By The Way...

I just realized that we never finished our blog last year.  Maybe that's because our camino in Spain may have ended but our life camino continues.  Traveling on the Camino de Santiago was an amazing journey that words fail to adequately describe.  One thing we did learn was that we enjoy walking and exploring foreign lands so this year we will be hiking in Ireland!  Let the new adventure begin!!

Eventually

It's been several weeks since we've been home and we still haven't written our conclusions about our Camino.  There's not a day that goes by that we don't talk about it or make reference to it in one way or another.  I never imagined that this journey would have such a big impact on our lives.  People's perspectives always get a reality check when put in a much different environment.  Some folks would soon forget that view on life and return to their pre-trip ways.  That will not be the case for us.  This started as a trip to Europe.  It became so much more.  We'll figure out how to describe it eventually.

Frequently Asked Questions

(By Ed) Since we have been home, we have repeatedly been asked some of the same questions so I thought I would try to answer those here.

How was your vacation?
Well, I guess you could call it a vacation.  I mean, technically, we were away from home.  But this journey was not like any vacation I've every done nor heard anyone talk about before.  We walked an ancient pilgrimage route and we traveled 12 to 21 miles per day on foot with backpacks carrying just a few essential items, staying in mostly meager accommodations and mostly eating just enough to get by (we did have days where we ate quite well).  We walked almost 300 miles in all.  Along the way we experienced so many things.  We had so many feelings:  joy, sadness, accomplishment, frustration, exhaustion (mentally and physically), invigoration, anxiousness.  We laughed, we cried. We talked about so many things.  We saw some incredibly beautiful vistas.  We saw some very quaint old towns and hamlets.  We saw the most indescribable architecture and artwork. We experienced the power of the ocean.  We met people from all over the world.  I guess to answer the original question I could say, "It was good" but that wouldn't begin to describe how it was.  Vacation?  Well, ok.

What group did you travel with?
Our group consisted of Joan and me (and when we tell people that, for some reason, they seem shocked) and those we met along the Way.

Did you have a map?
We had a guidebook but basically we just followed the spray painted yellow arrows and these signs:

Would you do it again?
I'm not sure we would do it again.  I think it might somehow cheapen the original experience.  I feel like we would like to go back to several of the places we visited.  We sort of missed out on Astorga due to our timing so to go back to that crazy big cathedral and to go to their chocolate factory would be cool.  And to spend a bit more time back at Muxia would be nice (we loved it there).


FYI:  We have finally put captions on all the pictures we posted online to hopefully describe the many scenes.  The link to those photos is on the previous blog post.

Home

We are still adjusting to being home.  It is harder than we thought it would be.  We need a bit more time before we finish this blog.  In the meantime, we have posted our pictures on our Picasa site.  You can find those by clicking this link

Closing Time

After sadly leaving Muxia, we have been hanging out in Santiago de Compostela, catching a glimpse of what we may have missed when we were here last week. Santiago is quite a commercial tourist city and as such comes with many of the tourist town trappings. We have been fortunate to weed through the chaff and find some hidden gems that have made our stay and trip very special. (on a side note, the weather today is rainy, cool and very windy.....we never had to endure anything like this the entire time on the camino) Our time here concludes our trip as we fly home tomorrow morning. Our emotions are quite mixed right now but we know it's time to return home. We will conclude this blog after we return home and have had time to digest what we have been through and try to adequately put into words about what has been an incredible journey.

What a Day!

We decided to walk to Muxia, a coastal town 30 km to the north. It was a nice quiet walk even though we missed one turn and ended up walking along the road and not the path. We found our way back to the path and had a picnic on a new bridge that takes the place of large stepping stones, some of which are partly submerged. We arrived, found our hotel (yes a hotel, we are done with albergues).. The "bad" news was they had over booked, but the good news was they had a place for us to sleep. A modern, two bedroom apartment on the 4th floor overlooking the bay. Very nice place for the night. We got cleaned up and went to explore and found it to be quiet and peaceful. There were large rocks on the coast and the waves came crashing in and we could have sat for hours. It reminded us of how life's lessons crash around us and hopefully we are refined and get smoother around the edges. Next we walked to a high point on the point where there was a large simple rock cross and we knew that at that point we had completed our camino. Our plan was to finish in Finisterre, but we had time and walked on, not knowing at the time why, but we now know it was God's plan all along. It was now getting past 8pm so we searched for dinner and it was superb.

A Chill Day

Ah, to sleep in. Even if the rest wasn't the best, not having to leave at 8 like most albergues was a luxury. Standard bread, bread and more bread breakfast prepared us for a day of exploring in Finisterre. What we found? Not much going on in this fishing port town. Of course we can always get into something so we spent some time near the water hanging out and climbing on jagged rocks. Watched a local fisherman collect bait by turning over rocks and catching small crabs with his bare hands (ouch!). Spent some time chillin' on the beach. We are now preparing to make our final walk; 30 km to the (supposedly beautiful) town of Muxia tomorrow. Probably wouldn't be making this jaunt but we finished our camino two days ahead of what we thought it would take. We'll keep ya posted.