Strong at the Broken Places: Part 4. Bilbao and After

I had to leave   early to walk to the bus station the next morning after ending my bit of the Camino de Santiago at Logrono in Rioja province. I was heading north to Bilbao on the northern coast of Spain to meet my sister before travelling back home to Ireland.   Light was just starting to trail ahead of the morning and wiry, delicate cats wound in and out of doorways like phantoms. Early morning workers walked along head down in a fug of early rising. My stomach rumbled in response to smells of coffee and bread wafting out from apartment blocks and early opened cafes. I passed camino walkers/pilgrims walking in the opposite direction to me and turned to watch them wistfully. I could see their scallop shells that quintessential mark of the camino bouncing up and down on their back packs, marking their identity as pilgrim, a walker of the way. I longed to go in their direction. Instead I turned back, hitched my back pack into a more comfortable position and turned my thoughts north to Bilbao. 

My sister and I were arriving the same day In Bilbao. She had travelled over from Australia to England to visit my parents. I had booked my outbound flight back to Ireland from Bilbao and we were both travelling out of the airport on the same day – myself to Ireland and her to England. So we were going to have couple of days catching up together in Bilbao. Bilbao is the largest city of the Basque country in northern Spain. It used to be the commercial hub of the Basque country due its port activity as it is situated near the northern coast of Spain. It experienced heavy industrialisation during the 19^th century for which it was known. A surge of tourism came with the opening of the Guggenheim museum in 1997. This radical museum brought a more visionary aspect to modern architecture and it is also considered one of the best contemporary art museums in Europe. 

Guggenheim Museum,Bilbao

I combed Bilbao with my sister eating up the streets by foot – another though albeit different type of camino to that I had just finished. We talked non- stop through the streets and cafes walking, eating and drinking up the miles. 

Bilbao

My sister had a step counter on her phone. We were agog to find that over the 2 days we were there, we had clocked up 10 miles walking a day. We tended to drift several times towards the Guggenheim museum revelling in the idea that were getting a 2 for 1 deal in terms of the fact that the  Guggenheim is both a feat of architecture and art .Our heads were permanently craned as we traced the sweeping curves and wave like dimensions of the building. Outside we enjoyed the playful sculptures such as a huge spider that looked as if it was about to lay an egg and the somewhat worn puppy dog sculpture – a large puppy made up of thousands/millions of plants and flowers – a little scrubby in places – as if he had just returned from a foray in the forest.

Puppy by Jeff Koons

We sampled the Basque version of Prosecco, a slightly sparkling, very dry white wine with high acidity and low alcohol content, called txakoli. We were amused by the eye rollings and sighs that our attempts at its pronunciation evoked in the waiters and others attending on us at cafes and restaurants we stopped at on our ramblings.  During our time in Bilbao, our conversation would return many times to our parents, namely our father as if unbeknown to us we were foreseeing what would happen later that year. 

Later on that year back in Ireland at work in the nursing home, I was sitting briefly at the nurse’s station acutely aware of my throbbing feet – taking a few seconds before ringing the doctor to come and see a sick resident. I took a slug of water from my water bottle and my eye fell on a postcard propped up amidst all the detritus such a forms, stethoscopes, envelopes, rosary beads, hastily scribbled notes and such   that accumulate in a busy nurses station where there are plenty of nooks and crannies   to stuff things, not having time to put them in their proper place. It was the post card I had sent fromViana, one of many I had written whilst sitting on the sun warmed wall watching the swifts wheeling overhead. As I read it, I was immediately transported back to the sunflower warmth of the sun on my face and how warm the stone under me had felt as I snuggled into the seat cut into the wall surrounding the cathedral. It was if that post card was like a door into a wonderful Narnia heaven like land, I recalled that feeling of languor and pleasurable anticipation of an enjoyable afternoon and evening ahead.

Guggenheim at night

And then even later on in the year when my father was failing fast I recalled the eccentric patron at the first albergue I had stayed in at the beginning of the camino in St Jean de Pied de Port and what he had said wildly waving his arms in the process – that you cannot control or break the camino for it will break you.As Ernest Hemingway put it in his novel “A Farewell to Arms” as it hurtled towards its pithy and heartrending finale – “The world breaks everyone and afterwards many are strong at the broken places”. How right that patron was about the camino and how right Ernest Hemingway was about our own camino or way in life. I had yet to realise that when I was doing that first third of the camino to Logrono and unaware of what lay ahead later that year.

And finally as autumn took hold that same year, the evening before my father died, he was lying in his bed downstairs, gazing out of the window. At that stage he was not talking and I looked to see what he was looking at. It was a magnificent sunset set in a   mackerel tinted and textured sky which in all the hustle and bustle of what was going on with looking after him, I had not noticed. He was looking at it as if he too, like myself that day at the nurse’s station with the postcard, was recalling something.  As if he too saw swifts wheeling acrobatically above on a sunny May afternoon and felt the sun warming his face, leaving a feeling of languor and peace and he had not a whit to worry about except where and what to eat on a sunny evening in a northern Spanish town on the Camino de Santiago – the Way of St James, my father’s name. Maybe the  door into his own  Narnia was that beautiful evening lying in his bed looking out of the window out onto that sunset as he was making his own way, his own  camino out of this world……..   I would like to think so.

In memory of my father James Feeney who both ended and began his own camino on 10^th October 2016.

Strong at the Broken Places: Part 3. Viana to Logrono

The walk from Viana to Logrono the next day was only 10km and never really lost a somewhat suburban aspect as if signalling that my days of walking Spanish  country lanes , fields and forests and encountering small, higgledy higgledy  villages with white washed walls and  brightly coloured shuttered windows  were finally at an end. The Sligo native and I walked part of it together speaking in that desultory half asleep manner of early morning. Then I walked on ahead as he stopped to browse through some market stalls. I could see the footpath ahead entering the suburbs of Logrono. I stopped at the last field before entering manicured parkland that ran alongside the river Ebro and stood with my back to Logrono. I could see the hazy hills and countryside I had walked through. The field that I had stopped beside were filled with red poppies firing all around me in a blaze of colour.

