Granada, and the final day of a three month vacation

On Saturday morning in Madrid I said goodbye to my brother, gave him a hug and dashed off into the early morning metro in hopes that I would have sufficient time to catch my train to Granada. Of course I made it and had a fairly uneventful six hour trip through the hills and mountains of southern Spain until finally arriving in Granada at 2:00 PM. It felt good to be returning to a city that I knew, and was confident in. It felt even better to retrieve my stuff from the school and to be reunited with a large selection of CLEAN clothing, my laptop, and free wireless.

Tonight I will catch the last bus from Granada to Malaga, and then head to sleep and hang out in the airport until my flight leaves tomorrow morning. I find it hard to believe that in less than 24 hours I will be reenter the Anglophone world, where I will be returned to a completely different type of struggle with communication. One that is centered on subtleties and shadings rather than on verbs, adverbs, nouns, adjectives, and conjugation.

It is very surreal for me to be sitting in the same little classroom in the same little language school in Granada that I was sitting in six weeks ago struggling to learn about the uses of haber, the various tenses, tricks, and basics of Spanish, or more precisely Castellano. In this moment it is clear to me that my perception of time is anything but linear. It is as if the last six weeks of my life have occurred simultaneously in six years, and in six seconds. In that time I have spent four days in Barcelona (which I hardly remember), and walked from Roncesvalles, in the Pyrenees, across 800 kilometers of northern Spain to Finisterra, literally "The End of the World," on the Atlantic coast. Faulting about 26 kilometers from the Spanish border with France I have walked all of the way east to west across a European country....

When I first told my brother that I was going to be blogging about my adventures in Spain he was very encouraging. He told me about how he had always struggled to tell people about his experiences abroad and that perhaps with this blog I would have an instrument to help tell my friends and family about what I had done. I am not exactly certain if I have accomplished this or not. In the last several weeks I have found it extremely difficult to type anything at all. I think that the last three months, and especially the last six weeks of the Camino have had a great impact on my life, but how am I supposed to communicate an experience that is so important to me to anyone else? It is not something which I can translate into any sort of equation, and is definitely beyond my meager skills of composition. My brother has also written a blog about his time in Spain with me at http://kevinmtrowbridge.blogspot.com/ Personally I think that he is a much better writer than myself, and if you choose to check it out I think it gives an interesting perspective on traveling in Spain, and on traveling with me :-D.

Wish me well for my greater than 24 hours of accumulated travel time to return to K-zoo. I will see all of you soon.

Besos y abrazos,
-Jason

SANTIAGO

Two days ago on July 21st, 2006, at approximately 3:00PM Spanish time I walked into the town of Santiago de Compestela. I do not think that I have yet figured out exactly what happened in that moment. All that I do know is that the last two days have been crazy, and that in an hour my brother and I will attend the Misa de Peregrinos again, and then head out for Fisterra.
The one moment from the last two days that comes the closest to how I feel is this: The day that we arrived, after we had found an albergue and met up with some of my friends I found myself alone, sitting in the center of the massive square in front of the Catedral waiting for my fellow pilgrims to return. For the first time in 30 days I found myself NOT hurrying Westward, searching for something untangible and unknown, but looking UP to the EAST, at the benvolent image of Santiago staring down at me. I lay back on the warm paving stones, unable to take my eyes off of him, and watched the clouds stream by behind him in a surrealistic, dream inducing flow. Between the warmth of the stones, the feeling of peace, the hypnotic motion of the clouds and the exhaustion which had been building up over the past 800 kilometers I shortly fell into a peacful, dreamless sleep, only to be awoken by my friends as they returned from their errands.

