Nadine Walks

stories of trekking and travel

On the Terrace, in the Sunshine

I’m writing this post from the terrace of La Muse, sitting on a bench in the sunshine. Sitting in the sun is the only way I can work outside today- it’s downright cold. 

Well, that’s probably an exaggeration. But the high today couldn’t have been much more than 60 degrees, but with the strong wind, it feels even cooler. The day has alternated between dark gray clouds, sprinkles of rain, periods of sun, always the strong wind. But it’s felt almost perfect to me: just what I needed to stay inside this morning to write, and just the right temperature to go for a small hike in the afternoon. And now, a blog post on the terrace in the sunshine. 

  
I’ve never really explained how things work here (have I?) and since I’m a solid 9 days in, I figure it’s about time. Most people, when I explain that I’m spending 3 weeks at a writer’s retreat in France, ask about the structure here. “Are there lectures or workshops, is there a teacher?” No, no, and no. It’s all pretty unstructured, it’s one of my favorite things about this place. You apply for a spot- a room, essentially- by sending in a resume and an explanation of your work. If there’s an open room and it seems as though you’re serious about your art, you’ll be offered a spot. But then the rest is up to you: La Muse provides the beautiful room and the stunning, almost magical scenery, and you work on your art.

There are now several places to stay in the village: The Big House (where I am, and the orginal home of La Muse), The Mews (the other half of the Big House that used to be the home of the owners of this whole thing), Cottage #1 and Cottage #2, each with two bedrooms. Right now every single room is booked, so there are 14 of us in total. Sometimes the residents all gather together, if we organize a communal meal, or do a reading, but mostly people are on their own to do whatever they want. 

Some people stay and work in their rooms for the entire day. Some (ahem) go off for long hikes. Some work on the terrace or hang out in the library, some work late into the evenings or early in the mornings. But often we come together for dinner, eating with whoever is around, and most of us eventually congregating on the terrace to finish the night.

  
Once a week you’re driven down the mountain for a bit of sight-seeing but mostly so you can hit a grocery store and stock up for the week. There’s a house in the village where you can buy fresh eggs, a constantly running water source with what might be the best water I’ve ever tasted, a truck that comes through the village two times a week selling bread and basic supply of fruits, veggies and canned goods. There are between 30-40 residents who live in this village, and many of them are well into their 80’s. But I see them out, all the time, tending to their gardens, walking slowly up and down the sloping streets. They congregate when the bread truck arrives, chatting as they wait, lingering as they stock up on supplies. For many, it’s the social highlight of the week.

  
I’ve found a good rhythm here, though it took me awhile. I wake early to eat breakfast on the terrace, then I go back to my room for several hours to work. I take a lot of breaks and do a lot of puttering around- it’s hard to sit still and write for hours on end. I break up my time by walking up to Le Roc-  a viewpoint at the top of the moutain- going on water runs to the source, hand washing laundry, straightening up the few possessions in my room, reading a book. If it’s a cloudy or rainy day (we’ve only had a few), I’ll stay in my room and write. But by mid-afternoon (at the latest!) I’m ready to get out and hike. There’s a network of trails that run through the village, so all I have to do is strap on my pack, walk out the door, and I’ve got several great paths to choose from. 

  
My family and friends have asked me: how’s the writing going? Are you getting much done? The answer is… it’s going okay. I’ve had some great stretches of writing and have started to work out some of the structural stuff for the book. But I’d by lying if I said that I was spending all day writing, getting a tremendous amount of work done. I can’t, or maybe it’s more that I choose not to. Just being here and soaking up this experience is so important to me; it’s good if I can get a lot of writing done, but what’s even better is what I’m remembering from last time: that I feel so inspired and creatively energized. After a week, my writing feels as strong as it’s ever been. I’m having great conversations about the creative process, today on my hike I memorized a poem. It’s been a long time since I’ve done that. 

