Hi Friends,
As I’ve mentioned in previous letters, my husband and I just finished walking the Camino Francés to the coast and then walked part of the Camiño dos Faros in Galicia. 600 miles in total. We have another few weeks before we have to return home, so we have decided to walk part of the Portuguese route. Because we are crazy people. Or maybe we just love to walk.
The first few weeks of walking the camino, though, I didn’t love it. I was sick with COVID, and we had to isolate (but were still walking) so that likely explains my feelings. But there were some other things, too.
I wrote to a friend asking her why she keeps walking the camino (she has done various caminos many times) because I was thinking of bailing after only a couple hundred miles. And it wasn’t the walking, though it’s a lot of walking. I really did love the walking; that was the best part.
The Camino de Santiago is a Catholic pilgrimage, though in truth, only about 20 percent of those walking are practicing Catholics. Before I left, I was one of those people who claimed that the camino was a Pagan route first (and there’s evidence that it was) to the ocean (which was why it was important for me to end there).
But once you are out on the way, there’s no denying the Catholic aspect. The trail routes by every major Catholic church or cathedral in northern Spain (where you can receive pilgrim stamps in exchange for a small donation). People have constructed bark crosses in freeway fencing. Even much of the graffiti is Jesus-centric (which I found to be nearly as ironic as the spray-painted message RESPECT NATURE on a rock wall.
Like most subcultures, the camino has its own lexicon, some of it inspired by a kind of magical thinking, perhaps connected to God or at least an ordered universe. Right behind the ubiquitous phrases Buen Camino and The Way is this one: The camino provides! What this means is that as you walk, you will find what you need, even though it wasn’t what you were necessarily looking for. In other words: serendipity.
I don’t think there’s more serendipity on the trail than there is in other places in the world, but because everyone is walking, they have finally slowed down enough to notice when it happens. Or maybe we find something when we are out searching.
My husband and I were walking from Herrerías to Triacastela, which includes the beautiful village O Cebreiro. I loved every minute of walking up that mountain but as soon as we started going down, my knee hurt so badly all I could do was limp along at a pace no faster than one mile an hour.
That’s when the thunderstorms started.
We made it to a tiny café just as the downpour began. Even the chickens sprinted for cover. We ate lunch, and the rain just kept on coming. My husband told me to call a taxi and I told him I would, that I just needed to finish my cafe con leche.
He took off in the rain while I chatted with some other ladies who were sheltering from the storm. The truth was I didn’t want to take a taxi. I wanted to walk, and with no one waiting for me—my husband was already far ahead—I could go as slowly as I needed to.
My husband called me and asked, “What are you doing?”
I told him I was walking.
He told me he knew I would, that I was too stubborn not to. Perhaps a vestige of Catholic guilt, there’s an implicit shame in taking taxis along the camino (as opposed to walking the whole way). People will even call you a touragrino (tourist + peregrino or pilgrim in Spanish)
I didn’t care so much about that. What I have is an inordinate amount of FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) and was sure that any part I skipped would be the most beautiful section of them all. I struggled along as best I could, singing along to my music. This section was along a highway, definitely not the most beautiful. And I was thirsty though because I had left the cafe in such a rush—it had stopped raining!—that I had forgotten my water bottle (setting out to walk another 10 miles without water—dumb, I know). I looked for the cafe and the albergue I was supposed to have passed by then, and nothing. So much for the camino providing!
That’s when the taxi nearly hit me.