day 27, Palas de Rei, somewhere 60ish Kilometeres from Santiago

214 junk e-mails in my Hotmail inbox. I guess maybe this is some kind of measure of time since I have last been online. It is interesting for me, a person who lives more or less symbiotically with 24/7 internet when I am in Kalamazoo, to be using it hardly at all. As far is that is concerned I feel really out of touch with what is happening in the world and everything that I usually spend my time trivially clicking around random webpages, playing games, and reading articles. Strange...
So you may be asking, Jason, what has been happening to you in the last 200 or so kilometers? Well, a lot. I ended up deciding to meet my brother in Sarria, a little spanish town around the 112-114 kilometer mark from Santiago and it was quite a push to get there in time. It wouldn´t have been hard at all except inbetween Astorga and Sarria are two quite sizable mountain ranges. One around 800 meters or so high and the other pushing up pash 1300 meters. Since I have been in Spain I have discovered that I love mountains, perhaps because I have little to no experience with what to expect. For example, I made my third 40+ kilometer day a couple of days ago and about 15 kilometers of it was more or less straight up, over and straight down a small mountain. In the first 20 minutes this spanish guy, Raul, and I had walked high enough up that the entirety of the town we had just walked out of was spread out in precise detail below us. Then after and hour or so more of walking up and over the peak we were staring down at a new valley which we were shortly to descend into and then in the next day climb out of. It really is a profound feeling of a closeness with the land. To realize that in the last week, I have walked into, through, over, and out of a fairly sizable range of mountains, and into an entirely different community of Spain. Galicia, land of green trees, CRAZY old farmers, streets completely full of cow crap, rolling hills, and best of all SHADE!
Some of the more interesting things that have happened in the last couple of days:
*Walking into a tiny little town in the mountains, desperate for some more water, and being served a draft beer by a young boy who couldn´t have possibly been older than 13.
*Staying in a tiny municipal Albergue in a tiny town on the top of the mountains. Notable only because its main street was completely covered in cow crap. I´m not talking in the way that you can walk a little here, and a little there and completely avoid all of the mess. I mean completely full of crap, it was a necessity to just accept it, roll up my pants a little, and not pay attention to where I was stepping. Also, in this same town, am amazing italian guy who I have been walking with, Alexandro, cooked some very tasty pasta for five of us in the Albergue. Of course all good meals need to be accompanied by wine and after three bottles or so we went out and wandered around the village. The church in this town was small, old, and beautiful, with and incrediably old bell tower (supposedly the oldest on the camino) which the four of us ended up sitting and talking in. Then we got the wonderful idea to ring the bell for nine o´clock. I think perhaps we were slightly under the influence of a little to much wine... :-P I´m not entirely sure what the village people thought about us drunkenly ringing their church bell, partially because they were speaking Gallego, and partially because they were all quite old, and a little crazy.
*Walking down a mountain highway, seeing a lonely cow wandering up the street all by itself, later running into the boy who was watching the cows, telling him that he has lost a cow, and getting absolutely no reaction from him in responce to this information.
*Walking down the Camino, turning a corner and suddenly being confronted by a donkey leading a herd of cows up the Camino. Suddenly realizing that there was NOT enough space for me, the donkey, and the cows on the Camino and having to jump into the ridiculasly thick brambles on the side so as to not get gored or trampled by the peaceful mountain cows, only to be laughed at by the farmer when he walked by with the slowest cows in the end. :-P
The next day was a hard push into Sarria to meet my brother at the train station and for the last two days I have been busily trying turn him into a true pilgrim. 22 kilometeres, and then 26 kilometers with 20 pounds on your back are not trivial days for the uninitiated, and I need to remember that he hasn´t been walking the last 700 kilometers with me. It is quite nice to have him here. The Camino has a completely different feel now than it has for the last 700 kilometers and many of my friends have this slightly frazzled and anxious ambiance, almost like a surprised deer looking for a place to jump to get away from a clumsy hiker who has stumbled into its peaceful mountain meadow. I think that walking with my brother is having the effect of mitigating this feeling for me. I am sure that I would be feeling it if I were still walking solo. Also, all of the prices have gone up, due to the natural market forces of supply and demand, something that is frustrating my friends a lot. The Albergues are more or less full every night, and it is becoming necessary to seek out alternative accomadation. This is not always a bad thing though as tonight we have a very nice two bed room with a shared bathroom for the trivial sum of 20 euros. Spain is the place to be if you can keep the mind set of how much things cost in the US because EVERYTHING is so cheap in comparison.
Well three or four days will bring us into Santiago. I am not able to describe the feeling that I have right now for the proximity of the end of my pilgrimage. I guess I will go to find out in a couple of days. Maybe I will be able to describe it the next time I encounter internet.

Day 20, 254.5 Kilometers to Santiago, sitting in Astorga

Friendships on the Camino are interesting things. Every day I get up and start walking by myself around 5:30 or 6:00 in the morning. (Aside: And when I say walk by myself, that is starting to become a mildly funny expression as the Camino is incrediably popular and many spaniards choose to walk the last part in HUGE touristy groups wich are a little frustrating to those of us who have walked 500+ kilometers already. However, I am coming to see this as nothing more than my latest challenge in the Camino. To still have MY Camino regardless of those who are walking around me.) Then at sometime during the day I usually run into someone who I know and walk inevitably my pueblo of destination is affected or changed depending on where they want to go. And when we finally get into town, there is usually a large group of people who I have gotten to know over the kilometers. Still they are interesting because everytime we say good bye and go to sleep for the night, it could be the last time we see each other...
So what have I been up to in the last couple of days. Well I walked 40 kilometers or so on the day that I went into Leon, and then after that took a day of rest. It was one of the strangest things I have done yet, waking up in Leon and watching all of the people that I knew getting they stuff together and walking off, knowing that it would probably be the last time that I would see them. Then afterward just wandering around Leon, going to see the Catedral, drinking quite a bit of beer and wine, and then that evening running into a couple from Barcelona and an older spanish man that I knew and having dinner, and speaking spanish with them. The catedral was AMAZING, and I wish that I could post the pictures, but unfortunately not, and the pictures from the Camino will have to wait untill I am back in Granada at the absolutely earliest. Generally had a good day, but just strange because I was so used to walking, and that day I wasn´t.
Then I have spent the last two days trying to get out of the little towns that are proximal to Leon. Almost all of it has been next to a loud, rude, highway, but today the Camino finally turned back into the mountains. Astorga is a beautiful town, with it´s original center more or less intact. The central part sits on a raised portion which is still surrounded by a fortified wall. The cathedral is huge and I´m going to go see it tonight, and there is a building which Gaudi designed here as well. How cool.
Also, I just talked with my brother and we were able to make some plans to facilitate meeting up when he gets over here on Sunday. Sweetness, now I just need to be calm about it and let things fall together. Untill a later time.