Leaving the camino behind. Entering Logrono, capital of Rioja province my last stop

This was northern Spain – flamenco reds, sunflower yellow sun, dark greens of spirally cypresses in the distance, a child’s version of a drawing a bright blue sky – so different from the muted lilacs, greys and duck egg blues of the less flamboyant but nevertheless magical, mystical north west region of Ireland.

Then I turned my back on the camino for a while anyhow and started to walk into Logrono.  In Logrono I had quite a few tasks to carry out and I felt as if I was gradually being pulled back into my general daily life having stepped off that Wizard of Oz like way. I was planning to spend a day in Logrono and then head north on the bus to Bilbao, an industrial Basque city on the coast famous for the Guggenheim museum, a feat of modern art combined with architecture. I was to meet my sister there. So  my head was beginning to rattle with thoughts like scattered cats such as my accommodation after exiting the albergue, a post office to buy stamps, bus times and where to find the bus station to Bilbao, where to find an ATM etc.  I was hoping Logrono was going to be user friendly in that aspect and I was heartily relieved to find that was in fact the case. The wide and sweeping river Ebro runs through Logrono and there are many parkland spaces and paths along it. I took one of these along the river bank wending its way into what I hoped was the centre of Logrono. Soon I came to a sign that indicated a centre for information for pilgrims and a few minutes later I arrived at a majestic stone bridge which was a busy avenue for cars. This was the Puente de Piedra (Stone Bridge) which took the pilgrim’s route to Santiago de Compostela into the city. 

I had arrived to the city of Logrono. I took the stone steps up from the river path to the avenue and there it was – an information centre dedicated especially for pilgrims. Those scattered thoughts started to lay down and purr. I obtained all the information I needed and was able to also store my pack there. This was such a relief as it was still early and the albergue was not yet open. And I wanted to take a walk and start ticking off my list of tasks. 

Logrono is the capital of the Rioja region and is famous for its red wine and being on the pilgrim’s route to Santiago de Compostela. It is well off the tourist radar and feels like a traditional Spanish town with a modern twist.

As well as red wine Logrono is also famous for food, namely pinchos or pintxos in Basque , meaning one serving. Pinchos are Northern Spain’s version of tapas and are small portions of food served up skewered and often on a slice of bread. There are many taperias located within a four block area near the town centre of Logrono with some offering many varieties of pincho, while others are famous for just one such as seta (mushrooms) for example. 

A rather lugubrious looking pilgrim!

They are usually cheap and paired with a glass of 

red wine cost around €2 -3. So you can do a sort of a “food crawl” as opposed to a “pub crawl” visiting the different bars and having a glass of wine and a pincho, an evening past time much favoured by the locals.  Calle del Laurel, known as “the Path of the Elephants” and Calle San Juan are typical streets situated near the cathedral of Santa Maria la Redonda in the old Market Square that are lined with these restaurants and tapas bars that offer their own specialities.

Logrono is just the right size for walking everywhere in the city with narrow medieval streets but also green 

parkland and nature reserves down by the river.

Parks and nature reserves entwined in and surrounding Logrono

I was so happy to be spending a day or so here and immerse myself in Spain so to speak. 

When you do the camino, it puts you in a bit of a rarefied climate. It is very esoteric in that all the talk and way of life is that of walking, blisters, aches and pains, places to stay, cathedrals, pilgrims. The camino can be like the Vatican in certain aspects, a state within a state. In Logrono I disconnected with the camino, albeit reluctantly and immersed myself in Spain. 

I stayed for one last night in the municipal albergue. Immediately when you walked in there was a charming, enclosed paved garden with a tiny square pool in the centre. On my part it was still not quite hot enough to plunge my camino trodden feet into though others did not agree judging by the array of boots and sandals left haphazardly around.  I felt sad as I emerged the next morning to change to my other accommodation for staying one more day in Logrono before going to Bilbao. The albergue opened directly onto the cobbled street that is the camino passing through Logrono. I had slung my now obsolete boots over my shoulder and I yearned to follow the other pilgrims/walkers traipsing doggedly on up the narrow street, a watery sun trying to penetrate down between the tall buildings and warm the morning. 

Ending my camino for the present in Logrono

As usual in new places I was lured to the green spaces and strolled along the river side paths and parks that lined the river bank. I was enchanted with large storks that flew back and forth from an island further down theriver. They seemed to be using the city architecture as their crèche. Everywhere I looked I could see that storks had built large rickety looking nests atop of bridges, tall buildings and chimney stacks. It was almost like a miracle to see how they had integrated into the city landscape and made it their own. 

Around tea time I sat in a café near the Market Square in front of the cathedral watching people bustle in and out of Mass. I decided to try “chocolat con churros”. This is a quintessential hot chocolate Spanish treat and there is both eating and drinking in it! The chocolate is rich and pudding like but yet liquid enough to drink – heavenly, molten sweet lava into which I dipped the “churro” – light pastry type ridged biscuit fingers – crisp on the outside and tender on the inside. 

And then that evening, wandering around near the old Market Square through the narrow cobbled streets under the cathedral. Those streets where I could flit from bar to bar sampling a pincho with a glass of Rioja at each one. Milling and mixing in the jostling crowd enjoying the convivial atmosphere – groups of Spanish strolling around for the evening, So tasty - morsels of flaky fish grilled and succulent, shiny round scallops, foresty, buttery mushrooms and my last – an intriguing hot bread roll that seemed complete on the outside and then you break it open to find it filled with various savoury delicacies. They are known as pulgas which is also the Spanish word for flea!

