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Althea Hayton | |||||||||||||||
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The road to Santiago de Compostela: My pilgrimage blog, created September 2005) | |||||||||||||||
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Sunday, July 10, 2005 Through the winter I have been building up my fitness with long walks around our beautiful city. I have built up to doing 15 miles a day without the pack, in one walk a week. I have discovered some absolutely beautiful walks, and have rediscovered my love of English countryside, not that I have ever forgotten it but to set off at dawn and walk in the quiet of country lanes in summer is a real delight. Also to know that I have nothing to fear when walking alone. What a great country! Friday, August 05, 2005 Well I'm still training, with two weeks to go. Wednesday I thought I would test out my new-found fitness with a really long walk and a heavier load. I made 20 miles but the pack was a bit too heavy and made me top heavy. I went over the stile into a field of horses, got safely over but one of the horses, after a friendly sniff started to nibble at my knapsack, wherein lay my lunch. I turned quickly and see what was happening and was so top heavy that I toppled over in that inevitable kind of way... I now have a large bruise on my hip bone to remind me of that day's two lessons : 1 don't carry too much 2 dont walk too far. Pretty obvious stuff, but then I'm not very bright at this kind of thing. Well I did both and survived but it took me a full day to recover! Glad I learned that lesson here and not on the road. Not far to go now. One more long walk in the hills on the Ridgeway and I'm into a regime of rest, sleep, food, socialising and a bit of housecleaning and I'm OFF!! Friday, August 19, 2005 Day 2 and I'm a pilgrim now. I got my pilgrim passport stamped yesterday in Pamplona, which makes me an official pilgrim. My first refugio complete with snorer, my first pilgrim meal ( I chose the beef: a mistake) and my first day on the road. My first recording made, but after 10 attempts at various spots around the village, Spain is a very noisy place. Found the ideal spot in an alleyway, got three minutes into it and the dogs began to bark. Then it was cars, then kids, then sprinklers. However at 8am today I found a little cemetery in the middle of nowhere and got 5 minutes into it and HOLA! there was a pilgrim come by for a look. Anyway I did it. However making recordings will be a major problem as I have to find a quiet place. Chose a quiet refugio at Puenta la Reina ( lovely place) so as to make a good recording .... the wind is blowing now! Food good, boots fit, bit achey but Ill get fitter. Thank you all for being there for me. Much love and hasta la vista! Tuesday, August 23, 2005 Viana and my body is groaning! So I weakened and found a hotel room. Bliss. Silence. Hours and hours of sleep. Lots of food, very little walking. Today I walked just a few miles and am at a WONDERFUL refugio for pilgrims with every modern convenience and a terrace to sit in, plus fountain! So I am off to explore the city SLOWLY and have a sleep and then some more food and maybe a pilgrim blessing somewhere ( they are excellent, the priest shakes your hand and then showers you with holy water. ) Then tomorrow I do the longest walk of the whole trip but I am in good shape for it. Have been into the slough of despond, thinking that I will never make it, and out again, remembering that with a little more self care, such as lots of food in my bag to keep me going, things can be easier. The recordings are coming along, very interesting to see how things pan out. Have met many people and chatted with them. Some of them crazy enough to be truly interesting! Like a Shaman from Brazil and a young blonde woman from Northern Ireland that I took to be about 30 and who told me she had been married for 34 years! Weather cool enough for a jacket and some light showers. Excellent walking weather! Its getting much warmer now. I may need some sunscreen tomorrow! Lots of love, especially to those who I am carrying with me in my thoughts. Thursday, August 25, 2005 Now I am at Santo Domingo, and its been a hot day, but beautiful. Again, my legs are complaining so I wont walk very far tomorrow and maybe take a room in a hotel. This is the most amazing experience, because of the places and the people. The whole atmosphere. I have made a few friends and we sometimes eat together at the refugio in the evenings. Every day I try to leave before dawn ( 6.am) because I walk so slowly. I start off with the energetic Germans and French and gradually the whole company overtakes me! I end up with the older people! I dont care because I just enjoy wandering along. Today its only 11 miles which to me now is a short walk! This is wonderful country side. Lots of Rioja vines growing, with huge bunches of grapes nearly ripe. Every day I ponder this question: why do people do this? So far there is only one answer: " It's a mystery!" Love to all. Thinking of you. Wednesday, August 31, 2005 Well, I am now in a pilgrim refuge that is next to a campsite and we ate here and it was an enormous meal..... I will sleep well tonight! This is high country, miles of wheat fields and some straw collecting still happening. Very dry, chalk lands and a white road to walk upon. I have just parted company with a group of young people who I have been with for a few days now. I am about to embark upon a few days of great heat, and will now make new friends, I hope. The road passes through wonderful villages with some broken down houses, but there is always a bar and a sandwich and a friendly greeting: " Buen Camino!!" wherever we go. Small blister is now large blister, so a rest day is soon needed---- Feet sore, heart happy!!! Friday, September 02, 2005 Hallo. Now things are hotting up as I walk across the meseta. Incredible wide skies, dry and dusty, some straight and stony roads stretching into the distance. The principal problem now is not the Blister (yes just one) but the heat. With