6 days´ walking. Karl says that´s cheating. I say, I REALLY want to see Finisterre if possible, and it´s not as easy for me to ¨just come back¨ as it is for him, and that apparently the entire countryside from Burgos to Leon is flat and barren and shadeless and hot. And even with the train ride, at this pace, I don´t make Santiago till Aug 9 anyway. So Finisterre is STILL a question mark. If I took no train at all, I wouldn´t even make Santiago, and hell if I´m going home without seeing the place I´m walking 500 miles to see! I´m not a pilgrim purist. Besides, I crossed the friggin´ PYRENEES, so I´ll have words with ANYONE who gives me flak about a train ride.... =)
All for now...I´m not sure this had any kind of order to it, but I tried. Hopefully I will sleep well tonight, and my leg will be better in the morning. Tomorrow´s plan is to get just outside Pamplona. With the festival still going on, the refugios are closed, so we can´t stay in the city. But we´ll hopefully be able to see the bulls run early Sunday morning.... I want a red kerchief before we leave there. =) Maybe even a shirt splattered with fake blood. Ha ha. FAKE, Mom, I promise....
Thursday, July 10, 2008
The Pyrenees and Roncesvalles
So today I crossed a mountain range on foot. Because I´m AWESOME.
It was beautiful but nearly pure hell in every other way. I got some awesome pictures, though none of me weeping bitterly every time I got to the crest of a rise and found that the path just turned around the mountain and kept going UP. Some of the inclines were EXTREMELY steep and they seemed never to end.
(Happy happy - back on a QWERTY keyboard!!)
This morning, after almost NO sleep (10 in the room, M&F, every creak and snore and noise from the window woke me up), I got some honey-flake-type cereal and a bit of coffee, grabbed a wrapped sandwich for the road, and hauled out of town. Dunno why I was in such a hurry...think I was trying to catch up with Clara. Glad I never did. She´s beast. Anyway, I walked alone for a while, and then with Karl the Belgian for a while, and then with two little old ladies named Mimi and Jocelyn, also I think from Belgium, one of whom was wearing a bundle of weeds and ferns and grasses for a hat, looking like some little grass nymph. They went really slow and stopped a lot, and advised me to do the same. Met up with a Mississippian named Joe and then an Austrian named Christa. None of them stayed with me for long...most passed me...but Christa moved slow enough for us to keep pace the rest of the day.
The mountains just never ended. I passed a house with a long red roof that ran right along the rising hillside behind it, and I think I probably took about five more pictures of the same house as it got smaller and farther below me.
Did I mention STEEP?? And NEVER ENDING?? You just can´t imagine. Loose rocks didn´t help. In some places the grass on the path was surprisingly thick and green, presumably because it feeds upon the blood, sweat, and tears of pilgrims. The views of the valley were breathtaking...when I´m not on a 20 minute time limit, dwindling to 6 minutes now, I´ll see if I can figure out how to download some pics.
When we FINALLY reached the end of the upslope, we found something far worse. It was 3pm, and we had two roads to choose from: a paved road sloping gently down the side of a mountain, and a dirt and rock road heading STRAIGHT down the mountainside at a suicidal tilt, complete with loose rocks and tree roots. After 10 hours climbing mountains. Guess which one had the arrow and which had the X (meaning wrong way)? YYYYEAH. So down we go, at a snail´s pace, thighs trembling, knees giving out, toes smashed against boots, blisters rubbing, dappling light making the loose rocks and tree roots even more treacherous than normal...DISASTER. And NO signs to let us know how much farther. Rolled both ankles twice but managed to not get any major injuries.
Long story short (because so is 3 minutes), made it in to Roncesvalles and have a bed in a giant cathedral with 160 bunks or so...heard a Spanish mass with a Pilgrim´s blessing, and got fed. Tomorrow´s trek, only 22 km, would like to go farther but should shut up since God only knows how I´ll feel tomorrow when today has time to set in.
But the bottom line is, I MADE IT OVER THE PYRENEES. Bragging rights forEVER. Lovin´it.
Last notes: still no hat, didn´t use sunscreen so shoulders and face are warm, and finally got a shell. More tomorrow...should be a much shorter day.
Love you all!!!
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Made it!!!
I am here in St. Jean Pied de Port after 22 hours of almost nonstop travel. Immediate note: keyboards are NOT the same in France as in the US, and God only knows what Spain's will be like. So typing this is going kind of slowly, which, combined with a 10pm curfew at the alburgue, means this will be short. After two flights, a LONG bus ride through Paris, and two train rides, I arrived in SJPP and said hello to a girl in front of me who was also carrying a pack. Her name is Clara from Holland and she had a reservation at a hostel...i did not. I followed her there, and they had ONE extra bed, which is now mine. 23 Euro got me enough dinner to choke a horse, a bed, a breakfast, and a packed lunch for tomorrow...GOOD DEAL.
Roncesvalles is FAR. Think strength at me; I'll need it.
Wish I could tell everything...perhaps tomorrow, perhaps will be too tired.
Randoms: just got a pilgrim's passport and my first stamp. Alburgue is beautiful. Tonight's crowd is mostly Dutch and German, all of whom comment on my last name. Ten of them look to be in their 50s...the other three are thirtyish. No hat yet. Scenery gorgeous...mountains daunting. MUST SHOWER SOON. =)
All for tonight...am alive and well and fed and sheltered and tomorrow I begin The Camino!!
Monday, July 7, 2008
Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow....
Boy, it certainly creeps in its petty pace. I’m a bundle of nerves at the moment. The anticipation is killing me. I’m scared to death and just want to get underway. I keep telling myself that I’ve been thinking about every part of this trip for two months, and my rucksack has been packed for a week now, and I have its contents honed to what is either necessary or worth its weight. I’m as ready as I can be.
I’ve been reading Jack Hitt’s book “Off the Road” about his Camino, and I’m not sure I’d recommend it. The cover compares his story to The Canterbury Tales. If you haven’t read it, I’m sure your first opinion of that comparison is that this book must be stuffy and boring. However, if you have read it (or were in my ’06 senior English classes), you know that this really means the cast of characters is an irreverent, obnoxious, belligerent, drink-sodden, philandering bunch of anything-but-pilgrims. Hitt’s book is similar. It’s been a little disheartening, as it reveals that human nature on a trek like the Camino can be giving and altruistic, but can just as easily be nasty and petty and full of first-grade-type politics. When resources and scant luxuries are at a premium, alliances are just as capricious as they were in grade school, and when broken, can be just as isolating. I hope that’s not what I find, and if I do, I hope I’m more successful than the author at distancing myself from such people.
But I have high hopes. I think your expectations have something to do with the reality you find. My dad’s version of that sentiment is “You make your own weather.” Since thirty years has taught me how seldom my father is wrong, I’ll go along with it.
People keep asking me something along the lines of, “What possessed you to do this?” “How did you come up with this idea?” “WHAT? WHY???”
I keep trying to come up with an answer.
It found me. And once it found me, it wouldn’t leave me alone. That’s the best I can do.
About a year and a half ago, an audiotape version of Shirley MacLaine’s The Camino caught my eye in the library. I checked it out and spent a week or so listening to it on the way to and from work. Most people know what a nutcase Shirley can be, and this book in no way disappoints that expectation. But a good bit of it seems to track with other information I’ve found on the Camino. Anyway, in any case, that book was my first introduction to the idea. I don’t know why it stuck in my mind...I guess I Googled it at some point or something...who knows. But once I started thinking about doing it, it started to pop up everywhere.
This spring, I got pretty disgruntled with teaching, and decided to leave the profession and spend a couple years living abroad. Cruise ships, tour guide agencies, work-around-the-world schemes...for a month or so, I was convinced I would do it. Rent my house furnished, ditch the car...the whole nine. Mainly because I got tired of all my married, new-mom friends saying things like, “Oh, I’m so jealous that you’re so unattached...you can do whatever you want...you have no kids, no husband...if I had that kind of freedom, I’d....” Fill in the blank. I got tired of being envied...I wasn’t DOING anything envious!!
As you might expect, the long-term-travel idea (“vagabonding,” in some circles) kinda got derailed. And up popped the Camino again.
The next thing I knew, I’d found several websites and a handful of books on the Camino. And the more I read, the more it appealed. It seemed the perfect mix of “out there” and control. For example:
Planning. It’s an established route. People have been doing it for years. The people on the Camino are all heading in the same direction (except for a few salmon), and to the same place. It’s not as haphazard as I-get-off-a-plane-in-Amsterdam-and-three-weeks-later-hope-to-wind-up-in-Venice-on-my-way-home. But it’s not a lockstep tour, either. I can go alone, but never really BE alone unless I want to be. I can go at my own pace. I can stop here and there, I can walk when I feel like it, I can reroute if I choose to...I’m in charge.
Help along the way. A pilgrimage route that’s been alive since the 700s is used to seeing exhausted-looking pedestrians with rucksacks and sleeping rolls. Everything along the route is pilgrim-oriented. Bars have cheap, meat-and-potatoes pilgrim’s fare. Hostel-type establishments are cheap or ask for donations. Fellow travelers share your hardships. Local churches and farmhouses are often willing to help when the hostel is full. Even schools open up fields and gym floors when the numbers swell in the summertime.
Maximum time, minimum cost. This equilibrium was key. I could be gone for over a month (my trip is 35 days), and much of what I’ll encounter will be relatively cheap when compared to major attractions in Europe at the height of the tourist season.
Simplicity. A friend of my father’s who has hiked the App Trail several times said if he doesn’t wear it or eat it, he doesn’t carry it. While the Camino has more civilization along its length than the AT, the premise is the same. I’ve spent two months thinking about what I REALLY NEED. A couple changes of clothes. Good boots and good socks. A quick-dry towel. Something to throw over me in the rain. A journal. Some moleskin and a couple band-aids. No hair dryer, no makeup, no jewelry, no worries about what I look like, NOTHIN’. And the absence of people I know...well...what are you like when no one knows you, and the people you encounter may never see you again? Talk about some serious self-awareness....
The idea of a pilgrimage. I kinda dig it. My religious journey has been an interesting one. I love the church I go to these days, and my pastor is AWESOME...but I’m not an especially religious person, and I never plan to be again. But the idea of stripping down to the barest essentials, placing yourself in the hands of the Almighty and counting on the help of strangers and your own perseverance to face hardship along the way...that’s pretty cool. The endpoint may be the tomb of an apostle of Christ, but I doubt such an experience will be any less transforming for anyone who chooses to undertake it, Christian or not.
I teach Transcendentalism. Whitman. Thoreau and his experience on Walden Pond. Emerson’s “Self-Reliance.” The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. If this stuff didn’t scream Camino at me all year long.... Well, I would’ve been deaf to miss it.