Here in Logrono was indeed an apt place for the moment to hang up my boots and postpone my journey along the camino until another time. There was still another two thirds to do and I had the rest of my life to do it in. But although spring was flourishing mightily in northern Spain, for me it was a case of “….and now with treble soft a redbreast whistles from a garden croft and gathering swallows twitter in the skies”. Logrono held an air of autumnal finality for me with that slight sadness creeping in of an ending that one is not quite ready to turn into another beginning. 

Strong at the Broken Places: Part 1. Los Arcos to Viana

In 2016 I walked part of the Camino de Santiago in northern Spain from St Jean Pied de Port in France to Logrono in Rioja province, Spain.

During my second and final week I arrived to the village of Los Arcos in Navarre province. For such a small, simple village it proved to be a delightful surprise and turned out to be one of the best places I had stayed in so far. As I began walking into the village after my musings by the barn on the outskirts that marked the final step of the first half of my trip, I immediately came upon an albergue on the corner of a street. It looked homely and earthy with lots of plants and a pleasant balcony.  Austrians ran it and it seemed very eco-friendly. I was struck by the air of warmth and friendliness as I entered the porch. The main living room was large and comfy with various nooks if you wanted to separate from the milling crowd so to speak. Although simple as is the way with the albergues, everything worked effectively – for example the water was piping hot and plentiful, the showers structured where you could hang everything without it becoming wet and the rooms not too crammed. 

Although small and very rural, Los Arcos had signs that it was more than met the eye. One of these was the huge cathedral in the square. It was the equivalent of having   Westminster cathedral in one of Ireland’s villages such as Dromahair, near where I live. The churches along the camino were  amazing and it was great to multi task by sitting in a service, getting a feel of local religious customs and culture (there was always some sort of ritual around a devotion to a particular local saint) and looking around at the jaw dropping architecture and décor. It seemed that the nearer you got to Santiago de Compostela, where it was thought the saint St James was buried, the bigger the churches.  Los Arcos had been settled since Roman times and was strategically located on a raised part of a flood plain of the River Odron. It was fought over by the kings of Navarre, Aragon and Castile throughout most of the Middle Ages. The land about it was very fertile due to the flood plains and produced a lot of grain, grapes and vegetables. The square was very evocative in a Mediterranean holiday sort of way with a cluster of bars and cafes. After attending a service at the cathedral I enjoyed sitting in the square eating calamari (squid) and potato bravado. I fell to talking to a group of American pilgrims under a moon two thirds full overhead, lighting the vast expanse of the square with swifts swooping and darting like boomerangs high above us.  

Viana was the next rather larger town on the way where I planned to stop, the last before Logrono my final stop. The trip was becoming autumnal in my mind  in that though the end or winter was still  not upon me, there was an air of finality creeping in – a smidgeon of  melancholy interrupting the remaining excitement of seeing  new places , landscape and people still awaiting to be discovered. The walking was quite flat that day and I could see Viana away in the distance looking disturbingly smoggy and industrialised. This seemed to increase as I drew closer and I was not looking forward to searching around for lodgings in a large busy town. I had got used to the tranquil, soft landscape with the green/ grey hues of vine and olive trees interspersed with the breath-taking reds of poppies through the fields and along waysides and hedgerows.

Poppies,poppies,poppies!

And so I entered Viana with trepidation. It looked very dingy and industrialised on the way into the town from the camino. However as we walked up the hill towards the cathedral that towered up above the rest of the town, the street suddenly became cobbled and hey presto I was entering the picturesque medieval part of the town. I had already realised early in the camino that this was a feature of most of the towns I had encountered so far on the camino. Also the municipal albergues tended to be in these old areas which was useful and avoided having to spend ages trekking around trying to find it.  The albergue was at the top of the hill at the other end of town.

The albergue in Viana

It was set beside an old ruined church with a grassy knoll dotted with majestic horse chestnut trees. The setting was magnificent in that there was a vista of a view towards Rioja province which we were now entering and away in the misty distance, Logrono, the capital. It was also a sunny hot day quintessentially reminiscent of Mediterranean holidays taken in the past. The afternoon hummed with the heat and I wanted to book quickly into the albergue and then get out and soak up the sunflower yellow afternoon. Although the weather had been temperate during the camino, it had not been particularly sunny and warm as we were still in early/mid May. This was the first day where the sun had seemed to beat down a little on my back as I was walking. As the camino goes from east to west, the sun is always at your back until after midday which is useful for the hot summer months .If you leave early you can generally finish up walking by 2pm at the latest just as the sun is directly above you in the sky and can then take on a somewhat relentless aspect. So I wanted to make the most of this day.

As I checked in I fell into conversation with a man in his sixties who turned out to be from Sligo, near me. It was good to touch base with familiar place names and as it turned out familiar people. He know my cousin’s wife and her mother and father who had passed away in the last few years. I had also known her parents well and as we were waiting in the cool stone lobby queuing to check in, I felt my eyes fill up with tears as we talked about them. That is the way with the camino. It is not just a physical journey and sometimes the swirl of emotions and gentle spiritual release of attending Mass swam to the surface as was happening now, while talking to someone who knew those I had dearly regarded. He too seemed emotional as we talked about them as if the camino had also jostled things up to the surface for him too. One of the American women I had met en route back in Estella also pitched up and we all agreed to meet for dinner later. 

I left mundane tasks like having a shower, doing laundry and re arranging my paltry baggage, flung all in a locker and headed out. I gravitated towards the grassy knoll and the breath-taking view like most other people.

