MY OWN JOURNEY ON THE CAMINO DE COMPOSTELA.
“My own story is different, just
like every pilgrim’s Camino is different on the same walk we make in life”
reflected the old man. It is 7am at the ‘refugio’ de San Tiago, France. We have
breakfast and begin walking up hill and onto the mountains. The weather is
magnificent this August 31, 2006. We are lucky as it may often be cloudy and
misty and difficult to see the road ahead. But we are having a magnificent view
of the ancient country and of the French Pyrenees. “The angels are guiding me
and Gemma in Castellon that loves me, she will meet me at the end of the Camino
in San Tiago de Compostela to celebrate the end of the walk” thought the old
man with a pleasant smile on his face and carrying a heavy, much too heavy pack
on his back. The Camino of the heart is calling and we go! From Roncesvalles to
Zubiri, a small town in Navarra province of Spain – we are only on the third
day of the Camino we cannot find an ‘albergue’ to spend the night in so we
improvise; I get a room at a small hotel for 6 Euros for myself. No snoring
pilgrims and warm showers. This is a luxury but without the proper care of the
body the souls cannot travel well. Next day I got to Pamplona and sent some
unnecessary stuff to Gemma and felt relieved from the heavy burden (4K) in my
backpack.
Notes from my diary: “My body
aches all over, Andrew disappeared with a couple of girls One from NZ who lived
at the ,Gold Coast Australia and now lives in London and Leanne 28, an
Irish/Indian lass from Dublin. She finished her MA in Ecological engineering
and her dark hair and very pleasant constitution AND not carrying much in her
back pack inspired all of us – amazing!- I think Andy is in love.”
More writing: “I am tired and still
25 days or more to go. I have to pace myself better and have even less weight
on my back. Take more ‘siestas’ during the hot midday period. Not worry about
the next ‘refugio’ like many pilgrims who rush to the next stop like sheep. I
am wondering how this will be for me in the next long days. Well I can always
take the bus. Yet that is only in case of an emergency! So far the Camino is
all forest and going downhill to Zubiri. I am exhausted and walked very slowly,
I realize that I lost track of my companions. Suddenly I felt a presence in my
back, thinking it is a pilgrim wanting to pass me by, I looked back and saw no
one there. At that moment, I felt that an angelic presence was caring for me on
that difficult trek.
Many small ‘miracles’ emerged
along the way. For example, I found a
walking stick when my new one was lost. I was walking out of Pamplona early in
the morning (Andy and friends were still asleep) and thinking that I need a
stick to help me walk, suddenly in front of me dropped a stick! I was shocked
as the streets were deserted and there were no wooden sticks around to be seen.
“Here is a gift from San Tiago and the Angels” thought the pilgrim. “Thank
you!”
Day 7 - week one - walking from
Los Arcos to Logrono – 27K.The walk to Los Arcos in 35C was a real trial!
Leanne, Andrew and I walked very slowly on a hot road. Finally I gave up and I
rested in a shade of a big hay stack and there I met a young Iranian man Hushi.
He lives in Sweden but now is working as a bartender in Alicante.
With another young man, Ed from
London we made up a very interesting group of ‘yolo, yolo’ pilgrims. We came to
Logrono, capital city of the Rioja province and the best wine in the country!
The inner city is a typical medieval town with a huge cathedral and plaza. Very
dark inside and outside a nice café where I had a tortilla and coffee. Dinner
with my new group of friends with a lot of Rioja wine, this pilgrimage is
turning to be a party every night. Oh how different and good we all feel!
The imagination flows on the
Camino. Our group of five pilgrims, walking all day, gave us a sense of walking
on the “yellow brick road” in the wizard of Oz folk tale. Leanne was like
Dorothy, intelligent, cute; Andrew as the Tin Man, pursuing ‘Dorothy’ and
wanting to get her in a private room somewhere, while she flirts and plays ‘not
ready yet’. Hushi the young, bold, intelligent, critical and handsome Iranian –
we called him ‘the munchkin’; the young Englishman writing his first novel as
he walked, Ed, was named ‘munchkin two’; Yaro(me) was named ‘the lion with
heart’ He kept connecting with lovely Gemma on the mobile. Their love is
growing even on the Camino. This is one of her many texts:
“Your memories give me many
emotions, our meeting is near. I love you without any conditions, in a profound
way! How are you my butterfly?”
And
“Closing circles in life- how
good and also enjoying the walk! My love, I am so happy. I wake up with the
vision/image of our contact soon!”
HALF WAY TO THE TOP
I AM HALF WAY TO San Tiago.
Connecting with Gemma, my love on the internet at about 4pm each day and
receiving her text messages. I think “how is that I deserve such a love? I
answer: Because I was open to love and she came in. She was waiting for
millennia” LOVE IS LIFE. Love is pain and happiness!