Then there are the coincidences. Divine interventions, perhaps. When I read The Alchemist last year, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on more Coelho books. A tight budget left me scouring the used bookstores for whatever they had. Only two. They went onto the shelf and I haven’t touched them since. This spring, a fellow teacher who heard of my plans asked, “Didn’t Coelho write a book called The Pilgrimage? Wasn’t it the same walk you’re doing?” After I bought the tickets, it occurred to me that I’d bought two Coelho books and never looked at them. Found them on my bookshelf. One of them was The Pilgrimage. The cover had a picture of a man in a cloak and a broad-brimmed hat, carrying a staff with a gourd (the medieval pilgrim’s typical garb), with a winding road leading into a scallop shell sunset (the shell is the symbol of the Camino), with a menacing-looking dog on the road (also frequent in Camino stories). No doubt. The book is coming with me.
Another one...my brother recently took a trip to Wisconsin. Good sister that I am, I bully into his house and pilfer about 25 CDs to download onto my iPod and return before he got home. He won’t care. I pick through his heavy metal and my sister-in-law’s country music and Fleetwood Mac. Somewhere in the pile is a CD called Pilgrimage. Intriguing. On the CD is a scallop shell. The booklet makes references to “Field of Stars,” translated as Compostela. Santiago de Compostela is the destination of the Camino. When I download it, the music is new-age electronic instrumental, inspired by the Camino. How the hell did a CD like THAT end up in my brother’s house??? He couldn’t answer. I kept it.
And it goes on and on.
So you just got the long version of my answer. Be careful. You’ve heard of the Camino now, if you hadn’t already. It might track you down, too. =)
Final preparations are in stride. It’s midnight. I’m meeting my dad at the house in just over 12 hours. I have a list of things to do tomorrow. I have to compile addresses for postcards. I have to process laundry. I have to hit the bank, the Starbucks, the library tomorrow. I have to forward my email, make sure the thermostat is set right, block the voicemail box on my cell phone. I have to take canned cat food to my folks’ for my cat. I have to figure out what I’m wearing on the plane. I have not YET walked with my new Superfeet insoles in my boots. Too much too much too much....
Simplicity.
If it’s not done, the world will not end. If I didn’t pack it, if it breaks, if it tears, they probably sell it in Spain. Blisters are not deadly. Thirty pounds is not fifty. Members of my family hate to lose, hate to quit, and (as I was told today) have never fallen out on a hump. I’ll make it.
“Ultreya” is the pilgrim’s cry on the Camino. Somehow, it translates to “Westward ho!”
I’m off. Ultreya!
I’ve been reading Jack Hitt’s book “Off the Road” about his Camino, and I’m not sure I’d recommend it. The cover compares his story to The Canterbury Tales. If you haven’t read it, I’m sure your first opinion of that comparison is that this book must be stuffy and boring. However, if you have read it (or were in my ’06 senior English classes), you know that this really means the cast of characters is an irreverent, obnoxious, belligerent, drink-sodden, philandering bunch of anything-but-pilgrims. Hitt’s book is similar. It’s been a little disheartening, as it reveals that human nature on a trek like the Camino can be giving and altruistic, but can just as easily be nasty and petty and full of first-grade-type politics. When resources and scant luxuries are at a premium, alliances are just as capricious as they were in grade school, and when broken, can be just as isolating. I hope that’s not what I find, and if I do, I hope I’m more successful than the author at distancing myself from such people.
But I have high hopes. I think your expectations have something to do with the reality you find. My dad’s version of that sentiment is “You make your own weather.” Since thirty years has taught me how seldom my father is wrong, I’ll go along with it.
People keep asking me something along the lines of, “What possessed you to do this?” “How did you come up with this idea?” “WHAT? WHY???”
I keep trying to come up with an answer.
It found me. And once it found me, it wouldn’t leave me alone. That’s the best I can do.
About a year and a half ago, an audiotape version of Shirley MacLaine’s The Camino caught my eye in the library. I checked it out and spent a week or so listening to it on the way to and from work. Most people know what a nutcase Shirley can be, and this book in no way disappoints that expectation. But a good bit of it seems to track with other information I’ve found on the Camino. Anyway, in any case, that book was my first introduction to the idea. I don’t know why it stuck in my mind...I guess I Googled it at some point or something...who knows. But once I started thinking about doing it, it started to pop up everywhere.
This spring, I got pretty disgruntled with teaching, and decided to leave the profession and spend a couple years living abroad. Cruise ships, tour guide agencies, work-around-the-world schemes...for a month or so, I was convinced I would do it. Rent my house furnished, ditch the car...the whole nine. Mainly because I got tired of all my married, new-mom friends saying things like, “Oh, I’m so jealous that you’re so unattached...you can do whatever you want...you have no kids, no husband...if I had that kind of freedom, I’d....” Fill in the blank. I got tired of being envied...I wasn’t DOING anything envious!!
As you might expect, the long-term-travel idea (“vagabonding,” in some circles) kinda got derailed. And up popped the Camino again.
The next thing I knew, I’d found several websites and a handful of books on the Camino. And the more I read, the more it appealed. It seemed the perfect mix of “out there” and control. For example:
Planning. It’s an established route. People have been doing it for years. The people on the Camino are all heading in the same direction (except for a few salmon), and to the same place. It’s not as haphazard as I-get-off-a-plane-in-Amsterdam-and-three-weeks-later-hope-to-wind-up-in-Venice-on-my-way-home. But it’s not a lockstep tour, either. I can go alone, but never really BE alone unless I want to be. I can go at my own pace. I can stop here and there, I can walk when I feel like it, I can reroute if I choose to...I’m in charge.
Help along the way. A pilgrimage route that’s been alive since the 700s is used to seeing exhausted-looking pedestrians with rucksacks and sleeping rolls. Everything along the route is pilgrim-oriented. Bars have cheap, meat-and-potatoes pilgrim’s fare. Hostel-type establishments are cheap or ask for donations. Fellow travelers share your hardships. Local churches and farmhouses are often willing to help when the hostel is full. Even schools open up fields and gym floors when the numbers swell in the summertime.
Maximum time, minimum cost. This equilibrium was key. I could be gone for over a month (my trip is 35 days), and much of what I’ll encounter will be relatively cheap when compared to major attractions in Europe at the height of the tourist season.
Simplicity. A friend of my father’s who has hiked the App Trail several times said if he doesn’t wear it or eat it, he doesn’t carry it. While the Camino has more civilization along its length than the AT, the premise is the same. I’ve spent two months thinking about what I REALLY NEED. A couple changes of clothes. Good boots and good socks. A quick-dry towel. Something to throw over me in the rain. A journal. Some moleskin and a couple band-aids. No hair dryer, no makeup, no jewelry, no worries about what I look like, NOTHIN’. And the absence of people I know...well...what are you like when no one knows you, and the people you encounter may never see you again? Talk about some serious self-awareness....
The idea of a pilgrimage. I kinda dig it. My religious journey has been an interesting one. I love the church I go to these days, and my pastor is AWESOME...but I’m not an especially religious person, and I never plan to be again. But the idea of stripping down to the barest essentials, placing yourself in the hands of the Almighty and counting on the help of strangers and your own perseverance to face hardship along the way...that’s pretty cool. The endpoint may be the tomb of an apostle of Christ, but I doubt such an experience will be any less transforming for anyone who chooses to undertake it, Christian or not.
I teach Transcendentalism. Whitman. Thoreau and his experience on Walden Pond. Emerson’s “Self-Reliance.” The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. If this stuff didn’t scream Camino at me all year long.... Well, I would’ve been deaf to miss it.
Then there are the coincidences. Divine interventions, perhaps. When I read The Alchemist last year, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on more Coelho books. A tight budget left me scouring the used bookstores for whatever they had. Only two. They went onto the shelf and I haven’t touched them since. This spring, a fellow teacher who heard of my plans asked, “Didn’t Coelho write a book called The Pilgrimage? Wasn’t it the same walk you’re doing?” After I bought the tickets, it occurred to me that I’d bought two Coelho books and never looked at them. Found them on my bookshelf. One of them was The Pilgrimage. The cover had a picture of a man in a cloak and a broad-brimmed hat, carrying a staff with a gourd (the medieval pilgrim’s typical garb), with a winding road leading into a scallop shell sunset (the shell is the symbol of the Camino), with a menacing-looking dog on the road (also frequent in Camino stories). No doubt. The book is coming with me.
Another one...my brother recently took a trip to Wisconsin. Good sister that I am, I bully into his house and pilfer about 25 CDs to download onto my iPod and return before he got home. He won’t care. I pick through his heavy metal and my sister-in-law’s country music and Fleetwood Mac. Somewhere in the pile is a CD called Pilgrimage. Intriguing. On the CD is a scallop shell. The booklet makes references to “Field of Stars,” translated as Compostela. Santiago de Compostela is the destination of the Camino. When I download it, the music is new-age electronic instrumental, inspired by the Camino. How the hell did a CD like THAT end up in my brother’s house??? He couldn’t answer. I kept it.
And it goes on and on.
So you just got the long version of my answer. Be careful. You’ve heard of the Camino now, if you hadn’t already. It might track you down, too. =)
Final preparations are in stride. It’s midnight. I’m meeting my dad at the house in just over 12 hours. I have a list of things to do tomorrow. I have to compile addresses for postcards. I have to process laundry. I have to hit the bank, the Starbucks, the library tomorrow. I have to forward my email, make sure the thermostat is set right, block the voicemail box on my cell phone. I have to take canned cat food to my folks’ for my cat. I have to figure out what I’m wearing on the plane. I have not YET walked with my new Superfeet insoles in my boots. Too much too much too much....
Simplicity.
If it’s not done, the world will not end. If I didn’t pack it, if it breaks, if it tears, they probably sell it in Spain. Blisters are not deadly. Thirty pounds is not fifty. Members of my family hate to lose, hate to quit, and (as I was told today) have never fallen out on a hump. I’ll make it.
“Ultreya” is the pilgrim’s cry on the Camino. Somehow, it translates to “Westward ho!”
I’m off. Ultreya!
Monday, June 30, 2008
Finishing Touches
Sally (my backpack) is TWENTY-SIX POUNDS.
That’s eleven more than I wanted to carry. Oysh. But there isn’t a thing in there that I don’t absolutely need (except for Coelho’s The Pilgrimage, but even that I feel I need)...and I’ve spent so much time over the past few months figuring out what to bring, that I feel like this is as good as I can do. It’s not too heavy when it’s ON...but picking it up, it feels like a ton of bricks. I think I’ve finally got the hang of the straps, too, as far as weight distribution goes.
Space Bags...those big vinyl ziplock bags you see on infomercials for closet storage? They make travel sizes. Got a few of ‘em today. Good thing: they save space. Bad thing: more space makes you feel like you need to bring more crap. Good thing: my pack is TOTALLY organized and everything is easy to get to. Bad thing: they don’t reduce weight at ALL. Good thing: I’ve resisted bringing more crap. Conclusion: they’re a good thing.
Went to Lowe’s today and got a pair of Leatherman tools and a pair of knives in a $25 set. Certainly not top-of-the-line, but the tools work and the knives are sharp and pointy and therefore, life is good. Large and small of each. Kudos to Tony for tipping me off that that deal existed.
