An Eternity of Walking

After days of walking together and staying in the same places, Simon, Marc, and I were getting very close. I woke them both up after our night in the less than stimulating town of San Juan de Ortega. Marc and I were ready quickly, but Simon seemed to take forever. We waited for him outside in the cold dark morning and were glad we did, as it was nice to start the day together.

Sometimes we would see these massive rock arrangements... Aliens?

Andreas started after us, but caught up later in the morning. That day was exciting because we would arrive in Burgos, one of the largest cities along the way.  Unfortunately walking into big cities is pretty miserable. First of all, walking on concrete and pavement is hard on your knees and hot. Also, walking into cities feels like it takes an eternity. You walk through suburbs and outskirts, past shops and markets, alongside streets with lots of traffic, but you can still be kilometers from the city center.  

A midmorning break

Most of the day was really nice, thanks to my companions.  We made fun in small ways, half-singing songs and me learning bits of German. I found out that David Hasselhof is extremely popular in Europe (at least in Germany and Switzerland). This was so shocking to me that I thought Marc was joking when he said he was a fan.

The last kilometers into Burgos I started to feel really bad. At one point we were a little lost, so I just sat in the middle of a sidewalk at an intersection while the men decided which way to go. 

I think Marc noticed that I was lagging and in pain. Sometimes he’d slow down to walk beside me and I appreciated his encouraging smiles.  

Finally, we reaching the main plaza in front of a stunning cathedral.  As the Camino de Santiago is an ancient pilgrimage, it takes you from church to church where the pilgrims of old would find shelter.  The cathedral in Burgos was by far the most amazing building we had seen thus far.  

We sat down at a restaurant terrace in the square to eat olives and drink expensive cokes.  None of us were sure what to do next. Marc and I knew that we wanted to stay an extra day in the city and that meant we needed to find a private hostel to stay at because the municipal only allowed pilgrims to stay for one night. Simon hadn’t decided if he would stay an extra day, so he headed to the municipal albergue and Andreas ended up treating himself to a night in a nice hotel.

Marc and I agreed that we would find a non-camino hostel so that we wouldn’t be awoken at 6 or 7 AM on our tourist day.  Our hostel search was far from fruitful.  The one we wanted was closed and others seemed few and far between. The few that we checked out were over 50 euros and we couldn’t justify spending that.  After walking around 30 kilometers to get to Burgos we probably added on another 5 that afternoon just wandering around. Finally, as we had nearly given up, we went into a slightly sketchy hostel not too far from the cathedral. The proprietor was friendly and soon enough we were checking in.

The view from our restaurant

It wasn’t a very high class location and the single bathroom was shared by a lot of people. I waited several hours before getting a chance to shower. After showering and relaxing a bit we walked around the city some and found a restaurant that served delicious cheeseburgers. Heading back to the hostel we ran into Harry and Tippy who we hadn’t seen since my birthday. It was nice to catch up a bit with them. 

Marc and I both went to bed early that night and I slept very well.  

The farther I walked on the camino the farther I felt from the dreams and expectations I had started with. I didn’t feel like I was gaining a ton of new insights into myself or what my life should look like, but slowly the life that I’d thought I wanted was slipping to the back of mind as I focused on each day as it came and watched my feet take step after step.

San Juan de Ortega

Marc asked me to wake him up the next morning so we could leave together. I generally woke up much earlier than him because when other people in the room were active it worked as my alarm.  I was flattered that he asked me to wake him up because it meant that he enjoyed my company enough to not leave our walking partnership to chance any longer. Simon would have also liked me to wake him, but he was in a different hostel so it wasn’t possible. 

That morning Marc and I had one of our first really serious conversations. We talked about the dreams we had had for the future and how life changes things. We also talked about relationships and love. It was nice that we could open up to each other. I tended to open up with pilgrims on the camino after about five minutes of walking with them, but Marc was different and it took a lot for him to share deep things about himself.

Soon, we befriended Henrik, a tall German man. Henrik’s pack was massive because he was carrying complete camping gear. He was very friendly and the three of us settled into a conversation about movies, then passed around the typical camino question; “Why are you here?”