Last night the residents all gathered in the library for a reading, to share some of what we’ve been working on. I read a short part from my book, something I wrote last week. It’s the first time I’ve ever done something like this, the first time I’ve shared anything from this book I’ve been working on. And it was scary. But it also felt good. The idea, the hope, is that eventually I can get something published and have lots and lots of people read my story. Sharing just a very small piece of it felt like a good start.

Walking through Fields of Thorns

It took me several days, but I’ve finally gone hiking. I thought it would be the very first thing I’d do, that I’d settle into my room at La Muse, look out the window, and promtply run out to the green hills.


And I wanted to- oh believe me, I wanted to- but for nearly all of this first week at the retreat, I’ve been fighting a cold. At first I thought this was a good thing, that it would give me more time to write, but mostly it’s just been frustrating. I want the energy to write and to go hiking.

My energy has been coming back, and so for the last two days, I’ve gone out to explore the mountains that I fell in love with three years ago.

Like so much else here, the memories come flooding back, and it almost amazes me what I can remember. As I hiked up the steep, rocky hill on what I call the “Lastours view” hike, it hits me with such a strong sense of knowing: there’s a spot coming up where I like to stop and rest. The spot with the tree that’s just tall enough to provide some shade, the one that casts its shadow over a rocky wall that’s the perfect height to rest against- ah yes, there it is. I’m out of breath, and like I always did, like I probably always will, I stop here and drink some water.


After that first hike I began to think that I wouldn’t exactly be having adventures out here this time around; that I’ve already done all of the hikes, that I know this terrain. But then I found myself setting out yesterday, not exactly sure where I wanted to go. I stopped by the source at the bottom of the village to fill up my water bottles (I love that there’s a place to get water that’s actually called ‘the source’ and it’s the first thing that people say to you when you arrive here: “Have you been to the source yet?”). Then, since I’m already down here, I decide to follow a nearby path that winds up and out of the village, the one that heads towards the lake.

I don’t want to walk all the way to the lake today (I haven’t been yet and there’s talk of a group going later in the week), but I know that the path will connect me to a track that can take me over the mountain. So I venture off, gradually making my way up and up on this shaded and narrow trail through the woods.

Almost immediately, I’m not having much fun. There are trees and bushes on either side of me and spiders have cast their webs across the trail and with nearly every other step, I’m walking staight through the stringy webs. I wipe against my arms and legs constantly, trying to rid myself of the invisible strings.

Soon the path curves and opens up and I remember this from last time: it’s a wide and grassy path, hot in the sun. This time, too, it’s hot in the sun and the path is rather wide and grassy, but it looks like it hasn’t been maintained in the three years since I’ve been here last. Wildflowers and weeds shoot up from the ground and take over the trail almost to the point where it’s hard to know if you’re still on a trail or not. And really, this wouldn’t be so bad if there weren’t stalks of thorns, too. Fields of thorns, as I came to call them, endless fields of thorns.


To be fair, I’d been warned. Another resident, the film editor, has been hiking a lot. He’d arrived a few days before the rest of us and only stayed a week- he’s already gone. But on his last full day he hiked up to the lake, taking the same trail out of the village that I was on now. I asked him about the hike and he gave me some tips, adding, “Oh, if you have long pants, you might want to wear them.”

He said his legs got a little cut up but he really didn’t mind, and that was it. I didn’t think much of it, just assumed that there were a few overgrown sections, that it probably wasn’t that bad.

Let me just say: I should have worn long pants. By the time I got out of the field of thorns, there were scrapes and cuts all over the bottom half of my legs. I’d been careful, too, moving slowly, stepping high, knocking branches away with the end of my stick. But it didn’t matter, the thorns were everywhere. Little nettles were, too, their tiny sharp ends wedging into my socks and shoes and jabbing against my ankles.

“Never again,” I muttered to myself as the path finally joined the road and I walked on towards the mountain top.