Today I think I finished getting everything I needed, with the sole exception of those insoles I saw at REI the day I bought my boots. They’re expensive, and I feel guilty for spending another CENT on gear, but I’m also gonna feel guilty if I don’t get them because if there’s one thing you have to take care of on a trip like this, it’s your feet.
Travel gear discovery of the day: you know those little pocket-pack Listerine strips? They have similar packs, slightly larger, for shampoo, conditioner, body wash, shaving cream, and laundry detergent!!! If these things work, they’re gonna be the BOMB!!! (If they don’t, they have drugstores in Spain.) Found ‘em at Bed Bath & Beyond. My laundry detergent dilemma is SOLVED. Unless I’m without a sink I can stopper. Then I’m back to improvising.
Got the quick-dry, ultra-absorbent towel...got the emergency blanket and the little first-aid kit, got the Camper’s TP (!!!), and sucked it up and bought a Thermarest sleeping mat. Big, inch-and-a-half thick, self-inflating, tight-rolling, and only weighs a pound. Think I got my money’s worth on that. Got my dad’s Gore-Tex raincoat. No poncho, but since everything in my bag is in some sort of plastic container, or else doesn’t need to stay dry, don’t need to cover my pack in the rain.
I think I’m set.
(MY CAT JUST USED SALLY AS A SCRATCHING POST. GRRRRR....)
I was just thinking about getting picked up next Tuesday and driving away from my house, heading for the airport and for over a month on another continent, with nothing but this backpack. Swear my pulse spiked. On top of that, arriving in Paris, in a country whose language I know NONE of, with not a soul I know and JUST THIS BACKPACK. I need to sit down....
This is scary stuff.
Tomorrow I’m gonna walk to Hoadly in the morning, my 8-mile trek, with the pack at full weight. OH...did I mention that the 26 lbs was WITHOUT the 3L Camelback full of water???
Tonight at Borders, finally located Whitman’s “Song of the Open Road.” What follows is now in my journal, and more to come....
1
Afoot and light-hearted, I take to the open road,
Healthy, free, the world before me,
The long brown path before me, leading wherever I choose.
Henceforth I ask not good-fortune—I myself am good fortune;
Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing,
Strong and content, I travel the open road.
The earth—that is sufficient;
I do not want the constellations any nearer;
I know they are very well where they are;
I know they suffice for those who belong to them.
(Still here I carry my old delicious burdens;
I carry them, men and women—I carry them with me wherever I go;
I swear it is impossible for me to get rid of them;
I am fill’d with them, and I will fill them in return.)
2
You road I enter upon and look around! I believe you are not all that is here;
I believe that much unseen is also here....
4
The earth expanding right hand and left hand,
The picture alive, every part in its best light,
The music falling in where it is wanted, and stopping where it is not wanted,
The cheerful voice of the public road—the gay fresh sentiment of the road.
O highway I travel! O public road! do you say to me, Do not leave me?
Do you say, Venture not? If you leave me, you are lost?
Do you say, I am already prepared—I am well-beaten and undenied—adhere to me?
O public road! I say back, I am not afraid to leave you—yet I love you;
You express me better than I can express myself;
You shall be more to me than my poem.
I think heroic deeds were all conceiv’d in the open air, and all great poems also;
I think I could stop here myself, and do miracles;
(My judgments, thoughts, I henceforth try by the open air, the road;)
I think whatever I shall meet on the road I shall like, and whoever beholds me shall like
me;
I think whoever I see must be happy.
That’s eleven more than I wanted to carry. Oysh. But there isn’t a thing in there that I don’t absolutely need (except for Coelho’s The Pilgrimage, but even that I feel I need)...and I’ve spent so much time over the past few months figuring out what to bring, that I feel like this is as good as I can do. It’s not too heavy when it’s ON...but picking it up, it feels like a ton of bricks. I think I’ve finally got the hang of the straps, too, as far as weight distribution goes.
Space Bags...those big vinyl ziplock bags you see on infomercials for closet storage? They make travel sizes. Got a few of ‘em today. Good thing: they save space. Bad thing: more space makes you feel like you need to bring more crap. Good thing: my pack is TOTALLY organized and everything is easy to get to. Bad thing: they don’t reduce weight at ALL. Good thing: I’ve resisted bringing more crap. Conclusion: they’re a good thing.
Went to Lowe’s today and got a pair of Leatherman tools and a pair of knives in a $25 set. Certainly not top-of-the-line, but the tools work and the knives are sharp and pointy and therefore, life is good. Large and small of each. Kudos to Tony for tipping me off that that deal existed.
Today I think I finished getting everything I needed, with the sole exception of those insoles I saw at REI the day I bought my boots. They’re expensive, and I feel guilty for spending another CENT on gear, but I’m also gonna feel guilty if I don’t get them because if there’s one thing you have to take care of on a trip like this, it’s your feet.
Travel gear discovery of the day: you know those little pocket-pack Listerine strips? They have similar packs, slightly larger, for shampoo, conditioner, body wash, shaving cream, and laundry detergent!!! If these things work, they’re gonna be the BOMB!!! (If they don’t, they have drugstores in Spain.) Found ‘em at Bed Bath & Beyond. My laundry detergent dilemma is SOLVED. Unless I’m without a sink I can stopper. Then I’m back to improvising.
Got the quick-dry, ultra-absorbent towel...got the emergency blanket and the little first-aid kit, got the Camper’s TP (!!!), and sucked it up and bought a Thermarest sleeping mat. Big, inch-and-a-half thick, self-inflating, tight-rolling, and only weighs a pound. Think I got my money’s worth on that. Got my dad’s Gore-Tex raincoat. No poncho, but since everything in my bag is in some sort of plastic container, or else doesn’t need to stay dry, don’t need to cover my pack in the rain.
I think I’m set.
(MY CAT JUST USED SALLY AS A SCRATCHING POST. GRRRRR....)
I was just thinking about getting picked up next Tuesday and driving away from my house, heading for the airport and for over a month on another continent, with nothing but this backpack. Swear my pulse spiked. On top of that, arriving in Paris, in a country whose language I know NONE of, with not a soul I know and JUST THIS BACKPACK. I need to sit down....
This is scary stuff.
Tomorrow I’m gonna walk to Hoadly in the morning, my 8-mile trek, with the pack at full weight. OH...did I mention that the 26 lbs was WITHOUT the 3L Camelback full of water???
Tonight at Borders, finally located Whitman’s “Song of the Open Road.” What follows is now in my journal, and more to come....
1
Afoot and light-hearted, I take to the open road,
Healthy, free, the world before me,
The long brown path before me, leading wherever I choose.
Henceforth I ask not good-fortune—I myself am good fortune;
Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing,
Strong and content, I travel the open road.
The earth—that is sufficient;
I do not want the constellations any nearer;
I know they are very well where they are;
I know they suffice for those who belong to them.
(Still here I carry my old delicious burdens;
I carry them, men and women—I carry them with me wherever I go;
I swear it is impossible for me to get rid of them;
I am fill’d with them, and I will fill them in return.)
2
You road I enter upon and look around! I believe you are not all that is here;
I believe that much unseen is also here....
4
The earth expanding right hand and left hand,
The picture alive, every part in its best light,
The music falling in where it is wanted, and stopping where it is not wanted,
The cheerful voice of the public road—the gay fresh sentiment of the road.
O highway I travel! O public road! do you say to me, Do not leave me?
Do you say, Venture not? If you leave me, you are lost?
Do you say, I am already prepared—I am well-beaten and undenied—adhere to me?
O public road! I say back, I am not afraid to leave you—yet I love you;
You express me better than I can express myself;
You shall be more to me than my poem.
I think heroic deeds were all conceiv’d in the open air, and all great poems also;
I think I could stop here myself, and do miracles;
(My judgments, thoughts, I henceforth try by the open air, the road;)
I think whatever I shall meet on the road I shall like, and whoever beholds me shall like
me;
I think whoever I see must be happy.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Nine days to go....
Okay, keeping up with this blog is already getting hard to do, and I haven’t even LEFT yet.
More pieces are falling into place. I have some “Jerusalem cruisers,” as Tony calls them, and they’re faboo. Have finally put together toiletries (should probably cut the stash in half)...last few things are on their way from REI...still need a Leatherman. Have spent HOURS downloading music and putting together playlists, to the point where I’m starting to worry that I’m overly obsessing about the music part and it’s going to detract from what this experience is supposed to be like.
Triumphs:
Still to do:
I went up to DC the other day to see my friend Drew and pick his brain for backpacking tips...mainly because I was thinking of him as a backpacker, and not a former Marine. Therefore, the first-aid-kit list he put together for me would have me ready to survive unaided and alone while scaling the mountains of Patagonia for six months, rather than walking a hostel-and-town-laden pathway across summer wheat fields in Spain. (I have to bust on him for this because he said he’s going to laugh at my blog, and I want to know if he’s really reading it. Ha ha. Just kidding, Drew, you rock.) Highlight of the DC trip: the SECOND I got off the escalator up from the subway station, some bearded kid with a Greenpeace clipboard accosted me with “Hello, ma’am, YOU look like someone who cares about the environment!!” With my Jesus-stompers, my pack, and my cargo shorts, I already felt like a walking granola bar.... Highlight #2: Drew’s contribution to my hiking vocabulary: “swamp ass.” I don’t know what it is, but I have a kind of dread that I’ll find out. At least I have his vow that baby wipes are guaranteed to cure it....
Also hiked through Locust Shade Park the other day...only about 3 miles, but my first hump without cars whizzing by me at 60 mph...sort of. The trails are sandwiched between I-95 and Rt. 1. So I was never out of earshot of traffic, which was a bummer in such gorgeous forest trails. Maybe tomorrow I’ll find the time to go to some of the longer trails out off Joplin Rd.
I guess a lot of this prep stuff isn’t terribly interesting reading. I figure I should put something in here to explain why I’m keeping the blog. Mainly, (obviously) it’s to keep track of the whole adventure from start to finish...and maybe make something out of all this in the way of a publishable end product when it’s all said and done.
I’m also trying to write the kind of blog I wish I could find...that has info about airline tickets and tricks for getting around outrageous Eurail prices and stuff. I’m sure I’ll be writing about stuff I wish I had packed, and stuff I wish I hadn’t....
Third, it just makes things easier when talking to friends. I have everyone from former students to work and bar friends to my family reading this thing. It’s a five-week trip...there’s no way I’ll be able to tell all those stories a million times when I get back. Hell, there’s no way I’ll even remember them all. It’s been really cool when friends I haven’t talked to in forever say, “HEY, I saw your blog...your trip sounds like it’ll be awesome!!” And I can just launch into the latest without having to introduce it a million times...because NO ONE has heard of the Camino, and NO ONE seems to be able to get what it is or why I’m doing it...which is my next post.
Stay tuned. It’s about a week away at this point....
More pieces are falling into place. I have some “Jerusalem cruisers,” as Tony calls them, and they’re faboo. Have finally put together toiletries (should probably cut the stash in half)...last few things are on their way from REI...still need a Leatherman. Have spent HOURS downloading music and putting together playlists, to the point where I’m starting to worry that I’m overly obsessing about the music part and it’s going to detract from what this experience is supposed to be like.