My answer to that question changed throughout the camino. At first, I would say I was there to think and to figure things out, but that seemed like too vague a reason to walk 500 miles. To Henrik I answered, “I guess I’ll know when I get to Santiago.” 

The way that day was beautiful to me because it held a variety of landscapes. We saw rolling plains, fields of sunflowers, and ended with an easy road in a tall forest of pine trees. After the stark meseta it was a relief to have shade and greenery around us.

Someone carved faces on the sunflowers :)

Marc was worried that the albergue in the next town we reached would be full, because it was the only one within ten kilometers or so. However, his feared proved unfounded and we happily checked in and started our usual afternoon routines. 

Simon arrived while I was showering and we had lunch together in the hostel cafeteria. Simon was a lot more open than Marc and we had an interesting conversation about religion and spirituality that afternoon.  

Andreas also found his way to our hostel and the four of us came together in the evening to share another meal. This town was named San Juan de Ortega and soon it became clear that it was a town supported solely by pilgrims. There were a few houses, one small bar, and a few microwave dinners for sale at the albergue. There was no supermarket or bakery and no restaurants to be found. It was depressing, but we ended up laughing about it in the way hungry, tired people do to stay cheerful.

Eventually we decided to try the bar food. There weren’t many options so we all got tortillas with cheese. To my surprise, it was essentially an omelette, but didn’t taste bad at all!  At dinner Andreas talked some about his job as a cartographer. Marc was in administration and Simon was studying economics. Andreas and Marc had quit their jobs to do the camino and Simon would miss about three weeks of classes. By comparison, I felt that I was sacrificing almost nothing to be on the way. 

After dinner the four of us sat in the tiny village square and talked and teased each other. It was another pleasant evening. 

The lone hostel of San Juan de Ortega was clearly very old and not well-kept. I had been happy to find a free bottom bunk when we checked in, but I soon regretted that choice. The bunk above me was taken by a rather large man and as soon as he lay down I could seen the mattress sink down six inches closer to me. The bunk bed frame shuddered every time he moved and the springs that were the only thing keeping him from falling on me seemed ready to break at any minute.  I lay awake a long time that night both thinking about my time on the camino thus far and imagining newspaper headlines like, ‘Pilgrim Killed in Freak Bunk Bed Accident.’

Buenos dias! No agua.

The morning after my long, hot, and Oleg-free afternoon, I was awoken at 5:00 AM by our roommates packing up and leaving. This was unusually early, even for pilgrims.  Then, just a little after 6:00 a hostel worker came in and cheerfully announced, “Buenos dias! No Agua.” Usually late sleepers (such as Simon) were woken around 7:30 because the pilgrim hostels require you to leave by 7:30 or 8:00. So, this wake up call was strangely early and we were not really coherent enough to understand the second part of the message.

Soon enough Marc and I gave up going back to sleep and started getting ready to go. We then discovered for ourselves that we would be unable to use the bathroom, brush our teeth, or fill our water bottles. It was kind of chaotic and none of the pilgrims understood why there was no water. Through it all, Simon slept on. 

Thus, Marc and I set out walking together. We found out then that the whole town had no water. We stopped after 6 k in another village to use a bathroom at a cafe and it was there that we met Hamish. Hamish was a lanky Australian who truly loved to talk. He made the time go quickly for a while, but somehow without even realizing, we lost him and it was just the two of us again. Marc and I were comfortable company. Sometimes talking, but often quiet and just enjoying nature and our own thoughts.

We stopped for the day in a town called Belorado. Unlike many who walked the way, I had no guidebook. However, Marc did have one. He scoured the pages every evening after tearing out what he’d read the previous day. Mostly he used it for getting information about the albergues. In Belorado, he informed me that there was one that was much better than the others. So we waited in line and checked in when it opened.  

It was late afternoon and I was showered and finished with laundry when Simon came through the door. I was relieved he had found us again, but unfortunately our hostel was full. Marc and I walked with him to a different hostel and then we had a drink in the village square. Andreas saw us there and joined our table for a while. We decided to meet a few hours later for dinner as well.

I took a picture of Simon trying to whistle so I could show him what he was doing wrong.