View from Viana over Rioja province in hazy afternoon sunshine

The area was surrounded by a stone wall that was part of the ruined church in the background. There were seats carved into  the wall creating charming nooks and crannies to hide away in. This late in the afternoon they had been warmed by the sun. Overhead swifts swooped and spun like boomerangs, chasing insects, the task of which was turning these birds whose feet never touch the ground during their lifetime into aerodynamic miracles. I sat into one of the seats with my book and gazed periodically out across Rioja province spread out beyond, hazy and indistinct as it would be until I started my walk into it the following day. For now I was delighted with this serendipitous discovery of such an idyllic setting when I had been so disheartened at the prospect of spending the night in a busy industrial town.  

And so it was that I spent the afternoon reading, writing postcards , dozing and marvelling at the swifts. I  alternated between the sun warmed nooks set into the ancient wall overlooking the vista or cooling off on the grass under the shady, sweeping chestnut trees , their candle shaped pink flowers an apt backdrop for the old ruined church.

Later that evening I met the others for dinner and we ate at very good value outside a restaurant on a narrow cobbled street under the auspices of the grand cathedral. It was the best meal that I had so far – simple tomato and olive pasta to start and then hake stuffed with red peppers followed by ice cream – well an ice lolly. At the end of the day this was not Italy and so far ice cream did not seem to be a speciality of northern Spain. And after all, it was a pilgrims menu – less than €10 for 3 courses. It was a memorable afternoon and evening - one of those holiday memories that always stay with you, warm sun, that feeling of languor where an evening stretches pleasantly ahead, meeting other people and of course good food and the best of red wines – a few glasses of Rioja in deference to the province we were about to enter the next day.

The Camino: A Peaceful Unpredictability.Part 5. Estella to Los Arcos

Walking part of the Camino de Santiago in 2016 I arrived  on a Sunday to  Estella to  of the towns on the camino. Mentally I had reached that stage of the camino where the newness of it all had worn off a bit and a more day to day aspect was creeping in. Some annoyances and irritability rising up. However the walk into town was very pleasant alongside the river Eba. The area between the river and road had been landscaped with walks and benches placed in scenic spots along the river. The albergue was situated at the beginning of Estella which is an airy town surrounded by mountains with the wide fast flowing river flowing right through the town. It was a hot day and the albergue had a courtyard which many of us sat in. I definitely felt in holiday mode with the upturn in the weather and sat luxuriating in the sun. Inside my head I was purring like a cat lying contentedly in a sunny corner. I had fallen in a little with a group of Americans and Australians and it was good to chat and joke around. That afternoon some of us went into town and as usual were afflicted by the siesta phenomenon. A siesta is a short nap taken in the early afternoon, often after the midday meal. Such a period of sleep is a common tradition in some countries, particularly those where the weather is warm. It is common throughout the Mediterranean and Southern Europe. The word siesta of the Spanish language derives originally from the Latin word hora sexta or sixth hour (counting from dawn, hence midday rest).

Usually by the time one has walked from the last destination (if you leave early) and arrived at the next albergue and settled in and got yourself organised etc. – it is usually mid-afternoon.  I was usually ravenous after eating only a bit of breakfast or desayuno as it is called in Spanish. Unfortunately by the time I get out on the town and look for somewhere to eat – many places are closed for siesta, especially in the smaller towns and this is worse at the weekends. I would be more supportive of the siesta if they did what it said on the tin so to speak. I accept the need for a rest during the hottest part of the day, suspending work and then starting again in the late afternoon/evening. However as I discovered when I naively approached a post office during the week late one day around 5pm expecting it to open again after the siesta. This does not happen. The post office closed at 2pm in time for siesta and did not open again. 

This time, wandering around Estella I was with the American lady again and another American woman. We trailed our hungry selves  around the town becoming progressively more disconsolate as we realised there was nowhere open or even if they were – were not yet serving food. Eventually we arrived back to the  street of our albergue. Opposite the albergue there was a restaurant that probably received a huge amount of custom due to its fortuitous position near the albergue.  We had noted it on our way out but thought it would be worthy to make the effort and explore the town a bit. The restaurant was just beginning to open but despite valiant pleadings on our part the waiter would not let us eat earlier. We sat in a rather utilitarian room out the back, ostensibly fronting the river but blocked by what looked like panels of tarpaulin at the front of the balcony flapping around carelessly in the wind. The waiter looked   tired and was brusque with us rolling his eyes and sighing when we could not pronounce the names of the dishes. At the last stammering meal request from our group, he whipped the menus out of our hands as if in the next instant he was going to beat us around the head with them.  I noted that he was the only person managing what was turning out to be a busy evening in the restaurant. I had noticed that many of the bars and restaurants along the way in northern Spain seemed very short staffed. This may be the reason why I had found that people in this part were not frankly, particularly friendly even though many spoke some English so a language barrier did not seem a reason for the surliness. Maybe it was Navarre province – people seemed marginally friendlier the further west we went on towards Rioja province.  I was spoilt with living in Ireland. There, every encounter in a shop, bank, café etc. is a brief, friendly exchange that lifts the spirits and puts a spring in the step as you walk out of the shop etc.  It is just as if you had eaten a huge bowl of porridge on a cold morning – gets you glowing inside. I was not wholly sympathetic to the waiter. I worked as the only very busy nurse on a 32 bedded nursing home and would not get very far if I was as curt and dismissive as this guy.

Next morning I walked resolutely past the restaurant despite it serving breakfast, determined not to frequent it again. My body was not pleased with my defiance. I could feel every cell crying out for carbohydrates. However it was a sunny morning the colour of sunflowers. 

Early morning on the camino

 I set my face to it begging in my heart that at the next village 7km way there would be an open café given that it was Bank Holiday weekend. I saw mountains in the distance and as if to prepare us for them one popped up immediately ahead – Montjardin. Thankfully one only had to skirt around the shoulder. In the far distance, an escarpment, part of the mountains of Cantabria signalled the separation of Navarre and Rioja from the Basque lands.