Triumphs:
- Found Li-ion camera batteries for FOUR DOLLARS. Like, ones that are usually THIRTY OR FORTY dollars. Bought FIVE of the suckers. Go me.
- Found a voice recorder for $35
- ...and most importantly, the perfect journal. Today I spent some time at work hunting through Whitman’s Leaves of Grass for pertinent passages, and this is now on the first few pages of my super-cool awesome bomb-diggity journal. It seemed to tie in with Paulo Coelho’s idea of a Personal Legend (from The Alchemist).
Still to do:
- To my dismay, my copy of LoG did NOT have “Song of the Open Road.” Must find it and steal passages.
- Still considering getting insoles. And a knife.
- Have not really tried out the pack at real weight, since I’m still waiting for things to arrive at REI.
- Have probably not broken in the boots enough.
I went up to DC the other day to see my friend Drew and pick his brain for backpacking tips...mainly because I was thinking of him as a backpacker, and not a former Marine. Therefore, the first-aid-kit list he put together for me would have me ready to survive unaided and alone while scaling the mountains of Patagonia for six months, rather than walking a hostel-and-town-laden pathway across summer wheat fields in Spain. (I have to bust on him for this because he said he’s going to laugh at my blog, and I want to know if he’s really reading it. Ha ha. Just kidding, Drew, you rock.) Highlight of the DC trip: the SECOND I got off the escalator up from the subway station, some bearded kid with a Greenpeace clipboard accosted me with “Hello, ma’am, YOU look like someone who cares about the environment!!” With my Jesus-stompers, my pack, and my cargo shorts, I already felt like a walking granola bar.... Highlight #2: Drew’s contribution to my hiking vocabulary: “swamp ass.” I don’t know what it is, but I have a kind of dread that I’ll find out. At least I have his vow that baby wipes are guaranteed to cure it....
Also hiked through Locust Shade Park the other day...only about 3 miles, but my first hump without cars whizzing by me at 60 mph...sort of. The trails are sandwiched between I-95 and Rt. 1. So I was never out of earshot of traffic, which was a bummer in such gorgeous forest trails. Maybe tomorrow I’ll find the time to go to some of the longer trails out off Joplin Rd.
I guess a lot of this prep stuff isn’t terribly interesting reading. I figure I should put something in here to explain why I’m keeping the blog. Mainly, (obviously) it’s to keep track of the whole adventure from start to finish...and maybe make something out of all this in the way of a publishable end product when it’s all said and done.
I’m also trying to write the kind of blog I wish I could find...that has info about airline tickets and tricks for getting around outrageous Eurail prices and stuff. I’m sure I’ll be writing about stuff I wish I had packed, and stuff I wish I hadn’t....
Third, it just makes things easier when talking to friends. I have everyone from former students to work and bar friends to my family reading this thing. It’s a five-week trip...there’s no way I’ll be able to tell all those stories a million times when I get back. Hell, there’s no way I’ll even remember them all. It’s been really cool when friends I haven’t talked to in forever say, “HEY, I saw your blog...your trip sounds like it’ll be awesome!!” And I can just launch into the latest without having to introduce it a million times...because NO ONE has heard of the Camino, and NO ONE seems to be able to get what it is or why I’m doing it...which is my next post.
Stay tuned. It’s about a week away at this point....
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Solvitur Ambulando
“It is solved by walking.” - St. Augustine
I went hunting a labyrinth today.
If you’re anywhere near or over thirty, you probably instantly thought of David Bowie in REALLY tight pants and that giant, furry (and really kick-ass) Ludo-creature...what Sarah found when she wished the Goblin King would come and take away her baby brother, Toby. Ahh, 80’s cinema.
Real labyrinths are a bit different. I did a search and came up with several up in Alexandria...and one in good ol’ PWC. Drove out to Bristow and turned into the Linton Hall School, housed within the property of the Benedictine Priory of Gainesville, VA. The network of tiny roads and parking lots that wound through the complex was labyrinthine in itself. Lots of tall white statues on pedestals, with no explanation of who they were or what their significance was. I was competent enough to recognize Mary, but two or three others escaped me. I assume one was St. Benedict (but could have been Auggie or Francis or some other guy), and another appeared to be Mary with a young girl, and I would’ve liked to have some sort of story explaining that one.
On the grounds was the school itself, a small swimming pool, several little houses, and a large building I gather was where the convent actually was. Did not look convent-y. Looked like another old-fashioned, perhaps 60’s- or 70’s-era elementary school. Large front porch, rocking chairs. A couple red-brick mission-looking buildings, very small, with those bell-stands at the top that remind me of the adobe mission buildings in California. There was a “teaching garden.” A graveyard. Two boys playing basketball in the parking lot of the school. Lots of trees and big grassy areas. A sign pointing to “transitional housing” and B.A.R.N., which I didn’t get the long name for and looked to be a thrift store/donation dropoff point, so I suppose the Benedictine Sisters are, among other things, in the business of helping out families who are down-and-out.
After driving around for a while, and getting deeper and deeper into the complex, I finally wound my way back to the convent and parked. The door instructed me to ring the bell, but then to walk in if it was unlocked, so I did. Little old lady in the office...reminded me of my grandmother in a much smaller version. I told her I’d come hoping to find a walking labyrinth, and felt silly till I saw the labyrinth design on her mousepad. She gave me directions back past the teaching garden, where I’d already been, and told me to look for two large white silos.
I’d missed the sign the first time, but she was right...it was there. “Labyrinth Garden,” the sign said. The grounds are right off of Linton Hall Road, which is in a nightmare of construction that, I saw today, has merely morphed into new and equally neverending phases from what I’d seen before, but the labyrinth was buffeted from the noise of the road by some very thick conifer-type trees. There was a wooden fence, left open, and a little arbor leading down to the maze itself.
It looked just the way I figured it should. It was smaller than I’d hoped for, and I was sorry to see that, unlike the verdant, shady, contemplative grounds I’d been walking barefoot through earlier, the labyrinth itself was in full sun...which, at 2pm two days past the solstice, made the paving stones too hot to walk without my flipflops on. (They’re too big, and keeping them on detracted from my walk.)
So I dove in, tried not to hurry.
The purpose of a labyrinth is to quiet your mind. It’s a unicursal (one-path) design. There is no getting lost...it winds around from the outside and leads to the center, and then (as I found out later; I did not reverse the track) you’re supposed to walk back to the outside the way you came in. It’s a mediation thing. The site of Grace Cathedral’s labyrinth is a good one, and it explains the purpose of the labyrinth (which I won't bother to retype here, but check it out 'cause it's cool). I went there last summer with Ben, but as I recall, the indoor labyrinth was under construction, and I don’t remember why I didn’t walk the outside one, despite how taken I was with all the labyrinth stuff in the gift shop. Anyway...it’s meant to symbolize the twists and turns we take in life on our way to understanding...and how there is really only one path, and you can’t get lost, and there’s no dead ends.
“Off the Road,” the book I’m reading (and by “reading,” I mean “keeping weeks past the due date from the library without actually getting past page 40, then renewing it after paying a $7 fine, so that I’ll forget to return it before I go on my trip and wind up owing new fines far greater than the book’s original value”) is written by a guy who, like me, grew up Episcopalian, and it’s at once humorous, irreverent, and yet very heartfelt. He goes on the Camino and feels a desire to start the pilgrimage the way it was done in the Middle Ages, from his own front door, but alas, he is an American, and there is an ocean between him and Santiago...not just 500 miles of Spain. So he goes seeking some meditative undertaking on North American soil to sort of kick off his trip.
Which is why I went hunting labyrinths today.
The silos, by the way, looked like silos, but were really just large concrete cylinders. They had beautiful concentric paving stones on the floor inside them, and benches along the walls, and foot-wide, stained-glass panels reaching from above the doorways to nearly the tops, which were open to the sky. The curvature of the sunlight made the white, stony inner walls look really beautiful. You could sit on one of the little curved benches inside and look out the doorway over a segment of the labyrinth and the gardens beyond it. By accident (read: “Upon talking to myself”), I discovered the echo properties inside them, and was reminded of the time my mom and I stood on opposite sides of the dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London and made it work its acoustic magic.
It was a decent experience. Not life-changing, certainly not cathartic in any way. But I’d like to go back a few times before I go. With shoes that don’t distract me. Early in the morning, perhaps. Maybe even get to go into the little chapel they have there. Maybe see a nun. (I know, I know, they don’t wear habits, and they’re probably not that exciting, but Catholic I ain’t, and this is my meditative aspiration, not yours.)
Besides, “So, today I went to a Benedictine priory and walked a labyrinth” just sounds cool. Mystical. Which ties right in with the Camino.
I consider the journey begun.
I went hunting a labyrinth today.
If you’re anywhere near or over thirty, you probably instantly thought of David Bowie in REALLY tight pants and that giant, furry (and really kick-ass) Ludo-creature...what Sarah found when she wished the Goblin King would come and take away her baby brother, Toby. Ahh, 80’s cinema.
Real labyrinths are a bit different. I did a search and came up with several up in Alexandria...and one in good ol’ PWC. Drove out to Bristow and turned into the Linton Hall School, housed within the property of the Benedictine Priory of Gainesville, VA. The network of tiny roads and parking lots that wound through the complex was labyrinthine in itself. Lots of tall white statues on pedestals, with no explanation of who they were or what their significance was. I was competent enough to recognize Mary, but two or three others escaped me. I assume one was St. Benedict (but could have been Auggie or Francis or some other guy), and another appeared to be Mary with a young girl, and I would’ve liked to have some sort of story explaining that one.
On the grounds was the school itself, a small swimming pool, several little houses, and a large building I gather was where the convent actually was. Did not look convent-y. Looked like another old-fashioned, perhaps 60’s- or 70’s-era elementary school. Large front porch, rocking chairs. A couple red-brick mission-looking buildings, very small, with those bell-stands at the top that remind me of the adobe mission buildings in California. There was a “teaching garden.” A graveyard. Two boys playing basketball in the parking lot of the school. Lots of trees and big grassy areas. A sign pointing to “transitional housing” and B.A.R.N., which I didn’t get the long name for and looked to be a thrift store/donation dropoff point, so I suppose the Benedictine Sisters are, among other things, in the business of helping out families who are down-and-out.
After driving around for a while, and getting deeper and deeper into the complex, I finally wound my way back to the convent and parked. The door instructed me to ring the bell, but then to walk in if it was unlocked, so I did. Little old lady in the office...reminded me of my grandmother in a much smaller version. I told her I’d come hoping to find a walking labyrinth, and felt silly till I saw the labyrinth design on her mousepad. She gave me directions back past the teaching garden, where I’d already been, and told me to look for two large white silos.
I’d missed the sign the first time, but she was right...it was there. “Labyrinth Garden,” the sign said. The grounds are right off of Linton Hall Road, which is in a nightmare of construction that, I saw today, has merely morphed into new and equally neverending phases from what I’d seen before, but the labyrinth was buffeted from the noise of the road by some very thick conifer-type trees. There was a wooden fence, left open, and a little arbor leading down to the maze itself.