That dinner was one of the highlights of my camino journey. It was so fun talking and laughing together like we’d all known each other for years. I tried to teach Simon to whistle and he made sounds with his finger on the rim of his glass that I couldn’t replicate. It was light, easy fun and I felt a real bond between the four of us.

When I’d left behind my American friends, just day earlier, I wondered if I would meet anyone else I clicked with in the same way. That night, leaving the dinner, I realized how blessed I was to have found another group to fit with so easily. I don’t know that I believe in fate, but somehow the camino has a way of bringing unlikely people together.

The Boring Banker and the Meseta

My first day of age 22, I woke up before the sun, as usual. Daniel and Ulla were still sleeping and, sadly, I never saw them again. Upon walking downstairs, I found Oleg, the boring banker waiting patiently for me. 

Oleg also offered to take a picture of me.

Our morning walking together, was at least interesting. We talked about family and life experiences. One of Oleg’s eccentricities was that he asked me to take tons of pictures of him with his camera. In a few of them he dropped to the ground in the middle of the way and started doing push-ups with his backpack still on. Maybe this was supposed to impress me, however I found it to be ridiculous tinged with a hint of obnoxious. 

Oleg was only the second pilgrim who had been even slightly annoying to me. The first was a very boastful German dwarf. All in all, my experiences with pilgrims were delightful and even Oleg wasn’t too bad. 

My plan was to stop early and then catch up with Ha and Kim the next day, as they were taking a day off in Santo Domingo. Oleg, to my surprise, said he might want to stop as well. This was not pleasant news to me. 

We reached Azofra before 11:00 and found some Danish friends of Oleg’s at a cafe. We joined them and they told me a bit about their experiences being part of a well-known cult. They were moving on after lunch, so Oleg was torn between staying with me and going with them. I tried to encourage him to continue, but he seemed more inclined to stay.

To get some time alone I declined their invitation to lunch and sat in a small square writing in my journal. The hostel wouldn’t open for at least an hour so I had time to wait.

About 15 minutes later, I looked up and saw Marc and Simon walking toward me. Simon was whispering conspiratorially and jokingly loud, “I hate the U.S. government!” and then with a smirk said, “Oh, Caley! I didn’t see you there!” I laughed appreciatively and asked about their morning. They had woken up late and then walked extremely fast. Marc was getting a blister so he threw away his socks in frustration. 

They were determined to finish their day in Santo Domingo, 17 kilometers ahead, and also determined that I would come with them. I was very happy to see them and eventually judged that walking 17 k in the heat with these friends was a preferable fate to spending the day with Oleg (poor Oleg). As we left the town, I waved goodbye to Oleg and my Danish acquaintances, who were watching some kind of religious parade that was taking place in the street across from the plaza. 

Interesting Catholic parade.

Before too long, the boys were starting to see why most pilgrims wake up early and finish walking before the hot afternoon. It was sweltering and the flat orange path ahead of us seemed to go on forever. This was one of the longest stretches of the camino that had no water sources and my one .5 liter bottle was soon nearly empty and then painfully hot, thanks to the sun.

The only place to find shade in the dry meseta was beside one of the tremendous stacks of hay that littered the fields. We had a nice break there and regained some of our energy to finish the walk. Toward the end, all three of us were mostly silent. For Simon this was strange and we realized that he was in a lot of pain. 

Finally a little shade :)

For the last few kilometers, Simon walked like a man four times his 22 years. Marc and I had a hard time not finding it comical to see him shuffling behind us, leaning heavily on his walking stick.

Finally, we made it to the albergue and happily claimed beds and laid down our packs. Marc and I took top bunks, so Simon could have the last lower bunk in the room.

Walking through the barren meseta

After showers and relaxing, the three of us explored the town a bit and got to know each other even better. It was always interesting with Marc and Simon. They were polar opposites, yet got along very well. Simon, I learned, was raised in Germany, but went to a Swiss university and was even half Swiss. 

Gunter, our fabulous cook, and another German man named Andreas joined us for dinner. I was exhausted and didn’t contribute much to the conversation. Andreas was also quiet and didn’t smile much. He had biked the camino through France and then started walking when he arrived in Spain. Being at a dinner with four native German speakers, I felt bad that courtesy forced them to speak English around me. However, Gunter’s English was minimal, so most things were said in both languages and no one seemed to mind.