I arrived to Azqueta village. There was a sign for a café but was it open was the question that had my heart in my mouth as I trogged up the hill?  My body was creaking with ominous aches and pains like a car chugging along with its tank nearly empty of petrol. So I almost punched my fist in the air when I saw that it was indeed open. I sat in the sun at a table looking at the distant mountains and stuffed down a slice of tortilla (a sort of Spanish omelette) and pain au chocolat (a croissant like bread that oozes chocolate) and the first decent cup of tea since I had arrived to Spain. I was observed by a wee ballerina of a cat or “gato” in Spanish. It was one of those truly heavenly moments.

I was going to stop for the night in Los Arcos. It was a quiet, sleepy village and before entering it, I sat down by a barn and had a breather and a slug of water, regarded quizzically by a couple of busy, plump brown hens. I needed to collect my thoughts a bit as this was the first time that I was not going to be staying in a municipal albergue. I was going to be staying in a private one of which there were usually several. So I needed to choose one.  

 I was not using the camino guide books that most of those doing the camino that I had met seemed to be using.  I had a bit of a gripe in that people seemed to be following their itineraries slavishly and ending up racing through the camino and becoming quite distressed if they were not achieving their itinerary. They seemed to be treating their experience of the camino as if it was a work project to be completed with aims, objectives and outcomes and all the stress associated with that.    I was using a book I had read before doing the camino, written by a father and his daughter called “Buen Camino. AFather – Daughter Journey from Croagh Patrick to Santiago de Compostela” byNatasha and Peter Murtagh. It is written in diary form and tracks their journey along the camino. It is a mixture of reflections, history, and day to day occurrences and is also an itinerary as it is divided up by the places they pass through and the distances between them. So I found this very useful and had planned my part of the camino (from St Jean Pied de Port to Logrono – about 1/3 of the camino) based on their book.

Actually I had looked forward to the unpredictability of the camino - not knowing where I was staying from night to night, not being sure of the road ahead. Passing through different towns, villages and landscapes every day, carrying my present life on my back. It reminded me of my time working overseas. My life over the last 2 years had been more sedentary and although it had it's own joys, my more adventurous Dora the Explorer side of me missed the unpredictability I was now once more experiencing on the camino. However this was a different sort of unpredictability as compared to my work overseas in humanitarian aid which was often very stressful and fast paced. I enjoyed sitting by the barn wondering where I was going to stay that night. I was coming to the end of Navarre province and entering Rioja - a new land, a new set of adventures - heading into the last half of my journey. So I sat and relished the anticipation of a hot shower, interesting conversation and a delicious meal ahead of me that evening. Life had zoned down to those essential pleasures and the camino was teaching me the true meaning of living in the moment. It was hard to describe it - this contentment ...... except maybe to call it a feeling of peaceful unpredictability. 

   

The Camino: A Peaceful Unpredictability. Part 4. Pamplona to Estella

In 2016 I was walking part of the Camino de Santiago. I had started at St Jean Pied de Port at the start and after a few days I had reached Pamplona, one of the major cities/towns on the camino. Pamplona was a walled, cobbled city with a lively bar scene. I met the American lady that I had met in Zubiri and we walked together through the suburbs and into the city. We arrived  all of a sudden at the  majestic Puenta de la Magdalena, a medieval arched bridge over  a  sun sparkled  river , the Rio Arga. The camino then wound its way through a gap in the 16^th century fortifications up a cobbled stoned street and into the cathedral area. 

The walled city of Pamplona

The municipal albergue was near the cathedral and  set within a refurbished early 17^th century church, the Church of Jesus and Mary which belonged to the Jesuits. It held over 100 beds and was arranged in similar fashion to Roncesvalles in pods of four bunks each. The upstairs part was divided from below by a glass floor. I was staying below and was always aware of the glass floor above and would have liked to have stayed upstairs closer to the ceiling of the church.

Pamplona was the setting of Ernest Hemingway’s book “The Sun Also Rises” where he wrote about the running of the bulls in Pamplona. As well as the American lady, I had also met the Frenchman whom I had originally met way back in St Jean Pied de Port.  Later we all went to eat tapas and drink red wine in one of the many bars in Pamplona. It was a convivial evening. I ended up translating a bit from English to French. It felt good to be speaking French again – as if that part of my brain that used to speak and write in French was a dusty old room that I had opened up and was letting the sun and air in once again. It transpired that the Frenchman had been walking for months along various ancient pilgrimage routes in Europe. I had noticed on the few times I had met him while walking that he seemed to walk with great fervour – almost desperately striding off into the distance, a tall lanky figure. Making small talk I asked him if he would be doing this camino again. He looked sideways for a second as if collecting his thoughts and then facing us replied rather bleakly that it would be the last camino for him. We were all silent for a few seconds. I was unsure what to say and he seemed reluctant to expand . Then before all conviviality fled, he gave a watery smile, made an expansive gesture with his hands towards the various tapas crowding the table and encouraged us to eat up. We left soon after. I saw him later as I was strolling around the town and Pamplona cathedral. He was sitting in one of the alcoves in the cavernous cathedral head bent in an absorbed fashion. I did not disturb him. 

My next stop on the camino coming into the weekend was a village called Puenta la Reina. We were entering flatter country now, still in Navarro province. Arable fields dominated with small rolling hills and I could spot the odd field of vines and some knarled old olive trees along the side of the road. 

Poppies and olive trees

The village of Puenta de la Reina or Queen’s Bridge was small enough considering its geographic prestige. Just before the village one of the other camino routes from France, one that included several other routes that crossed the Pyrenees in the centre of the mountain range met the main camino route from St Jean and Pamplona and merged with it.  Thus Puenta de la Reina has been a place of some importance since the development of the camino in the 11^th and 12^th centuries – the first significant stop on the expanded camino. The river was wide at this point and the bridge was huge, surrounded by a grassy expanse. 