the help of my amazing Australian aboriginal scarf, which I put about my head against the sun, ( in an imitation of a cross between Mother Theresa and Lawrence of Arabia) then I manage well. Also every small stone or slim tree that throws a little shade is a place of rest for me until the sweat dries. Just one day of too much sun, cured by staying indoors and loads of rest. Won't do that again. The recordings are getting deeper, in the sense that the material is more philosophical, such as meaninglessness, would you believe. I came up with the idea that for each the journey is the meaning and our footsteps make our own pilgrimage road. There is a poem in there somewhere. There are poems everywhere on the Camino, on walls outside and pieces of paper on the walls of pilgrim refuges. Its that kind of place. Wonderful churches. The Romanesque church in Fromista is a real gem. Three or four more days of this heat and we reach Leon. Then I will be more than half way! Thanks for txt msgs, comments and emails. They really help. Hasta luego, amigos! Thursday, September 08, 2005 What can I say.....I am two days ahead of the plan, and have already left Leon. Leon cathedral, even in a dull light, is a wonderful place, with soaring arches and amazing stained glass in tall windows reaching right to the ceiling. This city was not so hard to be in as Burgos..for a start it's now quite cool and it even rained a little. Secondly the buildings are lovely and the whole place has a graceful air to it. I was with a German woman who was finishing her pilgrimage and we went for coffee and cake in the traditional German way, and it felt most civilised. We stayed in a Benedictine convent and we attended mass and vespers and received a blessing, so this third stage, traditionally viewed as the most spiritual stage, is off to a good start. The two days in the city and the emotional farewells left me a little tired and today's walk has been slow and short, as it will be tomorrow. Lots of food, quiet and sleep, that's the way. The scenery is amazing with the mountains in the distance in the west, beckoning us. By the next blog I will be walking in the mountains, so then I may need my new black poncho, which covers everything and makes me look like a cross between Darth Vader and the hunchback of Notre Dame! Now its over half way, we are all very conscious of how much is left, rather than how much is done. Truly a new stage. I will shortly lose some more friends as they must go faster and leave me behind. I may be alone for most of these days, but no matter - its lovely and there are always people to speak to in the pilgrim refuges. Till next time, amigos..... Monday, September 12, 2005 Well I've made it past the Cruz de Ferro, where pilgrims traditionally leave a stone from home. I carried with me all the way a stone from Yorkshire, Robin Hood's Bay in fact. It is a stone rich in old fossils, which seems suitable for an old fossil like me to carry about for a couple of hundred miles.........anyhow with due ceremony I placed the stone, on a damp and misty day high in the mountains above Pontferrada. As I dont have to carry so much water as its cool now and the stone has gone, my bag seems as light as anything and Imo dancing along. Five days ago on the way to Astorga I walked one hot mile too many and got touch of sunstroke which will teach me...... I spent a day in bed and a lovely little angel came into my life and ministered to me, a retired nurse from New Zealand. We have become firm friends and have been walking together for about 5 days now. I am glad to report a full recovery, and Galicia is unlikely to be all that hot so no more sunstroke. Now in Pontferrada ( big town) in a huge new Albergue ( refuge ) that has every modern convenience. I am sitting here in my night shirt as almost all my clothes are being washed. A good chance for a bit of a sort out of kit, hairwash, shop ec. My new NZ friend is going to cook scrambled eggs for supper.... like all nurses she loves looking after people and she is still checking on me every two hours or so.....she started in le Puy in May and will reach Santiago about 30th. She is 68 and has already walked more than 1000 kilometres! Tomorrow it will be less than 200 kilometres to finish and we cross big mountains. Already thinking of home and you dear people back there. Lots of love to all. Tuesday, September 13, 2005 Well I am in Villafranca and I am ready to climb into the mountains tomorrow, I am walking a bit faster now and so have just parted company with a delightful little New Zealand person who ministered to me in my hour of need a few days ago. Now I walk alone for a bit, but there are always new friends. More later! Wednesday, September 14, 2005 Just a little walk today into the mountains, its very hot and not as steep as all that, just one lovely village after another, complete with bar....Its a difficult job, but someone has to do it.... Tommorow is the Big Climb to O Cebreiro, where I understand that the refuge is in the hands of hippies, so anything may happen. The scenery is wonderful the sky clear the sun hot. Have now lost my reading glasses altogether. I'll just have to not read!! Have met some English here in this little refuge, typical pilgrims, the son is about to start a D Phil in Philosophy at Oxford at the age of 23. Ah well. There are a lot of deeply educated philosophical chaps about who converse about anything in several languages at once. Much maundering on spiritual issues, especially now, at this final stage. The latest thing is to find some way to integrate this amazing experience into every day life back there in the Kingdom of Uck. Much of it just wont translate at all, but my daily recordings seem to have unearthed some things that will. Cant believe there will only be 7 more refuges before Santiago. Some of my very best friends snore, but they dont usually gather together in dozens and snore in unison for most of the night, so I wont miss the dormitories. A washing machine may be nice too, and of course a good pair of reading glasses.... Miss you all. Thursday, September 