I often felt guilty for being a ‘typical’ American who only speaks English. My two semesters of Spanish in high-school were barely helping me at all in Spain, except in illustrating the vast differences between Mexican and South American Spanish and the more guttural and lisping Spanish of Spain. Thankfully, my wonderful friends were used to using English as a common language while traveling and I appreciated them greatly.

Turning 22- Camino Birthday

September 7, 2012 was my camino birthday. The year before I had been in South Korea, so I wasn’t entirely unused to a birthday without family and close friends. I knew that I could easily keep my birthday a secret while on the camino and let the day pass unnoticed, but that would have resulted in me spending the day in self-pity and depression rather than, at least potential, happiness. 

As it was, I tried not to have any expectations for my birthday. There was no guarantee that anyone would remember or that I would run into any of the people I had mentioned it to. The day turned out to be full of ups and downs, but truly unforgettable.

I started alone in the dark again before joining two friendly Norwegian women who wore dresses and insisted Norway wasn’t too cold for a Florida girl. They stopped for a coffee before leaving Logrono and I continued by myself until I caught up with my Korean sisters, Ha and Kim!

I was incredibly pleased to be able to walk with them again. They thought I should walk ahead, as they were even slower than the day before.  “It’s my birthday,” I informed them, “So, I would really like to stay with the two of you!” 

At the edge of Logrono there was a lovely park and a lake. We stopped there for a little snack break. The day before I’d gone to a supermarket and chosen a vegetable. There were two boxes of cucumbers next to each other that looked nearly identical. One was slightly cheaper than the other so I decided to try the cheap cucumber. Well, when I took it out of my bag Ha started laughing uproariously and let me know that I had purchased, not a cheap cucumber, but a regularly priced zucchini. 

They nearly cried with mirth, but I didn’t mind and I decided I liked raw zucchini almost as much as raw cucumber.

It was a joyous morning walking along a nice way. We found an almond tree and my friends cracked open the nuts with their teeth to munch on as we walked. Around mid-morning I saw a cherry on the ground and looked up to see a cherry tree! I’d never seen one before and I really wanted to pick a cherry and eat it. All the lower branches were picked clean, but I saw one that I thought I could grasp if I leaned against the tree and reached on my tippy toes. I leaned with all my weight on the tree trunk and an inch long thorn stabbed my palm. I cried out and removed the thorn, but then reached up again to pick the cherry. Ha and Kim were appalled at my bloody palm and quickly went into maternal mode. Doctor Ha, as I started calling her, took out a first aid kit to clean my hand. Unfortunately, there was still a piece of the thorn imbedded deep in my palm.  They used a needle to try and remove it. In the end that just widened the hole in my hand and pushed the piece of word deeper. Ha and Kim were deeply worried for me and tried to insist that I go to a doctor in the next town. I decided just to wait and see if the wound got infected before seeing a doctor about a splinter.

The sad epilogue of that adventure is that the fruit I’d picked wasn’t even a cherry. Apparently, discerning fruits and vegetables is not my strong point. I ate the fruit anyway, though I have no idea what it was.

Ha and Kim had reservations in Santo Domingo and I had decided to stay in Ventosa a closer town. I had an appointment to skype my boyfriend at 1 PM so I was determined to arrive at the hostel on time. My Korean sisters felt bad leaving me on my birthday, but I was just grateful that I had been able to spend the morning with them.

Soon after Ha and Kim and I parted ways, I came to a fork in the road. There was no sign so I asked some other pilgrims which way led to Ventosa. They told me I should turn rather than go straight. They were wrong. It was a long route mostly along pavement. I could tell that I was doing a giant circle and if I had only gone straight I would already have arrived. It was frustrating, but eventually I reached Ventosa and found that the hostel was still closed although it was past their stated opening time.

There was a fairly large group of pilgrims waiting outside the hostel. Most of them I didn’t recognize, but soon I spotted Marc and walked over to join him.  I showed him the wound on the palm of my hand and explained the story. In contrast to my overly worried Korean friends, Marc just smiled and said, “I think you’ll survive.” 