It looked just the way I figured it should. It was smaller than I’d hoped for, and I was sorry to see that, unlike the verdant, shady, contemplative grounds I’d been walking barefoot through earlier, the labyrinth itself was in full sun...which, at 2pm two days past the solstice, made the paving stones too hot to walk without my flipflops on. (They’re too big, and keeping them on detracted from my walk.)
So I dove in, tried not to hurry.
The purpose of a labyrinth is to quiet your mind. It’s a unicursal (one-path) design. There is no getting lost...it winds around from the outside and leads to the center, and then (as I found out later; I did not reverse the track) you’re supposed to walk back to the outside the way you came in. It’s a mediation thing. The site of Grace Cathedral’s labyrinth is a good one, and it explains the purpose of the labyrinth (which I won't bother to retype here, but check it out 'cause it's cool). I went there last summer with Ben, but as I recall, the indoor labyrinth was under construction, and I don’t remember why I didn’t walk the outside one, despite how taken I was with all the labyrinth stuff in the gift shop. Anyway...it’s meant to symbolize the twists and turns we take in life on our way to understanding...and how there is really only one path, and you can’t get lost, and there’s no dead ends.
“Off the Road,” the book I’m reading (and by “reading,” I mean “keeping weeks past the due date from the library without actually getting past page 40, then renewing it after paying a $7 fine, so that I’ll forget to return it before I go on my trip and wind up owing new fines far greater than the book’s original value”) is written by a guy who, like me, grew up Episcopalian, and it’s at once humorous, irreverent, and yet very heartfelt. He goes on the Camino and feels a desire to start the pilgrimage the way it was done in the Middle Ages, from his own front door, but alas, he is an American, and there is an ocean between him and Santiago...not just 500 miles of Spain. So he goes seeking some meditative undertaking on North American soil to sort of kick off his trip.
Which is why I went hunting labyrinths today.
The silos, by the way, looked like silos, but were really just large concrete cylinders. They had beautiful concentric paving stones on the floor inside them, and benches along the walls, and foot-wide, stained-glass panels reaching from above the doorways to nearly the tops, which were open to the sky. The curvature of the sunlight made the white, stony inner walls look really beautiful. You could sit on one of the little curved benches inside and look out the doorway over a segment of the labyrinth and the gardens beyond it. By accident (read: “Upon talking to myself”), I discovered the echo properties inside them, and was reminded of the time my mom and I stood on opposite sides of the dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London and made it work its acoustic magic.
It was a decent experience. Not life-changing, certainly not cathartic in any way. But I’d like to go back a few times before I go. With shoes that don’t distract me. Early in the morning, perhaps. Maybe even get to go into the little chapel they have there. Maybe see a nun. (I know, I know, they don’t wear habits, and they’re probably not that exciting, but Catholic I ain’t, and this is my meditative aspiration, not yours.)
Besides, “So, today I went to a Benedictine priory and walked a labyrinth” just sounds cool. Mystical. Which ties right in with the Camino.
I consider the journey begun.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Shorn...
Well, I did it.
My hair is GONE. Aaron gave me several chances to stop, but I told him, this was the deal, so he did it, and had an evil, inspired, slightly crazy grin on his face the whole time. Kept cackling. Crazy bastard. Lol...as for me, well, I totally freaked the eff out. I was actually in tears in the chair. He kept announcing to all the staring women in the salon, “It’s okay, she just cut ALL HER HAIR OFF, and HERE’S the PILE!!”
It’s SHORT. It’s way shorter than I’m happy with...I would never want to keep it this way. But it’s exactly how short it needs to be to get me through Spain with minimal hassle, and by the time I get back, in two months, I think it’s gonna look really cute.
That doesn’t change the fact that I was sitting there, under this friggin’ dryer, unable to stop the tears from streaming down my face as I watched this guy sweep up this giant pile of my gorgeous, beautiful brown curls, fill a WHOLE stand-up dustpan with it, and DUMP IT IN THE TRASH. I felt like someone had just tossed my CHILD in the trash can. It was horrible. Don’t laugh if you can’t relate. I had a LOT of hair. I mean, it was bigger than many counties in this area, as I told a friend at work last week. Cutting it all off is like chopping off a piece of my identity...it IS my identity. People identify me as the girl with all the curly hair. Seriously!! They say that women who have extremely long hair go through a mourning period when they cut it short that is akin to what people go through when they lose a relative. No joke.
Like, you really need to insert an expletive every few words as you read this post to get a grasp of how devastated and freaked out I am right now. But my mother reads this blog, as do my students, so you gotta make that leap yourself.
He took a razor to the back. It sticks me in the neck. It’s bugging me.
No idea when I’ll have the guts to go out and see my friends. I think I’ll just hide out till I go on my trip. Well, not really, but that’s what I feel like doing. My friend Jenn has told me she’ll come help me put some color streaks into it tomorrow. (Yay!) TOTALLY not me, but neither is this haircut, so I might as well make it a little funky. It IS summer, after all.
Jenn came over to see how it looked tonight. Asked if she should bring anything. I told her a knife. A rope. Hemlock. A large rabid dog. A poisonous adder. Rat poison.
It took me two hours to really stop getting all weepy every time I looked in the mirror.
When my dad saw me, he said, “You look like Olivia!!” From SVU. God, I wish.
So anyway...if you see me in the next couple weeks, if you think it looks great, for God’s sake, TELL ME.
And if you think it doesn’t, for GOD’S SAKE, LIE!!!
My hair is GONE. Aaron gave me several chances to stop, but I told him, this was the deal, so he did it, and had an evil, inspired, slightly crazy grin on his face the whole time. Kept cackling. Crazy bastard. Lol...as for me, well, I totally freaked the eff out. I was actually in tears in the chair. He kept announcing to all the staring women in the salon, “It’s okay, she just cut ALL HER HAIR OFF, and HERE’S the PILE!!”
It’s SHORT. It’s way shorter than I’m happy with...I would never want to keep it this way. But it’s exactly how short it needs to be to get me through Spain with minimal hassle, and by the time I get back, in two months, I think it’s gonna look really cute.
That doesn’t change the fact that I was sitting there, under this friggin’ dryer, unable to stop the tears from streaming down my face as I watched this guy sweep up this giant pile of my gorgeous, beautiful brown curls, fill a WHOLE stand-up dustpan with it, and DUMP IT IN THE TRASH. I felt like someone had just tossed my CHILD in the trash can. It was horrible. Don’t laugh if you can’t relate. I had a LOT of hair. I mean, it was bigger than many counties in this area, as I told a friend at work last week. Cutting it all off is like chopping off a piece of my identity...it IS my identity. People identify me as the girl with all the curly hair. Seriously!! They say that women who have extremely long hair go through a mourning period when they cut it short that is akin to what people go through when they lose a relative. No joke.
Like, you really need to insert an expletive every few words as you read this post to get a grasp of how devastated and freaked out I am right now. But my mother reads this blog, as do my students, so you gotta make that leap yourself.
He took a razor to the back. It sticks me in the neck. It’s bugging me.
No idea when I’ll have the guts to go out and see my friends. I think I’ll just hide out till I go on my trip. Well, not really, but that’s what I feel like doing. My friend Jenn has told me she’ll come help me put some color streaks into it tomorrow. (Yay!) TOTALLY not me, but neither is this haircut, so I might as well make it a little funky. It IS summer, after all.
Jenn came over to see how it looked tonight. Asked if she should bring anything. I told her a knife. A rope. Hemlock. A large rabid dog. A poisonous adder. Rat poison.
It took me two hours to really stop getting all weepy every time I looked in the mirror.
When my dad saw me, he said, “You look like Olivia!!” From SVU. God, I wish.
So anyway...if you see me in the next couple weeks, if you think it looks great, for God’s sake, TELL ME.
And if you think it doesn’t, for GOD’S SAKE, LIE!!!
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
STOP me....
Okay, SERIOUSLY, someone needs to stop me. I need to NOT keep going back to REI. They got another 250 beans out of me today, but the upside of that is that I heart boy pants again. I took back the ones from Kohl’s that wound up being too big. Got some awesome shorts and some zip-off cargoes that I wish were just ONE INCH longer, but I’ll live. BOTH from the MEN’S department. Can someone please explain to me how MEN’S pants fit a girl with a butt like mine, and yet women’s pants seem to be made for people who never outgrew the shape they had in 7th grade??? Sigh. Who cares...my pants rocks.
I did 7.2 miles today. Walked to my folks’ shop, and most of the way back. Today was the first test drive with the boots AND the pack...about half-loaded, with the Camelback in too. That Camelback is a 3L...and that thing is HEAVY when it’s full...no joke! Can’t seem to get the load distribution right yet...not getting much weight onto the lumbar strap, so it’s still mainly on my shoulders and my sternum strap. It wasn’t exactly a problem today, but most of the weight is supposed to be on my hips, and I gotta monkey with the pack a little more.
So, I was right...when my dad and I found average highs in the 70s throughout the Camino route for July and August, the person who made those almanac tables was on crack. Some guy today told me he’d seen highs of 47C in August in Pamplona...which translates to 113F!!!! Some chick from Australia also told me Spain is the hottest place she’s ever been. MOST people say AUSTRALIA is the hottest place they’ve ever been. Not cool with hearing an Aussie say that. But she also said it was a dry heat, so that’ll be a welcome change from ol’ VA.
Can’t decide whether to take the iPod or not. I’ve been sort of adopted by this Liverpoolian expat in NZ on Facebook, and the latest topic of conversation has been music. I was thinking NO on the iPod because a) I don’t want it stolen, or to have to sweat it being stolen, and b) as my mom put it today, if this is really is going to be a pilgrimage-type thing, music can get in the way of what I’m really after on this trip. Part of what I hear time and again about the Camino is that the rhythm of your own footsteps and the sounds of the world around you (or, more to the point, the lack thereof) is what can really drop you into another dimension. And though my NZ buddy said that the basic rule of thumb is that one generally removes the earphones in company (or impending company), I don’t want to be (or appear to be) cut off from the human contact that is also a huge part of the magic of the Camino. Then AGAIN, I’m sure there will be times when I WANT to appear unapproachable, and earphones are a great way to preclude unwanted contact...just ask any teenager.
I did kinda dig the prospect of putting together some bomb playlists, though. Dude at work just turned me on to this guy Mike Doughty, and he ROCKS. Good mix of him, Carbon Leaf, Pat McGee, Rusted Root, and Train...whoa, nelly. And I know I’m gonna need some inspiration to keep my feet moving on Day 2 over the Pyrenees, or on Day 3 when people say you’re going to seriously consider saying SCREW THIS WALK and hop a train to Prague or Amsterdam or Venice instead.
Speaking of trains...how stupid is this...I’m almost as excited about the 5 hour train trip between Paris and Bayonne on the day I arrive as I am about the Camino. Trains just seem cool to me. When I was a kid and we’d visit my aunt in Truckee, her house faced a mountainside with a train track, and the trains would snake out of one tunnel, cross the mountain face, and disappear into another, and my brother and I would watch for it all the time. I’ve never really been on trains much. Didn’t even cross the Chunnel, even though it opened while I was studying in London. I wish America was more of a train place, like Europe. People would travel more, and more easily.