I caught up with Andrew and Leanne and we had
dinner celebrating her master’s degree. A man played a harmonica in the
‘albergue’ and I sang a Russian song - the ‘katiusha’ with him to the delight
of all tired pilgrims. Miracles are small but they do appear on the Camino.
After getting a walking staff in Pamplona, I was doing a very agonizingly hot
walk to Estella and missed the yellow arrow. I lost 3kilometers and was exhausted
before getting to the town. I arrived at a cathedral at 3pm and there was bus
stop and a bus. The young female driver said that she is going to La Estella in
five minutes and for only 95c I was in the refugio in about 5minutes. Ah a rest
– thank you angels! At night, I imagine I am with Gemma, I close my eyes and
feel her kisses, so gentle and passionate. I see her naked with me in bed and
we make love. ….. I am on a magic carpet
flying to her side. I wake up in the early morning and have to get going. They
close the albergue at 8am. The Camino is calling me!
September 11/06. Walking at night
from Najera to Santo Domingo (21K) It is full moon and the OZ group wanted to
walk at midnight in moonlight. However, after much wine and late night, only I
and Hushi were the only ‘volunteers’ to do the midnight walk. Hushi and I
walked for six hours and did a lot of talking about life and women. I felt like
Paolo Coelho on his Camino with his master. Except that I was the ‘master’ and
Hushi the ‘disciple’. We passed by Santo Domingo at 4am and ended up in Granon,
a medieval town, by 10am exhausted. Santo Domingo was also an old medieval town
and had a very dark energy. We felt the many awful things that must have
happened there. The old sculptures on the buildings reminded us of the
Inquisition and its horrors. We were exhausted but did not go to the albergue
at the church but slept on a bench in the plaza, like tow hobos. Later we
walked on to Granon where a nice refuge greeted us. We slept in a church on
Yoga mattresses and then went on to Burgos. I rested in a nice little
hotel-posada where I had two days of blissful rest and got in touch with Reyes,
Gemma’s cousin and her family. From Burgos to Leon a tough 30K walk. Here you
have a bit of history of that fantastic city: BURGOS.
There are many human settlings
dating back to the Neolithic period (4,500BC) especially on the hill of the
castle that has a full view of the city. The city of Burgos itself was founded
by Diego Rodriguez in the year 884. King Alfonso III of Leon trying to stop the
advances of the Moors, ordered a building of a military castle surrounded by a
vast wall.
After the re-conquest of the
area, the warriors that were given land built houses and developed commerce.
The city was not changed much until about 1071. Alfonso VIII establishes a
court in the city and helps build the Monastery of Huelgas and rebuilds the
city walls as they are today.
The XV Century brings Burgos into
its full potential as the centre of the Catholic Kings: Fernando and Isabel the
couple who financed Cristobal Colon that lead to the discovery of America.
Howe3ver, in the following years, Burgos suffered disintegration due to wars in
Flanders, the centralization of Spain in Madrid, diseases and a shift of
economy to the New World.
The Spanish civil war (1936-39), placed
Burgos in a special category. From its beginnings, the city decides to support
the Nationalist Government and was well rewarded by the dictator Franco who
became the leader and the head of state.
Now, in the 21st century, Burgos
has evolved as a mayor centre of commerce and tourism. It has also become the
main point of meeting of the pilgrims to Compostela. It is situated about half
way Santiago.
SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA
According to ancient local
tradition, on 2 January of the year AD 40, the Virgin Mary appeared to James on
the bank of the Ebro River at Caesar Augusta, while he was preaching the Gospel
in Spain. She appeared upon a pillar,( Nuestra Señora del Pilar), and that pillar
is conserved and venerated within the present Basilica of Our Lady of the
Pillar, in Zaragoza, Spain. Following that apparition, St James returned to
Judea, where he was beheaded by King Herod Agrippa I in the year 44.
The translation of his relics
from Judea to Galicia in the northwest of Iberia was effected, in legend, by a
series of miraculous happenings: decapitated in Jerusalem with a sword by Herod
Agrippa himself, his body was taken up by angels, and sailed in a rudderless,
unattended boat to Iria Flavia in Spain, where a massive rock closed around his
relics, which were later removed to Compostela. The 12th-century Historia
Compostellana commissioned by Bishop Diego Gelmírez provides a summary of the
legend of St James as it was believed at Compostela. Two propositions are
central to it: first, that St James preached the gospel in Spain as well as in
the Holy Land; second, that after his martyrdom at the hands of Herod Agrippa I
his disciples carried his body by sea to Spain, where they landed at Padrón on
the coast of Galicia, and took it inland for burial at Santiago de Compostela.