When we were finally allowed in the hostel I tried to get settled in quickly in order to get on the internet on time. Unfortunately, my skype date was less than satisfying.

Jaggi had very poor internet connection in his apartment so he had returned late to his office to talk to me.  He had a little cake and when I called him he lit candles and held it up while singing ‘Happy Birthday.’ It was a sweet gesture and I laughed when the fire alarm went off for a few minutes. Despite this nice gesture I didn’t really feel like he was happy to see me. He let me know that it was a huge inconvenience for him to wait in his office to talk to me and even there we had a lot of connection problems. When we did manage to talk, it was all complaints about his job, the culture he was still not used to, anything and everything. Not long into the conversation, Simon walked into the downstairs room I was using to skype and wished me an exuberant “Happy birthday!”  Marc was with him and I was glad to see them though the timing was bad. I turned my tablet around and introduced Jaggi to my two friends. He just said, “Honey….Always men.” 

Simon seemed to want to have a conversation, but I couldn’t focus on these two camino friends and Martin at once so it was a little relief when Marc and Simon left. After they were gone, Jaggi and i stopped video chatting and just instant messaged. I started crying because I’d been so looking forward to talking to him and it wasn’t even enjoyable.

He felt bad then and we talked sweetly for a few more minutes before he had to go do something for work. 

Looking back, I wonder if that conversation wasn’t the beginning of the end for us.

I decided to take a nap and do laundry for the rest of the afternoon. I ran into Marc in a hallway where he gave me an awkward kiss on the cheek and apologized for forgetting today was my birthday.

While doing laundry I met a nice elderly American woman from Washington. We chatted for a few minutes and then I moved outside to wait in the courtyard for the washing machine to finish.  Marc was out there speaking with a German couple, Daniel and Ulla. Daniel had a scruffy face and dreadlocks and Ulla wore a lipr ing. They had on loose bohemian style clothes that could have been homemade. When I sat down they kindly switched their conversation to English.  

Daniel had done the camino three years earlier so he had some interesting insights. He had Ulla were walking at a very leisurely pace, with no deadline and no stress. They couldn’t understand why most people walked double their normal number of kilometers per day.

Though I was enjoying the conversation, when my laundry finished I hung it and went back inside to get my nap. Daniel and Ulla were in the same room as me and they came in later while I tried to sleep. Marc followed and they all spoke in German, but I got the feeling I was mentioned.  Sure enough when I sat up, they started a loud happy birthday chorus and invited me to dinner than evening. I grinned and of course accepted the dinner invitation.

Dinner was incredible. It was a vegetable and potato dish prepared by Gunter, a 53 year-old Austrian man who was extremely good-natured. On the side there was salad, cheese, and olives.  Besides Daniel, Ulla, Marc, Simon and Gunter we were also joined by Harry and Tippy a husband and wife from New Zealand. We sat around a huge table in the hostel dining room. The atmosphere was almost ecstatic. 

At the meal’s beginning they toasted me and sang happy birthday again, to my embarrassment. The owner of the hostel overheard and came in with a necklace as a present. It was a yellow camino shell. She also brought a lit candle and everyone clapped as I blew it out. 

I had such a warm feeling inside, surrounded by these veritable strangers who went out of their way to make this day special for me. As a student of culture, I was in heaven to be surrounded by people from around the world. We all talked happily about our camino experiences, our home countries, and a hundred other things. It was a magical evening that I’ll never forget.

As everyone finished eating, a pilgrim walked through the front door and joined us in the dining room. It was after 8:00 so he had been walking very late, yet he said he hadn’t decided if he would stay here or continue to Santo Domingo.  Soon enough he sat down and we started a conversation. His name was Oleg and he was a banker, originally from the Ukraine. Honestly, he was a bit boring. He explained to me in great detail how America had caused the world’s financial crises. He must have enjoyed the conversation though, because he made it hard for me to get away to go to bed. Oleg wasn’t happy that his own bed was a mattress on the dining room floor, but the hostel owner was being nice to let him stay in the full building at all.

Despite the sleep inducing conversation with Oleg, I walked up the stairs to my room with a happy heart. It had been a long day and not every minute was pleasant, but overall I wouldn’t have asked for a different birthday and it will remain in my memory forever.