Anyway...I booked the train trip the other day. Should’ve done a week and a half ago, when Paris all the way to St. Jean Pied-de-Port was 55 instead of 133. I don’t even know if it was talking about dollars or Euro, but DOES IT MATTER?? It more than DOUBLED in a WEEK! And the 133 doesn’t even get to SJPP...just to Bayonne!! Grrrr...but I did some poking around and found a website put together by some Brit trying to help Americans and Aussies avoid getting gouged by Rail Europe. It's an AWESOME site, and wound up helping me dodge the $(?)133 fare and wind up with one that was ∈60...still works out to about $95, but I saved anyway. Unfortunately, I have to get to Gare Montparnasse on a commuter bus, and the rail route only gets me to Bayonne...not a huge problem, as apparently there are quick, cheap, and frequent commuter trains to SJPP that take under an hour.
If my flight from Frankfurt would have made it in an hour and a half earlier, that rail pass would’ve been under ∈35. Dammiiiit. I’ll get to SJPP by about 7pm, and hope that the Powers That Be will have a place for me to stay, and compassionate French people willing to help a non-French-speaking American (their favorite kind of person) figure out what the hell I’m doing.
Today’s mystery: compression sacks. And the belt fastener on one of the pairs of shorts I tried on. Damn near had to go out and ask for help in getting it undone. I like to think I could’ve carried that off as cute and not laughably pathetic...or at least some mix of both....
I did 7.2 miles today. Walked to my folks’ shop, and most of the way back. Today was the first test drive with the boots AND the pack...about half-loaded, with the Camelback in too. That Camelback is a 3L...and that thing is HEAVY when it’s full...no joke! Can’t seem to get the load distribution right yet...not getting much weight onto the lumbar strap, so it’s still mainly on my shoulders and my sternum strap. It wasn’t exactly a problem today, but most of the weight is supposed to be on my hips, and I gotta monkey with the pack a little more.
So, I was right...when my dad and I found average highs in the 70s throughout the Camino route for July and August, the person who made those almanac tables was on crack. Some guy today told me he’d seen highs of 47C in August in Pamplona...which translates to 113F!!!! Some chick from Australia also told me Spain is the hottest place she’s ever been. MOST people say AUSTRALIA is the hottest place they’ve ever been. Not cool with hearing an Aussie say that. But she also said it was a dry heat, so that’ll be a welcome change from ol’ VA.
Can’t decide whether to take the iPod or not. I’ve been sort of adopted by this Liverpoolian expat in NZ on Facebook, and the latest topic of conversation has been music. I was thinking NO on the iPod because a) I don’t want it stolen, or to have to sweat it being stolen, and b) as my mom put it today, if this is really is going to be a pilgrimage-type thing, music can get in the way of what I’m really after on this trip. Part of what I hear time and again about the Camino is that the rhythm of your own footsteps and the sounds of the world around you (or, more to the point, the lack thereof) is what can really drop you into another dimension. And though my NZ buddy said that the basic rule of thumb is that one generally removes the earphones in company (or impending company), I don’t want to be (or appear to be) cut off from the human contact that is also a huge part of the magic of the Camino. Then AGAIN, I’m sure there will be times when I WANT to appear unapproachable, and earphones are a great way to preclude unwanted contact...just ask any teenager.
I did kinda dig the prospect of putting together some bomb playlists, though. Dude at work just turned me on to this guy Mike Doughty, and he ROCKS. Good mix of him, Carbon Leaf, Pat McGee, Rusted Root, and Train...whoa, nelly. And I know I’m gonna need some inspiration to keep my feet moving on Day 2 over the Pyrenees, or on Day 3 when people say you’re going to seriously consider saying SCREW THIS WALK and hop a train to Prague or Amsterdam or Venice instead.
Speaking of trains...how stupid is this...I’m almost as excited about the 5 hour train trip between Paris and Bayonne on the day I arrive as I am about the Camino. Trains just seem cool to me. When I was a kid and we’d visit my aunt in Truckee, her house faced a mountainside with a train track, and the trains would snake out of one tunnel, cross the mountain face, and disappear into another, and my brother and I would watch for it all the time. I’ve never really been on trains much. Didn’t even cross the Chunnel, even though it opened while I was studying in London. I wish America was more of a train place, like Europe. People would travel more, and more easily.
Anyway...I booked the train trip the other day. Should’ve done a week and a half ago, when Paris all the way to St. Jean Pied-de-Port was 55 instead of 133. I don’t even know if it was talking about dollars or Euro, but DOES IT MATTER?? It more than DOUBLED in a WEEK! And the 133 doesn’t even get to SJPP...just to Bayonne!! Grrrr...but I did some poking around and found a website put together by some Brit trying to help Americans and Aussies avoid getting gouged by Rail Europe. It's an AWESOME site, and wound up helping me dodge the $(?)133 fare and wind up with one that was ∈60...still works out to about $95, but I saved anyway. Unfortunately, I have to get to Gare Montparnasse on a commuter bus, and the rail route only gets me to Bayonne...not a huge problem, as apparently there are quick, cheap, and frequent commuter trains to SJPP that take under an hour.
If my flight from Frankfurt would have made it in an hour and a half earlier, that rail pass would’ve been under ∈35. Dammiiiit. I’ll get to SJPP by about 7pm, and hope that the Powers That Be will have a place for me to stay, and compassionate French people willing to help a non-French-speaking American (their favorite kind of person) figure out what the hell I’m doing.
Today’s mystery: compression sacks. And the belt fastener on one of the pairs of shorts I tried on. Damn near had to go out and ask for help in getting it undone. I like to think I could’ve carried that off as cute and not laughably pathetic...or at least some mix of both....
Sigh....
Saturday, June 14, 2008
Mustang Sally...
My passport just got here!!! 7 DAYS!! Whohooo!! The schmuck at the post office DID know what he was talking about.... Heh heh. Can’t believe that. I was sweatin’ that one.
I also bought my pack yesterday! My new baby is a blue and gray Kelty Coyote 4500W, 73L rucksack with detachable hip-pack top and integrated Camelback hydration capability. Her name is Sally. She’s sweeeeeeet. The adjustability of this thing is just sick. I showed it to my friend Keith, and he looked like he didn’t want to talk to me anymore afterwards. Lol...luvyu, Keeeeith. ;-)
In light of new intelligence that refugio availability is NOT a guarantee ANYWHERE in July and August, I also bought an accordion-style-eggshell-sleeping-mat thingy...which I’m now considering taking back. I don’t want to have to carry it on the plane, I don’t trust it to survive checking, I’m not sure the accordion-style was better than the roll-up kind, and when I really think about it, it might be the kind of thing I’m better off buying once I get there anyway. Sooo...it might be going back to REI, along with the socks that have the top band coming undone, grrr. Not cool. Especially since REI is a HIKE up into Fairfax and always involves at least three or four U-turns till I find it. Not that anyone’s surprised by that. ‘Cause I’m SOOO good with directions. Good luck finding the Atlantic, four weeks from leaving the Pyrenees, Christine. Yyyyyeah. Anyway...moving on....
What’s kind of silly is that I’m almost more excited about this blue paisley head-wrap thing I got yesterday than about my pack. It’s pretty badass. I also got a 1L Camelback bladder and already loaded it into the pack. Haven’t tried the pack at weight yet. The guy at REI claimed he loaded it with 20 lbs yesterday before he told me to huff it around the shop for ten or twenty minutes. When I got back and asked to try another pack, my dad watched him unload the weight and said it was more like 30, which I REALLY hope is true because that damn thing was HEAVY!!! I really want to get my stuff together and load this puppy up to see what it’s really gonna be like. Walks from now on have to include the pack. With a load. And the Camelback filled.
My anguish over my impending chop-off on Friday continues to grow. I’m going back and forth on it so much. Half of me can’t WAIT to get the weight and the hassle of this mop of mine off my head...the other half keeps listening to boys begging me to leave it alone. Wish I could cut it off for the summer and have it back by the fall.... Oh well. Life is hard.
Clothing continues to be a quandary. If anyone can locate those Sonoma zip-offs in 32x34, you will be my hero....
In case anyone cares, and really, for my own records, here’s the tally so far:
- Plane tix: $1140
- Trip Insurance: $38
- Boots: $150
- 4 pairs hiking socks, 3 pairs liner socks: $76
- Passport: $75
- Pack: $155
- Sleeping mat, head thingie, straps, REI membership: $80
- Camelback:$30
- Clothes: $70 so far, but probably returning them...becoming convinced that what I already own is good enough.
Oh...and no-go on the couple living in the house (and paying rent) while I’m gone. Good thing God saw fit to get Mell and Billy kicked out of their place, so guess they can watch the house while I'm gone.... heh heh, thanks, guys....
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Two Things
Okay...yesterday, finally did the trek down 234 to my folks' house. 57 minutes. Hitched a ride home with Mom. Yes, slightly wimpy, but did manage to make the discovery that handkerchiefs will be a NECESSITY on the Camino.
Also. Can I just say. Ahem. I am 8 days from lopping off my hair in Attempt #2 to become a brunette Meg-Ryan-in-City-of-Angels, and I have two thoughts. 1) It will not work. 2) Regardless, I am REALLY REALLY REALLY nervous about it.
But it must be done.
PS - 34s too big. Anyone know where I can find some 32x34 Sonoma Men's Cargo Khakis?
Also. Can I just say. Ahem. I am 8 days from lopping off my hair in Attempt #2 to become a brunette Meg-Ryan-in-City-of-Angels, and I have two thoughts. 1) It will not work. 2) Regardless, I am REALLY REALLY REALLY nervous about it.
But it must be done.
PS - 34s too big. Anyone know where I can find some 32x34 Sonoma Men's Cargo Khakis?
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
I Heart Boy Pants!!
OKAY...need an update. Well...we're at T-30 days and counting till I actually begin my Camino. The plan is to arrive in Paris on the morning of July 9, get to St. Jean Pied-de-Port that night, and head out from there the morning of the 10th.
Last Friday I finally went to the post office to mail my passport application. GOD I hope that 4-week promise holds...otherwise, I'll be doing a big fat NOTHING in 30 days. The guy behind the counter at the Lorton post office was VERY nonchalant about the whole thing and came off as a total dufus who did NOTHING to assuage my fears that it wouldn't arrive. What does it matter to him?? Of course he can be flippant about it. Kinda ticked me off.
Got sick over the weekend with a cold from hell...my house is totally devoid of Kleenex now...and I lost a whole weekend's walking. Not that I would've gotten far...it's been in the 90s with heat indices over 100. I'm hoping that breaks tonight because I HAVE to get back out. I've done NO walking in about a week now and that's NO BUENO.
But I'm recovering...tomorrow should be back to normal.