Disproportionately huge bridge entering small village of Puenta la Reina

In contrast the village was more or less one cobbled street. The albergue was small and very simple – dormitory fashion. Again I struck luck and got the bottom bunk. However I ended up swapping for a pair of French women who seemed stricken on entering the room to find only the top bunks free.   In the shower room the toilets had a chain that you pulled with old ceramic cisterns. I had the unexpected pleasure of being alone when I had my evening shower and sang out loud revelling in the echo that enhanced my voice. On the downside I left a load of toiletries behind that I only discovered the next day. I was mildly wondering why my rucksack seemed easier to do up early that morning only to have a sudden realisation later on the camino making me stop in my tracks – a flashback to having left my wash bag under a sink.

Back in Puenta de la Reina, maybe because it was Saturday or Pentecost or something, there was a rather festive air with many people milling on the street and clustered around the bars. I had expected a sleepy quiet village and was pleased to feel this lively, expectant air about the place.   A procession started up from the bridge end of the village and a band of young adults dressed in blue with instruments fronted by a huge trombone marched, singing and playing down the street. Everyone sashayed along behind them and the American lady and I got caught up in it all. A merry end to the day and we enjoyed it enormously. 

A few days into the camino and the weather was better – a little sunnier. I seemed to be escaping the blisters that were inflicting the other pilgrims/walkers like an outbreak of foot smallpox. I had various aches and pains but no worse than when I was doing a twelve hour shift in the nursing home where I worked. I was familiar with the shrieking agony of acknowledging aching feet and legs in my head, while at the same time performing various nursing tasks, generally on my feet. Yes I knew well how to ignore that all-encompassing weariness of being on your feet for hours at a time while trying to respond in the middle of the night to someone who needs emergency transfer to hospital or some such like event.  I was finding that on the camino I had the same aches and pains in my legs, back and feet but instead of having to shovel it all aside in my head in order to deal with the workings of being the only nurse on   a busy shift in a thirty two bedded nursing home, I could pause and look out over rolling pasture, rest my gaze on cypress trees on the horizon and distract myself from the pain that way – a much better option altogether. Again it made me realise what a hard slog frontline nursing was. Those bulls of Ernest Hemingway’s running in Pamplona, the Frenchman striding away from whatever troubles he was carrying. We all carry pain one way or the other and can end up running or trying to walk it away.

The Camino:A Peaceful Unpredictability:Part 3. St Jean Pied de Port to Pamplona

 I awoke in darkness in St Jean Pied de Port in France on the first proper morning of my walk towards the Camino de Santiago in northern Spain.  The rumpled unisex room in the auberge where I was staying was full of bunks, snores and various rustlings. Babbling thoughts ran  around my head like errant cats. The big question looming. How was I going to get washed and dressed quietly while sharing a room with six others? How was I going to lay out items so that all was easily accessible? This was to dog me for the rest of my time on the camino. Never mind blisters, aching limbs, unknown entities, rain, and dormitory life. My main bugbear was that I could not seem to get myself organised quickly in the mornings. Throughout my time on the camino I seemed to be eternally hunched down over my rucksack, rummaging and ruffling around and invariably misplacing something and then taking ages to find it. Although I would be one of the first up in the mornings, many others would pass me by as I squatted down, contents of my rucksack exasperatedly strewn around. As I would sit back on my hunkers all hot and bothered, images would flash through my head of several anxious wee ladies in the nursing home where I worked. They would be eternally pacing and searching for a handbag, comb, medication, handkerchief or any other item that was never missing in the first place. Working in a nursing home meant that I was witness to what we would all become in our sunset years. Some of it makes for ominous reading.   On a different practical and slightly more optimistic note -   on the whole business of ablutions, showers etc., I found wet wipes to be a godsend and used these in the mornings and had a proper shower in the evenings. 

Once on my way, the first part of the walk out of St Jean Pied de Port was uneventful and pleasant – small rolling hills and a pastoral aspect a little reminiscent of Leitrim where I lived in Ireland. I leaned into the road and it ascended benignly at first. Then it became painfully steep and on top of that it started to rain. I bent down into it hunching down, my nose nearly touching the ground as if curling into myself would ward off the pernicious, seeping of dampness into my bones.  It seems that this initial ascent out of town is one of the hardest parts of the camino. In fact it seems this French end of the camino is harder going than the other end, going into Santiago. I have a horror of becoming damp especially in my feet. Thankfully my boots stayed water proof but my rain mac started letting the rain in after about ten minutes.  I continued to set my head to the rain and wind   like a mountain sheep in the glens of Leitrim  and kept going. But I was disturbed to think that I could have two more weeks of this. Eventually we turned a corner and just as I was setting my teeth once again to the rain, I saw an auberge up ahead at a place called Orisson. A bowl of soup and a bit of a dry out and things looked brighter. 

View of the Pyrenees from Orisson

Thankfully it stopped raining and I set off at a buoyant pace as if that spell of rain had laundered me out and set me up for the way ahead.  I was feeling more relieved as this was a particularly long stretch of the camino (27km) and there was nowhere to stay if I wanted to opt out so to speak. The thought of battling rain for twenty seven km had frankly horrified me so I was mightily relieved that it had stopped. I continued to walk over the Pyrenees’ and was entranced by wild ponies on the horizon with eagles wheeling overhead.