But then the longer I walked, the higher I climbed up towards the ridge of the mountain, the dryer the air felt, the stronger the wind- the annoyance and pain of the first part of the hike vanished. All I was left with was that incredible feeling of freedom and space, the kind of strength you feel when you’ve made it to the top of something.

 Hiking route in Labastide, France

I love being back here. I ended my hike hot and sweaty and had to pluck a tiny needle of a thorn from the heel of my foot- but I love it. I’m trying hard to spend time inside, at my desk, but I also can’t resist what is sitting outside my window. Already a week of the retreat is gone- a week!- but I still have two more. And I have a feeling that there are several more adventures waiting for me.

No Sugar Tonight in my Coffee; the first days at La Muse

Yesterday morning I made myself a small pot of espresso, heated up some milk in the microwave, mixed it together and added a spoonful of what I thought was sugar. It was salt. 

This is a pretty good way to describe what my first few days at La Muse, the writer’s/artist’s retreat in the south of France, have been like. I was here three years ago and some things- many things- are exactly the same. The village dates back to sometime around 1000 AD, and the house where I’m staying used to be the chateau of the village in the Middle Ages. So, things have been here a long, long time. Of course nothing has changed.

  
In some ways I imagined that I would walk back in here and slip straight to the past, to exactly how things used to be, to the same person that I was when I was last here. I could pick up wherever I left off: journaling in the mornings and gazing out at the mountains and marveling over my explorations while I hiked. I could access the same thoughts and excitement and spirit. It would be immediate, and seamless.

But instead, I walked back in and was hit with such a powerful sense of familiarity, but also of difference. The trees are taller, they change the view from the terrace. I walk up two sets of stairs to my room and not just one, I listen for the sounds of my friends but I only hear the voices of strangers. I go on a small hike and pace back and forth, searching for the turnoff of the trail. Eventually I find it; it is much further down the hill than I remember. I reach for sugar and I grab salt.

I don’t quite have the same sense of wonder that I did the first time, either. It reminds me of my experience with Paris: I entered the city and knew exactly where to go, and what to do. If Paris felt like some sort of temporary home, then La Muse and Labastide do, too. Returning to a place you love is a special kind of experience; it reminds you of where you’ve been, it reminds you of where you are now.

There are 14 residents here, it’s a big group. Many Americans, two Germans, two Australians, one Irish woman and one English woman. One is a film editor but all the rest are writers. This feels a bit daunting to me. I know I’m working on a book, but others are too. Without knowing all that much about their projects, I still have the sense that their books are these real, concrete, serious things. So different than my own, which just seems to be a bunch of words at the moment. Some of the residents have already published, I get the sense that many of them know what they are doing.

  
Or do they? Maybe we all give off that sense to each other. If I let myself see past my own doubts, I see that others have them, too. It’s a fascinating experience to be back, once again, with a large group of creative people. We’re all still feeling each other out, and as usual, I’m content to sit back and observe the group quietly. But already I can start to see where I fall within the mix: Vera and I have similar writing schedules, we often work and take breaks at the same time. Hilary is introverted, like me, and we take walks down to Le Fenial for coffee. I pour over a large hiking map with Will, pointing out my favorite trails.

I thought I might be able to jump right back into this experience, to hit the ground running with my writing, to feel at ease around the other residents, but (and really, this should come as no surprise to me), I’ve needed time to settle into this. And I’m getting there, I can feel myself beginning to sink in. My room is beautiful, and I’d forgotten how much I love watching and listening to the swallows swooping around outside my window. I’ve been wandering through the hills (a mild cold has stopped me from taking on big hikes, but it’s probably just as well in terms of getting into a good writing routine), and I’ve returned to Le Roc- my beautiful spot on top of the mountain with views that seem to stretch on forever. Homer, the resident dog, has accompanied me both times, and I love this. He runs fast and far ahead, but always circles back to make sure that I’m still coming. And when we get to Le Roc, he finds a cool spot in the shade while I write, and when I’m done, we walk back to the village together.