22, 2005 Well, I am here. I have a pic taken outside the Cathedral that I will post when I get home, meanwhile you will have to take my word for it. The last week in Galicia has been so different! I got over the mountain pass at O Cebriero to a refuge with no Internet and so it continued until today. so you will get an update all in one go, I'm afraid. The walk has been largely downhill because the pass is very high, but still we negotiated lots of river valleys with steep ups and downs. The legs have taken a beating but the the feet are holding up. The weather has been amazing and the early morning wonderful. Not a single drop of rain in over a week. Its been a steady countdown until today and it was so difficult to believe that we are at last here. I walked into the old city and turned a corner and there was the Cathedral. I arrived alone, as I planned to do, because there were a few tears. I went into the Cathedral and touched the pillar under a statue of St James' where the hand print of so many millions of pilgrims has been worn into the marble. Then a short prayer and time to find a hostel. I found one very close to the Cathedral and the woman answered the door (second floor, lots of steps) in her dressing gown. Its like something out of one of those old French films. Anyway, I have a bed in a room all to myself with its own lock, that's amazing. Not quite ready for en suite and a TV; that would be too much culture shock!!! Off to get my certificate. More tomorrow. From an ex-pilgrim in a state of identity crisis...... Friday, September 23, 2005 I went to the Pilgrim office, where there are wonderful people behind desks and they all speak several languages perfectly. They ask why you made the pilgrimage and (if you say the right thing, such as yes you made it for religious reasons) they give you a certificate in Latin known locally as the "Compostella." Its really rather impressive, and rightly so. I have witnessed pilgrims practically crawl into Santiago, many of them limping, many leaning heavily on their staffs, many weeping, many exultant. Quite a sight to see. I have made friends with a very kind man from Denmark and I was included in his group of friends ( Norwegian and German) to have dinner, which explains the rush yesterday to complete the blog. It was a real celebration in several languages with loads of red wine and fish soup and beef and Tarta Santiago to finish. I then fell into bed ( my body wants to rest for a week, my spirit wants to explore and shop etc, a battle is on) to sleep, then at 4.0 in the morning some disrespectful, selfish young man with a bongo drum thought it would be fun to play the drum for over an hour in the street. It echoed all through the old quarter and everyone was too exhausted to react until a woman made herself clear in three languages and it all went quiet. The highlight today was to learn that a bus strike ( yes they have strikes here too) will not be happening tomorrow, the strike is only on weekdays. That means I can make the long bus trip to Finisterre and there burn a few clothes ( I have had a problem buying some new ones so I wont burn them all and come home naked but there is a certain pair of trousers I will willingly either bin or destroy!) I will also not be swimming naked in the sea. Further details when I get home. Actually that delightful news was eclipsed within thirty minutes by the Pilgrim Mass. I had learned that they swing the famous incense burner, the Botofumerio, at the Pilgrim Mass at 12 noon each day, at least they do if it is tied to the rope, and when I arrived sure enough it was tied to the rope. I positioned myself in the transept in the front row so I would get a good view of this amazing sight. There was a fair bit in Latin which was good because then language didn't matter. There was an announcement in Spanish with details of how many Pilgrims had come from where on the Camino, and where they were from. I was in there somewhere but I was unable to distinguish the word "Inglaterra" from the rest. I am the only English person that I have met who set out from Pamplona on August 18th. A rough guess is that more than 100 pilgrims arrived yesterday and went to get their Compostella and said they wanted to be included in that list. Double that for the actual number. Then we all went on with the Mass, all crammed in together with pilgrims sitting on the floor with their rucksacks and smartly dressed Spanish tourists weeping and joining in the responses. Then six men in special purple robes came into the sanctuary with a tin of incense and some coals. The excitement in the congregation was palpable. The priests ( there were six, five of them pilgrims) came forward and the incense was put into the burner and the lid put on. The Botofumerio is the size of a small dustbin but of course much more ornate and beautiful. It began to swing over our heads. Then it all made sense. The whole thing. This incense was not to make the air fragrant, for Pîlgrims down the ages have always been washed clean for the occasion. This was about being incensed. My understanding of incense is to recognise the sacredness of something and to underline the existing sacredness of something. This was a real blessing, and the great flaming incense burner swung higher and higher into the ceiling over our heads and the air was filled with frankincense. There was not a dry eye in that place. A spontaneous wave of applause began, and the people had what they wanted: a spectacular sight but also a blessing. Wow. So two hours' siesta and I'm about fit to explore and find the bus station because the bus for Finisterre leaves at 8am and I have to be there 7.30am in the dark and its a half hour walk..... I need to be sure of the way. No more blogs from Spain. Thanks for all the emails and support, it really has helped. Love to all. PS. In the cathedral I saw two pilgrims shake hands and say "Buen camino" out of habit. Then one stopped and said "No.. its finished." Then the other one smiled and said "No... it goes on....." Links
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