Ponies on the Pyrenees

The day continued somewhat dull but it was a good feeling to be walking over what felt to be the top of the world. The road was good but the land on either side was unfenced and made up of wild heath land. Eventually I started the descent to Roncesvalles my next stop on the camino. I came upon the fork in the road much maligned by the patron of the auberge I had stayed in the day before at St Jean Pied de Port with the shorter but steep descent to the left. Taking his advice I avoided it assiduously despite my aching legs and feet. The other descent to the right rolled out beneath in a long and leisurely fashion with wonderful and relaxing views of Roncesvalles down below. But after twenty seven km I found the descent far too leisurely and with each corkscrew bend I prayed we were close to Roncesvalles.

Roncesvalles is a religious settlement at the foot of the Pyrenees in Navarre province and is the first major point of the departure on the camino in Spain.

Albergue at Roncesvalles

It was founded in 1132 AD as a religious community and hospice, the main aim being to protect pilgrims from wolves and encourage devotion to the Virgin Mary. The settlement is large including the albergues for pilgrims – it holds over two hundred people. It had recently been restored. After such a long and arduous walk it was great to see how modern everything was and all tastefully ensconced within the ancient building.

The pod like structures in the Roncesvalles albergue

The dormitories were set up in pod like structures in capsules of four with two up and two down in bunk bed fashion. But there were cleverly fashioned spaces to put your rucksack etc. in. I was absolutely ravenous and after a shower etc. had that glowing feeling of being gloriously tired and  triumphantly exhilarated, after having tackled such a challenging walk over the Pyrenees. Thank goodness there was pasta as a starter at the pilgrims’ meal that night as my body completely craved and sucked up the carbohydrates.

The walk next day with the next destination being Zubiri was easier and shorter at around twenty km or so. It began with a sunny stroll through the forest. After the day before the pressure was off and it was good to know we had plenty of villages and albergues to choose from on the way, in the unfortunate scenario of not being able to walk the twenty km. In the forest I walked along briefly with a German girl .She had been walking for three weeks since she left her home in Germany and was planning to walk the present camino (700km) in about three weeks. After a while she sped off having built up a spanking pace after weeks of walking. It was one of the things I was noticing on the camino. It suits both extroverts and introverts. You can interact as much or as little as you want with people. There is a sort of elegant etiquette whereby generally you end up walking a while with someone whose pace matches yours. You chat for as long as one or other wishes and then you or the other person can either hang back or speed up. This is all carried out with cheerful and polite directness e.g. “I am going to speed up a bit now” as said by the German girl.

Zubiri was a greyish rather industrial town, made greyer by the dull afternoon that disappointingly arrived after the zinginess of a sunny morning walking through sun dappled forest. The albergue was equally grey and utilitarian. After a short walk up and down the one street of the town I took myself to my bunk and read for the rest of the afternoon and evening. On the up side I met a very pleasant American woman who I was to meet up with frequently for the rest of what was going to be my trip. She was doing the whole camino and I envied her.

The next day was Friday 13th and I dreaded all day sustaining an unlucky blister or injury. But it proved to be a case of realising how futile worry is, like walking around all the time with your umbrella up even when it is not raining. So I left Zubiri for Pamplona my next destination.  I had to pass by a belching magnesium factory on the edge of town. Then the path spread into a clearing with forest ahead. Before that there was a small waterfall and a sign saying “End of industrial zone” Someone had scrawled “Utopiste debout. Tu n’est pas seul”. Utopian begin – you are not alone. Very canny I thought. I walked on through the morning birdsong and spent a merry while hailing curious cows and sheep in nearby fields, peering out of hedgerows as I passed. It was indeed Utopia there on the shady forest path interspersed with fields where I still saw wee slips of mist rising in places as the heat took hold of the morning.

 I caught up with the American lady and we chatted for a while before I sped up a bit. Then the French man who had rescued me from the pump fiasco in St Jean Pied de Port passed me bestowing  a merry smile before heading on. I watched him stride off in a determined manner as if he was trying to walk to the end of the world which in theory he probably could do. The final end of the Camino de Santiago is a place called Finisterre which means the “End of the World” – the furthest westerly point of Spain.

En route to Pamplona I made a detour to a small thirteenth century church perched on a hill at a place called Zalbadica. I wound my way up a grassy, tranquil hill path, hearing only the hum of a warm May late morning. The ascent up the hill made my background aches and pains less comfortable than they had been. So I was glad to suddenly come upon the church opening out into a glade and softly shaded by trees. I made a beeline for a stone bench and flopped down, mightily relieved, flinging my now stone heavy rucksack as far away as I possibly could from me. I half closed my eyes for ten minutes and let the sun dappled and green hued light throw patterns behind my eyelids.  Soon I made my way into the church in this hushed and seemingly secret place up on a hill, away from the busy comings and goings of camino life. I knelt down in a pew, knees protesting and bent my head.  Suddenly for some reason I starting to think a lot about my father and became very emotional there in the church, crying softly under a benevolent depiction of Our Lady. I was surprised at the sudden wrench I felt. It was a long time later later while writing this and remembering my camino trip or what had by then indeed become a pilgrimage that I understood the reason for this – an eerie foretelling of what was to come further on into that  year.