  
I love that I have three weeks here, that I can spend these first days adjusting and settling in and finding my routines- the routines of three years ago, but also the routines of today. I’ll mix them together and come away with a brand new experience, and I can’t wait to see what it will be like.

  

Paris and London, Art and Memories

I’m on a train heading down through France, on my way to the writer’s retreat in Labastide. There was a little excitement just now, though not the kind that you want: a bag was left in the middle of the aisle in one of the luggage areas on the train, in car 6 (which, incidentally, was just a few rows behind where I was sitting). The conductor and the staff made multiple announcements, searching for the owner, and someone came through our car to ask if the bag was ours. The next announcement threatened to stop the train if the owner couldn’t be found, and before too long everyone in car 6 was being asked to take our things and move up to the first car. We did, the train began to slow down, and just as we settled into our new seats (I think in a first class car- more room!), we were told that the owner of the bag showed up. 

It wasn’t until the announcement that they were going to stop the train that I began to worry; I’m not typically a worrier, I don’t like to dwell on stuff that could go wrong. But for just a few minutes this had me a little rattled. It’s all the stuff we see on the news, the things that are happening around the world, the warnings of friends and family before I left for this trip: “Be careful!” they all said. “Europe’s not as safe as it used to be.” I don’t think that anywhere is quite as safe as it used to be, but that also doesn’t mean it’s so dangerous that we shouldn’t leave home. Still though, this was a reminder of how unsettling the world feels right now. In the past I might have just been curious about what was going on; this time, my mind jumped to the worst.

In any case, the train has picked back up to its regular pace, the conductor assured us that everything is fine, and the journey continues. 

Or, maybe it’s just not a great morning. Last night I started coughing, and woke in the middle of the night to a sore throat. A few days before- in Bath, actually- the woman in the bunk below me was sick, and was coughing and sneezing quite a bit. “Oh no,” I thought. “The last thing I want is to catch whatever she’s got.” It probably hasn’t helped that I’ve been moving around constantly, that I’m not getting enough sleep, that my meals are a bit erratic and that I might not be eating quite enough fruits and veggies (but the scones! And the crepes!)

So I’m drinking tea and orange juice and I think this was the first time in my life that I was in Paris and didn’t drink any coffee. It doesn’t seem right, somehow. In fact, all of Paris felt a little… different. I was there for under 24 hours- arriving around 2:00pm on Sunday afternoon, and I left just after 7am this morning (Monday). It was such a short time in the city and really I was just kind of passing through. Different than my other trips, even if the others were on the short side as well- this one was just a quick stopover. But for being in such a big, grand city, it was all rather simple. I grabbed a few metro tickets, easily got to my hostel, checked in and stored my luggage then went back into the city, stopped by the place with the best baguettes to pick up a jambon/buerre sandwich (ham and butter, my favorite), then over to the Musee Marmottan, to see all the Monet’s. This was a new museum for me, I liked that even on a short trip I could see something new. 

Back to the hostel to get my key, up to my room to have a shower, then back out in the city to wander around. This was when all I really wanted to do was crawl into bed and sleep: it was chilly and raining and I was exhausted. But it’s not a trip to Paris without seeing Notre Dame, so I walked over, checked out the new Shakespeare and Company cafe, bought a crepe, then headed back.


There’s so much of Paris that I’m not familiar with; every time I go I stay in the same hostel, so I know just one area really well. But there’s something to be said for this- for maybe the very first time, Paris felt sort of like another home to me. It was easy, and effortless. It was like I stopped by to see an old, good friend. And I thought, once again, of something I realized after my very first trip there, when I was 20: Paris isn’t going anywhere. It will always be there, waiting, welcoming me for however long I want to stay. I like that.


I never got a chance to write about my other days in England, but they were great. Rushed and fast and maybe a little too much for someone like me (who wants time to sightsee, AND time to hang out in cafes and write). But I saw a bunch of stuff that meant a lot to me to see- things that are sort of on my unofficial ‘list’ (you know, the things in the world you always assume you’ll get to do/see one day. Lately, I’m realizing that I’m never going to see this stuff if I don’t actually plan a trip and make it happen… obvious, I know, but I guess I just feel that I no longer quite have all the time in the world for all the things I want to do).