Today I went to Kohl's in search of Caminowear. Tony gave me a pair of his cargo shorts before he left for Vermont, and I realized I'm NOT doomed to evil, shapeless, terrible-fitting chick hiking shorts made for people with stick-figure bodies and that, believe it or not, a pair of 34 cargos are THE BOMB!! So I sought out a few pairs of lightweight cargos at Kohl's today and found TWO PAIRS of zip-offs!!! I've been wearing one pair all afternoon, and they're ALMOST perfect. They're a little big. And with the weight I expect to drop along the route, they're only gonna get bigger. Problem: the 32s only came in lengths of 30 or 32. And a 34 length is NECESSARY. So I may just suck it up. But I'm keeping the tags just in case. And at any rate, thanks to Tony, I learned that boy pants rock. :)
Next on the list: RUCKSACK. Ian told me there's an outdoors store in Springfield. Might be on the billet for tomorrow.
I FLY IN FOUR WEEKS. AAAAAAAAAACK!!!!!
Last Friday I finally went to the post office to mail my passport application. GOD I hope that 4-week promise holds...otherwise, I'll be doing a big fat NOTHING in 30 days. The guy behind the counter at the Lorton post office was VERY nonchalant about the whole thing and came off as a total dufus who did NOTHING to assuage my fears that it wouldn't arrive. What does it matter to him?? Of course he can be flippant about it. Kinda ticked me off.
Got sick over the weekend with a cold from hell...my house is totally devoid of Kleenex now...and I lost a whole weekend's walking. Not that I would've gotten far...it's been in the 90s with heat indices over 100. I'm hoping that breaks tonight because I HAVE to get back out. I've done NO walking in about a week now and that's NO BUENO.
But I'm recovering...tomorrow should be back to normal.
Today I went to Kohl's in search of Caminowear. Tony gave me a pair of his cargo shorts before he left for Vermont, and I realized I'm NOT doomed to evil, shapeless, terrible-fitting chick hiking shorts made for people with stick-figure bodies and that, believe it or not, a pair of 34 cargos are THE BOMB!! So I sought out a few pairs of lightweight cargos at Kohl's today and found TWO PAIRS of zip-offs!!! I've been wearing one pair all afternoon, and they're ALMOST perfect. They're a little big. And with the weight I expect to drop along the route, they're only gonna get bigger. Problem: the 32s only came in lengths of 30 or 32. And a 34 length is NECESSARY. So I may just suck it up. But I'm keeping the tags just in case. And at any rate, thanks to Tony, I learned that boy pants rock. :)
Next on the list: RUCKSACK. Ian told me there's an outdoors store in Springfield. Might be on the billet for tomorrow.
I FLY IN FOUR WEEKS. AAAAAAAAAACK!!!!!
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Boots 'n' Sox
Found myself with some extra time to kill on Saturday and headed up to REI in Fair Oaks.
I knew I was gonna be spending a lot of money on boots, so I was too nervous to head straight to footwear. I mulled around for a while in the Camelbaks, the pet accessories, and the hiking gear and tried some things on. I do NOT have the body for hiking shorts. Period. Seemed like every pair of shorts I tried on had some hidden mechanism that caused them to inflate around the hip and buttock areas with these big unsightly bulges that my own clothes don't seem to possess. Can't figure that out. I know it can't be me.... Still, I wonder if I'll be able to fit into them when I get BACK.... And it does have me a bit concerned...what you wear when you hike is important, I'm guessing. What the heck am I gonna wear for shorts, to make sure they don't chafe or make me uncomfortable day in and day out? I'm gonna have like TWO PAIRS of shorts / pants for WEEKS! They better be good.
Found some high-end performance shirts, too...about $40-$50 a pop. Is that worth the wicking mechanism? They say cotton is no bueno...a liability when it's wet and takes forever to dry. But the costs are mounting and I can't seem to decide if these fancy clothes they want you to wear are a gimmick or a worthwhile investment. And don't even get me STARTED on sports bras.
So, having failed in like SIX different pairs of shorts and cargo pants (with the cool zip-off lower legs, dammit), I meandered into socks.
Wool socks. SEVENTEEN DOLLARS A PAIR. Max padding? Medium padding? Wool? Synthetic? Polypro? Do I need padding? Will my feet get hot? Again, how important is WICKING? Am I hiking or trekking? There were like three aisles' worth of socks. I kept casting mournful glances at the teenage kids running the footwear department till one of them caught my eye and came over to help. He was great. He even let me try different socks on in the shoe department without making me buy them.
I found the shoes I wanted right away. Then felt guilty because I felt like I was seizing on the first pair of boots I found, and I needed to be more discriminating. But they were Vasques, the brand I'd seen mentioned several times in blogs, and I gotta admit, I liked them partially because they LOOKED COOL!! But they also had a lot of breathing panels that the leather ones didn't have. The kid who helped me couldn't have been more than 17, but he seemed to know what he was doing and was very helpful, as was the kid he passed me off to when he got off work five minutes after I tried on the first pair.
So I spent about an hour trying on three different pairs, with two different sock weights, with three different insoles, five different upper-lacing patterns, and about a JILLION questions for this kid. Finally made up my mind. $150 for the boots, another $50 for two pairs of medium-weight wool hiking socks and three pairs of polypro liner socks (to reduce blisters and allow you to lengthen the life of your socks between washings).
Also went to the folks' house last night to get my passport photos taken. I'm actually kinda pleased with the way they turned out. I've been sitting on this passport application for a month now, and I leave in 35 days. Tomorrow after school, I'll go to the post office and get it taken care of. There's a 2-week option that I hope will work. If not, I'm not sure what I'll do!!!
DEVELOPMENT: My dad has a friend who has a 26-year-old daughter. She and her NZ husband are moving to the area this summer. My dad and this guy are talking about the couple staying in my house while I'm gone AND PAYING MY BILLS WHILE THEY'RE HERE. HOW BOMB IS THAT???? That could potentially free up somewhere around $1000 for me in the middle of the summer!! If you're the prayin' kind...start prayin'. I need that to go through.
So it's Tuesday now, and I finally decided I better take the new boots and socks for a test drive. I decided I'd walk from my house to my parents', about 3.5 miles away. Got about 1/3 of a mile and the sky opened up. Stood for about 5 minutes under a tree, literally paralyzed with indecision about whether to press on (so I get wet, so what? It'll rain in Spain...on the plain...) or turn back. I turned back. It stopped raining. I got home, called my dad, decided to drive over. Needed to pick up those photos anyway. Right around the time I would've reached their development, with about half a mile to go, it started to BUCKET. Like, I think I saw animals two by two. That would've SUUUUUUCKED. So it's a good thing I turned back after all, but I still wish I could've done that walk today. I am NOT doing well with consistency. Did I mention it's 35 days away???
Sigh. Oh well. Found a Facebook group that has GORGEOUS pictures from the Camino. I found a picture of the Cathedral of St. James (the destination) and the harbor at Finisterre (the after-destination). BREATHTAKING. This is gonna be AWESOME.
I knew I was gonna be spending a lot of money on boots, so I was too nervous to head straight to footwear. I mulled around for a while in the Camelbaks, the pet accessories, and the hiking gear and tried some things on. I do NOT have the body for hiking shorts. Period. Seemed like every pair of shorts I tried on had some hidden mechanism that caused them to inflate around the hip and buttock areas with these big unsightly bulges that my own clothes don't seem to possess. Can't figure that out. I know it can't be me.... Still, I wonder if I'll be able to fit into them when I get BACK.... And it does have me a bit concerned...what you wear when you hike is important, I'm guessing. What the heck am I gonna wear for shorts, to make sure they don't chafe or make me uncomfortable day in and day out? I'm gonna have like TWO PAIRS of shorts / pants for WEEKS! They better be good.
Found some high-end performance shirts, too...about $40-$50 a pop. Is that worth the wicking mechanism? They say cotton is no bueno...a liability when it's wet and takes forever to dry. But the costs are mounting and I can't seem to decide if these fancy clothes they want you to wear are a gimmick or a worthwhile investment. And don't even get me STARTED on sports bras.
So, having failed in like SIX different pairs of shorts and cargo pants (with the cool zip-off lower legs, dammit), I meandered into socks.
Wool socks. SEVENTEEN DOLLARS A PAIR. Max padding? Medium padding? Wool? Synthetic? Polypro? Do I need padding? Will my feet get hot? Again, how important is WICKING? Am I hiking or trekking? There were like three aisles' worth of socks. I kept casting mournful glances at the teenage kids running the footwear department till one of them caught my eye and came over to help. He was great. He even let me try different socks on in the shoe department without making me buy them.
I found the shoes I wanted right away. Then felt guilty because I felt like I was seizing on the first pair of boots I found, and I needed to be more discriminating. But they were Vasques, the brand I'd seen mentioned several times in blogs, and I gotta admit, I liked them partially because they LOOKED COOL!! But they also had a lot of breathing panels that the leather ones didn't have. The kid who helped me couldn't have been more than 17, but he seemed to know what he was doing and was very helpful, as was the kid he passed me off to when he got off work five minutes after I tried on the first pair.
So I spent about an hour trying on three different pairs, with two different sock weights, with three different insoles, five different upper-lacing patterns, and about a JILLION questions for this kid. Finally made up my mind. $150 for the boots, another $50 for two pairs of medium-weight wool hiking socks and three pairs of polypro liner socks (to reduce blisters and allow you to lengthen the life of your socks between washings).
Also went to the folks' house last night to get my passport photos taken. I'm actually kinda pleased with the way they turned out. I've been sitting on this passport application for a month now, and I leave in 35 days. Tomorrow after school, I'll go to the post office and get it taken care of. There's a 2-week option that I hope will work. If not, I'm not sure what I'll do!!!
DEVELOPMENT: My dad has a friend who has a 26-year-old daughter. She and her NZ husband are moving to the area this summer. My dad and this guy are talking about the couple staying in my house while I'm gone AND PAYING MY BILLS WHILE THEY'RE HERE. HOW BOMB IS THAT???? That could potentially free up somewhere around $1000 for me in the middle of the summer!! If you're the prayin' kind...start prayin'. I need that to go through.
So it's Tuesday now, and I finally decided I better take the new boots and socks for a test drive. I decided I'd walk from my house to my parents', about 3.5 miles away. Got about 1/3 of a mile and the sky opened up. Stood for about 5 minutes under a tree, literally paralyzed with indecision about whether to press on (so I get wet, so what? It'll rain in Spain...on the plain...) or turn back. I turned back. It stopped raining. I got home, called my dad, decided to drive over. Needed to pick up those photos anyway. Right around the time I would've reached their development, with about half a mile to go, it started to BUCKET. Like, I think I saw animals two by two. That would've SUUUUUUCKED. So it's a good thing I turned back after all, but I still wish I could've done that walk today. I am NOT doing well with consistency. Did I mention it's 35 days away???
Sigh. Oh well. Found a Facebook group that has GORGEOUS pictures from the Camino. I found a picture of the Cathedral of St. James (the destination) and the harbor at Finisterre (the after-destination). BREATHTAKING. This is gonna be AWESOME.
Friday, May 30, 2008
It's a done deal....