Leaving France. Entering Navarre Province.Spain

The Camino: A Peaceful Unpredictability: Part 2. Bordeaux to St Jean Pied de Port

I was walking the Camino de Santiago in Northern Spain in 2016 and had travelled from Leitrim to Bordeaux as a first step. In order to go to where the Camino began in France I needed to get a train from Bordeaux.  The train stopped initially at Bayonne for the changeover to a smaller one for St Jean Pied de Port at the foot of the Pyrenees Mountains, the start of the Camino de Santiago from France. It  may as well have been called the “camino train”. It was here that a wave of hybrid walkers/pilgrims mounted the train. High tech walking gear went cheek to jowl with scallop shells on backs of rucksacks - the symbol of the pilgrim. There are many interpretations as to  why the scallop is such a ubiquitous feature of the Camino de Santiago.  The one most associated with St James ( the pilgrim saint of the Camino de Santiago) is the legend where the apostle once rescued a knight whose horse had fallen into the water and while saving him  St James emerged from the sea covered in scallop shells. Then there is the symbolism of the shape of the scallop shell which resembles the setting sun. This would have been an important daily event, full of symbolism in pre Christian societies. In those days where the sun set marked the end of the world.  The Way of St James is a journey to the West, towards the setting sun  and so finished at the “end of the world”  or "Finisterre" the end point of the Camino de Santiago on the most westerly point of Spain. On a more practical level, since the scallop is native to the coast of Galicia, the shell also became a momento, a physical proof of having completed the pilgrimage to Santiago. The shells could be picked up very quickly on the beach at Finisterre, but also became a popular souvenir and source of business for shops etc. along the way. The scallop shell also served practical purposes for pilgrims as it was the right size for gathering water to drink or for eating out of as a makeshift bowl.

The scenery from Bayonne to St Jean  Pied de Port was a vista of valleys and forests and the train chugged along   in a stoic fashion alongside a sparkling fast flowing river weaving and wending its way at the bottom of a V- shaped valley.

Main street.St Jean  Pied de Port

It seemed all of a sudden that we arrived to the pretty cobbled town of St Jean Pied de Port with mountain ranges ascending up at either end of the small narrow town. I queued for ages at the pilgrim office and was given a few options of auberges to stay in. And so I found myself marching doggedly down the street to the auberge where I was staying.  It looked fairly quaint from the outside but was very basic inside. I had forgotten that whole thing of loads of people bunking together and I certainly did not bank on it being unisex style but that’s how it was. Our patron swore like an absolute trooper but turned out to be a gem and his advice ensured my experience on the camino was a wonderful one. A lesson I have learned in life is that if someone knows what they are talking about and I am about to embark on something new where I have relatively little experience, then I take their advice. And so I did with this guy and his advice concerning the camino was as follows:

•           Drink plenty – aim for a couple of litres a day even if it does not seem hot – otherwise your joints become dry and you will get tendonitis.
• The camino is not a hill walk so no need to wear walking boots – they will give you shin splints because they come up too high on your leg. (I particularly smarted from this remark as he shrieked and flapped his arms when I walked  into the auberge pointing to my  hill walking boots as if I were wearing a pair of cloven devil hoofs).If like me it was too late to change them – then just make sure not to lace them up your leg.  
• There is a part of the camino we would encounter the next day coming into Roncesvalles (the next stop on the camino) where there is a fork .The left points to a very steep short cut to Roncesvalles and the right a longer though more undulating less punishing route. After walking nearly thirty km it would be tempting to take the left fork. Our patron begged us not to do this. He said that we would risk knee injury and blisters which would not be pleasant to have at the beginning of the camino and would serve to dog us then for ages. That would be the best scenario. The worst scenario would be similar something that happened just a few days ago to a pilgrim who took the steeper route and fell and broke his collarbone. In the following days I would meet many pilgrims with sore knees and awful blisters who had taken that steeper route and their problems had started at that time they had shot down the steep slope.
•   And finally do not attempt to rule on the camino or try to control it ……… it is the camino that will guide you. As Ernest Hemingway said “ The world  breaks everyone  and afterwards many are strong at the broken places”

As irked as he was about hill walking boots the patron of the auberge knew what he was talking about. I took all his advice on the camino even the drinking one (I am usually terrible for drinking water) and it seemed to work. I had an uneventful camino health wise – just the usual aches and pains – no worse than working a twelve hour shift at the nursing home where I work to be honest. And I had no blisters – again feet already hardened from pacing up down and around the nursing home for at least ten out of the twelve hours. It made me appreciate somewhat ruefully it has to be said how hard the work is for nurses and health care assistants in nursing homes.

I went for a walk after settling into the auberge which did not take long as the town is small. At one stage trying to be diligent and start drinking some water, I tried to obtain some from a water fountain opposite the main auberge for St Jean  Pied de Port – “Albergue Accueil Pelerin”. I could not turn off the pump and the water ran down the middle of the cobbled street under the impassive gaze of townspeople and pilgrims/walkers. I felt that awkwardness of the stranger to a town, not wanting to draw attention to oneself and be a bother. I looked helplessly over at a tall lanky man sitting on a stone bench near the pump. He looked a bit discomfited but nonetheless got up and managed to turn off the fountain. He did not speak English – only French so I stammered out my thanks in my shaky French. I marched off shamefacedly in the other direction down the town looking for less ham-fisted pursuits. I passed by a church and went in to light some candles and look round the church at the same time. I find churches are like a free architectural and cultural pursuit providing a blue print of the surrounding area (if it has had a lot of Christian influence through the ages). Mass was starting and it was actually a Mass for pilgrims with a pilgrim blessing.  I was delighted as it seemed a fitting start to my journey over the next couple of weeks.

 And so I sat in on the Mass. At the end the priest said something about pilgrims but I did not really understand. People were looking round and then I realised the priest was beckoning the pilgrims up to the front to give the blessing. There were about ten of us pilgrims/walkers all shuffling around and looking somewhat sheepishly at each other. We all bowed our heads and I felt very emotional as the priest raised his hand in the sign of the cross and bestowed his blessing. For the first time I did not feel like just a walker ……. I was really beginning to feel like a pilgrim. Walking back up the town I felt bemused and humble at the same time. I had not really thought about the pilgrim aspect of the camino. I had approached it as a long walk the way I go hill walking in Leitrim – a physical activity that would be challenging, yet satisfying.  That gentle blessing at the end of Mass had touched me and I began to realise that I was going on much more than a long walk.

The first step on the Camino de Santiago. Crossing the bridge out of  St Jean  Pied de Port