So I saw Stonehenge, and I really loved it. In London, I went to the Tate Britain and spent a long time in the Turner rooms- JMW Turner was the first artist I ever really studied, way back in high school, when I was 16. (Come to think of it, I wrote a paper on Notre Dame for that class, too!). Whenever I’m in an art museum I check to see if there’s a Turner, and I was overwhelmed by the number at the Tate. And then I saw another painting I recognized- in another connection to high school, my English class was reading Hamlet and there was a depiction of Ophelia on the cover of our books. When the books were handed out to us, a boy across the room exclaimed, “Nadine! This looks just like you!” Everyone started laughing (maybe because Ophelia was floating down a stream to her death), but the boy was serious. I blushed, and ducked my head. At the time, I wasn’t sure if this was a good thing or not. 
But then I was walking through the halls of the Tate and came across this painting and I started smiling, almost laughing, at the memory. 

The final connection to high school was also during my day in London; an old friend lives there, someone I haven’t seen since I was 18. She invited me over to her family’s apartment; that evening, in the square down below, the neighbors were having a communal bbq. It was an incredible evening: everyone spread out on blankets and chairs in a beautiful garden, a DJ playing tunes (a Beatles song was playing when we walked in), the smell of charcoal, kids running around, twinkle lights in the trees. Standing at the grill, my friend leaned over to me. “They don’t know how to grill stuff here.” And as predicted, the men around the grill watched as my friend flipped her burgers, then put down rounds of bright yellow pineapple. “American,” she explained, and the men all laughed, then asked if she could help them with their food.


Later in the evening, after lots of drinking, people started dancing. But it was the strangest sort of thing- it was like a wedding. There was line dancing and the Bee Gees and even the Macarena. That one brought everyone out to the floor. I was standing by another American and he kept shaking his head. “Don’t they know that no one dances to this anymore?” He gestured to the crowd. “Welcome to Brexit.” It was a combination of every age group: little children, a few teenagers, twenty and thirty-somethings, parents and grandparents. They were swinging their hips and waving their arms and smiling and laughing. England might be a bit of a mess right now, but on that night, in that square, it seemed like everyone was in it together. 



Next up, I’ll be checking in from the south of France!

To Summer, To Travel, To Time

The great summer trip of 2016 begins in less than a week, so I thought it was about time that I check back in here with an update. And the only update I really have has already been said: I leave in less than a week!

Does time seem to be moving fast for anyone else? Like, really really fast? Until only a few days ago I was convinced that it was still May, that I had over a month to plan and prepare for my trip, that the days are continuing to lengthen, that summer was still far off.

But all of a sudden it was summer, and work had ended for the year, and the only thing that was looming before me was my big trip. I should be used to this by now, it’s been my pattern for the last three years: work ends around the middle of June, and I promptly hop on a plane for Europe.

So why does it feel like this trip is still weeks and weeks away? Last year, on the first day of summer, I was doing this:

I’d already been walking on the Camino for a few days, life at home felt like it was another world away.

My trip begins a bit later than usual this year, maybe that’s part of it. Or maybe it’s just that life is speeding by so fast that I yearn to hit a pause button, and give myself some time to catch up.

But there’s no stopping time so here we go. I think that finally, in these last few days, I’ve accepted that summer is here. I’ve gone to a baseball game and drank a coke slushey and had a dish of ice cream and spent a day at the beach. I’ve stretched in the lounge chair on my porch with my feet in the sun and read a book that I was too busy to finish months ago. Two days ago I went on a 10-mile hike; tomorrow I’ll try for 12-miles. This is the most hiking I’ve done in a long, long time, and well, it’s about time.