El Burgo Ranero, day 16, who knows how many steps

This morning as I was packing my bag up I dropped and broke my step counter so there ends that expirement. I don´t mind so much though because I think I have a large enough sample to be able to predict how many steps I would have had at the end with some sort of accuracy. And it is better this way anyways, because I aslo took my watch off at the suggestion of a german girl that I was walking with and now my dependence on mechanical gadgets has dropped. I think it is better because they were merely devices that I was using to put some quantitative number on what is most certainly a qualitative experience.
One thing that I need to comment on about Spain is the fact that the Spanish have an obsession with HAM. Ham is not meat. The other day I met a british woman who is living in Spain and who is a vegetarian, she told me that several times she has asked waiters if a dish had any meat in it and after being assured that it didn´t, ordered it, only to discover when it was brought out that it had Ham on it. When I walk into the supermarkets to order meat for a sandwhich there are probably 6 or 7 types of ham, an equal number of sausages, and funny bologna type products, and not a piece of beaf, chicken, or turkey in sight. It is nearly impossible to buy chicken or turkey lunch meat at the market, and when I do happen to encounter it I tend to gorge on it and not be able to enjoy my only chance in weeks to eat my prefered meat. So if you happen to love HAM Spain is definately a place for you... :-P
Another thing that has struck me as odd in the last couple of days is the shirt that a spanish barkeeper was wearing one morning when I went to eat breakfast. Her shirt said in english "Today I want to be myself." Talk about irony, perhaps she was fluent in english, but even so...
The last couple of days of walking have been mildly unremarkable. The meseta is very large and very flat, and there more or less aren´t any trees, but it is beautiful in its own way and I have enjoyed walking through it. It is freezing cold at night and roasting hot in the day, the sky is as blue as blue gets, there is hardly any water, all the crops need to be irrigated, and and farming is done on an incrediably large scale. The other day I stood and stared in amazement as I watched a forklift load bales of hay, each the size of a compact car, onto a Semi-truck for transport to who knows where.
Tonight I sleep 40 kilometeres out from Leon, and the question of the morning will be do I walk 19 kilometers to the next refugio or go all 40 into Leon and take a day of rest to see the city. I´m not sure, I´ll see what the morning brings.

Burgos and beyond

Two days ago the two irish guys that I´ve been walking with and I were going to stop at a little town whos name I have permanentaly blocked from my memory, but we were met with really shoddy hospitality and did not feel welcome at all so we pushed on to Burgos. To say the least it ended up being a 40 kilometer day... close to a marathon of walking... too much to say the least. Then yesterday we parted ways for what I think will be the last time. I must say that I was quite sad to see them go. Michael and Barry, an engineer and an artist, the oldest and youngest brothers of a family, both living in Dublin. So for the next two weeks I get to see who from the original group that came together after Roncesvalles will catch up and pass me. The three of us managed to walk pretty far ahead of everyone (I think), and now I am planning on slowing down enough that I think everyone will catch up and pass me. It´s better though, I´ve been going far to quickly. 25-35 kilometers a day is too fast, I´m on a pilgramage after all, time to rest a little, smell the flowers, and look where I´m walking through.
On that note I've been taking it easy for the last two days only going 20 kilometers trying to rest a little bit. Also, I am into the meseta now which is a geographical feature whose predominant attribute seems to be an absolute lack of trees. This morning I woke up at 5AM and was out walking before 6AM just so that I could make my 20 or so kilometers before the sun came up and roasted me alive. It is beautiful land though. Extremely open with huge expanses of flatness, broken by sudden ridges or valleys that drop down, or pop up, and fade into rocky nothingness after a couple of kilometers.
Mentally I´m feeling better. I think that I caught my second wind and am feeling prepared to continue walking for a while. Physically I´m feeling pretty sound as well, accept for that fact that I´m getting several nasty pressure blisters on my heels. Just as a side note, they are the worst possible blisters I could imagine. Very difficult for me to pop for the double reason that they are in a very awkward location for me to look at, and because they normal skin on my heels is so much thicker than elsewhere on my body.
Another month in Spain, two more autonomous comunidades to walk across. Que bien.