Well, there’s no going back now, no matter what my $38 travel insurance details state. I bought my tickets today. I’m flying out of Dulles on July 8, heading to Paris. I come home from Madrid on August 14. The total cost for the tickets, with the trip insurance, was nearly $1200. I went to www.1800flyeurope.com, which was a pretty decent site. Done deal.
Now that I’ve actually set the wheels in motion, I’m nervous as hell. Excited, I guess, but nervous, too. It bums me out that I’m getting a lot of friction from my mom about the trip. Despite all I’ve told her, I think she still assumes I’m going to be traipsing across the hinterlands of the Iberian Peninsula miles and miles away from any human contact, seconds away from falling off a mountain or into a canyon or being eaten alive by a pack of wild hyenas.
Suddenly, that’s how scary it feels to me, too.
Once I really started thinking about making this trek, I knew that if I backed down from it, I’d be terribly disappointed in myself for wimping out. Though I’m a little shy on training and conditioning (I’m still only walking about twice a week), I’m sure I should be able to do it. I mean, there are plenty of women who do this and are ten or twenty years older than I am. I may not be in the best shape of anyone I know, but I’m far from being in really BAD shape.
Cost is daunting. Though many of the blogs I’ve read claim that this is really inexpensive travel, I have to remember that a 10 Euro night in a pilgrim’s refugio will compute to about $16 or $17 at least…and that’s going to add up quick, even if it includes some meals.
Also, it’s going to require some pre-trip shopping. Thoreau once said, “Distrust any enterprise that requires new clothes.” As much as I revere H.D.T. and his revelations at Walden Pond, I don’t find that to be true in many areas of life, so perhaps not this one, either. I’m gonna have to drop some COIN on some boots. The sites I’ve used for research say that’s where you should make sure you don’t scrimp…buy the best boots you can find. My brother (the most authoritarian source in my world, ha ha) seconds that idea.
I welcome recommendations, by the way – not only on boots, but on gear as well. Lightweight outerwear, walking shorts (the kind that zip on long pants), the best brand of clothes for multi-weather exposure. It’ll be the north of Spain, from mid-July to mid-August. Best brand of hiking backpack, since I’ll be living out of it for a month (with like TWO sets of clothes…). I have a backpack, but I bought it in 1997 for 60 pounds on a street corner in London, and last summer, the night before I left for California, I found the outer pockets coming off of it and spent half the night stitching them back on. I’m GONNA need a new pack.
Better get serious about the walking…it’s gonna be a long summer.
Now that I’ve actually set the wheels in motion, I’m nervous as hell. Excited, I guess, but nervous, too. It bums me out that I’m getting a lot of friction from my mom about the trip. Despite all I’ve told her, I think she still assumes I’m going to be traipsing across the hinterlands of the Iberian Peninsula miles and miles away from any human contact, seconds away from falling off a mountain or into a canyon or being eaten alive by a pack of wild hyenas.
Suddenly, that’s how scary it feels to me, too.
Once I really started thinking about making this trek, I knew that if I backed down from it, I’d be terribly disappointed in myself for wimping out. Though I’m a little shy on training and conditioning (I’m still only walking about twice a week), I’m sure I should be able to do it. I mean, there are plenty of women who do this and are ten or twenty years older than I am. I may not be in the best shape of anyone I know, but I’m far from being in really BAD shape.
Cost is daunting. Though many of the blogs I’ve read claim that this is really inexpensive travel, I have to remember that a 10 Euro night in a pilgrim’s refugio will compute to about $16 or $17 at least…and that’s going to add up quick, even if it includes some meals.
Also, it’s going to require some pre-trip shopping. Thoreau once said, “Distrust any enterprise that requires new clothes.” As much as I revere H.D.T. and his revelations at Walden Pond, I don’t find that to be true in many areas of life, so perhaps not this one, either. I’m gonna have to drop some COIN on some boots. The sites I’ve used for research say that’s where you should make sure you don’t scrimp…buy the best boots you can find. My brother (the most authoritarian source in my world, ha ha) seconds that idea.
I welcome recommendations, by the way – not only on boots, but on gear as well. Lightweight outerwear, walking shorts (the kind that zip on long pants), the best brand of clothes for multi-weather exposure. It’ll be the north of Spain, from mid-July to mid-August. Best brand of hiking backpack, since I’ll be living out of it for a month (with like TWO sets of clothes…). I have a backpack, but I bought it in 1997 for 60 pounds on a street corner in London, and last summer, the night before I left for California, I found the outer pockets coming off of it and spent half the night stitching them back on. I’m GONNA need a new pack.
Better get serious about the walking…it’s gonna be a long summer.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Training Day 3
Tuesday, third day of training for this thing...left my place and headed up 234 about two miles to Warm Springs Road, turned around and came back. Lumbar pack, about 6 or 7 pounds. 4 miles, 1:20 even. Hoping for less leg strain this time.
Oh, and airline ticket prices to Europe in the summer?
They SUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.
Oh, and airline ticket prices to Europe in the summer?
They SUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Training Day 2
Okay, so it's been six days, but I finally got out there again. Walked the length of Montclair today, from my house to my brother's. Got there in 59 minutes...about three and a half miles. Hung out for a while, then got my sister-in-law to drop me at the top of the road at Waterway, near Station 17, and walked the three miles home. 38 minutes home...total of about 6.5 miles. Not bad. Feel pretty good, though my calves are tight and my feet are sore. It hurts my hip joints...not a good thing. I had my lumbar pack, and I estimate I had about 7 or 8 pounds on me.
Hopefully will walk again on Monday after work....
Hopefully will walk again on Monday after work....
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Training Day 1
So of course, I decided I'd better start training. Walking six to eight hours a day is going to be no joke, especially across the Spanish plains in July. Today I had my first day off in what seems like MONTHS, and thought I'd see how far I could get.
I left my house and headed up Rt. 234. Two hours later, I stopped in at the Subway where 234 meets Hoadly, to get a sandwich and write for a bit. I was knackered. It really surprised me how tired I was. I've always been a walker...it was the only way to get around to see friends and go places in high school in Okinawa, and I remember days I'd set off and just walk forEVER, it seemed. How easy it is to forget that that was 13 years ago. So the walking was easy, but I was exhausted when I stopped. In two hours, I'd covered about 7 or 8 miles (I'll drive it later to see for sure).
I need to remember that this was Day One. Otherwise I'll be very disappointed that, a mile or two into the way back, I decided my legs hurt too bad and my bourgeoning blisters were too threatening to continue, and called my sister-in-law to come get me. Amazing how in five minutes, we covered what would have taken me another hour and a half.
One thing that concerns me was that today was drizzly, overcast, and about 60 degrees. The Camino will probably be hot, sunny, and average about 90. The books I'm reading on it talk about walking into towns in the midafternoon to find nothing open due to siesta time. They also talk about long stretches of 30 km or more, with no shade, no civilization, and maps indicating lone water pumps that cannot be trusted to produce water of any quality in the high summer.
This is going to be no easy task.
Another thing that worries me is the training I'm going to have to do between now and then. I feel fine about the prospect of spending a month walking towards a definite destination. But the fact that preparing for it will require I spend hours and HOURS every week just WALKING through my own town...when there are always a million other things I'd like to be doing...is daunting. Walking here, and walking back. Walking there, and walking back. Walking and walking and walking...and then bumming a ride back. It's going to feel kind of pointless, I think. I hope not.
On the other hand, it is kind of interesting to think of how long it would take to walk the ten-minute drive to my mom's shop, or to my Starbucks, or even across town to my hangout. We don't think about distances in our automotive society. If we do, we think in terms of gas mileage. I'm going to be thinking about it in terms of shoe leather, I guess. Planning to meet someone at Starbucks can happen at the drop of a hat...well, now I could set out for such a meeting two hours prior and just get there in time.
I'm sure people around me think I have a new harebrained plan every week, and they never happen. If I were smarter, I'd play my cards a little closer to my vest and keep my plans to myself in order to avoid getting a reputation for being flighty. But I can't help it. I get too excited, caught up in the plan, and want to tell everyone. Plus, saying it out loud makes it more real...makes it seem more likely that I'll actually do it.
So stay tuned. Hopefully there'll be more of this to come.
Training Day One Total: 9.3 miles
I left my house and headed up Rt. 234. Two hours later, I stopped in at the Subway where 234 meets Hoadly, to get a sandwich and write for a bit. I was knackered. It really surprised me how tired I was. I've always been a walker...it was the only way to get around to see friends and go places in high school in Okinawa, and I remember days I'd set off and just walk forEVER, it seemed. How easy it is to forget that that was 13 years ago. So the walking was easy, but I was exhausted when I stopped. In two hours, I'd covered about 7 or 8 miles (I'll drive it later to see for sure).
I need to remember that this was Day One. Otherwise I'll be very disappointed that, a mile or two into the way back, I decided my legs hurt too bad and my bourgeoning blisters were too threatening to continue, and called my sister-in-law to come get me. Amazing how in five minutes, we covered what would have taken me another hour and a half.
One thing that concerns me was that today was drizzly, overcast, and about 60 degrees. The Camino will probably be hot, sunny, and average about 90. The books I'm reading on it talk about walking into towns in the midafternoon to find nothing open due to siesta time. They also talk about long stretches of 30 km or more, with no shade, no civilization, and maps indicating lone water pumps that cannot be trusted to produce water of any quality in the high summer.
This is going to be no easy task.
Another thing that worries me is the training I'm going to have to do between now and then. I feel fine about the prospect of spending a month walking towards a definite destination. But the fact that preparing for it will require I spend hours and HOURS every week just WALKING through my own town...when there are always a million other things I'd like to be doing...is daunting. Walking here, and walking back. Walking there, and walking back. Walking and walking and walking...and then bumming a ride back. It's going to feel kind of pointless, I think. I hope not.
On the other hand, it is kind of interesting to think of how long it would take to walk the ten-minute drive to my mom's shop, or to my Starbucks, or even across town to my hangout. We don't think about distances in our automotive society. If we do, we think in terms of gas mileage. I'm going to be thinking about it in terms of shoe leather, I guess. Planning to meet someone at Starbucks can happen at the drop of a hat...well, now I could set out for such a meeting two hours prior and just get there in time.
I'm sure people around me think I have a new harebrained plan every week, and they never happen. If I were smarter, I'd play my cards a little closer to my vest and keep my plans to myself in order to avoid getting a reputation for being flighty. But I can't help it. I get too excited, caught up in the plan, and want to tell everyone. Plus, saying it out loud makes it more real...makes it seem more likely that I'll actually do it.
So stay tuned. Hopefully there'll be more of this to come.
Training Day One Total: 9.3 miles
Camino de Santiago
So I've recently decided to undertake the Camino de Santiago de Compostale this summer. It's a pilgrimage route from various points within Europe across the Pyrenees and the north of Spain, terminating at the Shrine of St. James the Apostle in the northwest corner of Spain. I plan to start at St. Jean Pied-de-Port in France and take about a month to complete the trek. It's about 500 miles. Check it out at http://www.caminodesantiago.me.uk/.
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