And then next week, I’ll leave for Europe. My first stop is England, something I don’t think I even mentioned in my Summer 2016 blog post. It sort of got lost in the shuffle of my mind, and stayed lost until just a couple days ago. But- oh yeah!- I decided to fly into London because it’s been a solid 15 years since I’ve been there and I thought it could be nice to do something a little new.

This photo is from my last trip to England, all those years ago:

My friend reminded me that our original plan was to spend a few days in London, then head to Stonehenge. But in 2001, Stonehenge was closed for 5 1/2 weeks because of foot-and-mouth disease, so we went to Liverpool instead (and honestly, this was probably my vote all along… Long Live Ringo!).

It’s a bit crazy to think back to that trip- parts of it that feel like a lifetime ago, other parts that are so recent in my memory I could swear that I was just there. Wasn’t I just there? Leaving notes for our friends on scraps of paper at the hotel lobby because this was just before any of us had a cell phone; crossing the street at the wrong end of Abbey Road (and causing quite the pile up of traffic in order to get a photo); battling a cold on the train to London and the endless cups of tea to soothe my throat; noticing that a small magnolia tree was growing in the front yard of the house where George Harrison grew up.

These memories are creeping in because I finally sat down and planned some things for my three days in England. I focus on these details for a moment- there’s a Jane Austen Centre in Bath! I can finally make it to Stonehenge!- but then an email pulls me into another part of the trip. It’s from the writer’s retreat in southern France- our host has forwarded a suggested shopping list so that we’re not overwhelmed when we arrive and are whisked off to the grocery store. And then I think back to my time there three years ago, and how I was overwhelmed, and didn’t buy quite enough food. Will that happen again? What will the village be like- will it be just as I remembered, or will there be changes?

And what am I like, this time? Three years wasn’t all that long ago, and yet, I know that I am different. And certainly, I’m different than I was 15 years ago, on that first trip to London and Liverpool.

Different, and yet… still me. Always me.

There’s more, too: another Amazon package arrived at my door, it’s a guide to walking the West Highland Way. And then I need to push the days in England and the writer’s retreat from my mind, and focus on Scotland. Scotland! I know nothing about Scotland! Shouldn’t I learn something, shouldn’t I do some research? A friend warns me about the haggis, and I wonder if I will try it.

And then, finally, in the very back corner of my mind, I remember that I’m also walking a Camino. That I’m returning to Spain. I’ve barely given it any thought, because this is the thing that feels the most familiar, the most comfortable. Other than breaking in a new pair of shoes, I haven’t done much in preparation. I have all my gear, I know where I’m going; this is the thing that I don’t have to plan for.

But remember just two years ago? My fretting and my fear in the weeks before I left for Spain that first time? Wasn’t I just memorizing the Spanish words for ‘I’m allergic to nuts’ and wondering how, exactly, I was to go about hand-washing my clothing?

Ah, time. I still don’t know what to make of it, of how quickly life is streaming past, yet of how far I’ve seemed to travel in what feels like very fleeting moments. I know that in August, I’m going to be back here at my computer, in my apartment, marveling over how fast the summer just went by.

Of course I will. But I’m not at the end yet, I’m only at the very beginning. So, here’s to summer! May it be the best one yet.

Round Three.

Plans for Summer 2016 have been made! But here’s the truth- I’ve hesitated to talk about the long, long process of figuring out what I wanted to do and where I wanted to go. There are probably a few reasons, but none more than this: it feels a little ridiculous to spend so much time (publicly) fretting over how to spend my two months off. Because… I get two months off! Every year that I stay in the job I currently have, I am increasingly grateful that the work I do affords me time off in the summer. It’s a luxury that most people simply don’t get. I was pretty intentional about choosing this particular job in order to have the two months off, and like nearly everything in life there are trade-offs. But I still recognize how lucky I am, and for having this job at this particular time in my life: my family is healthy and I am healthy, I have no kids and no commitments or obligations that keep me state-side. And, for better or for worse, I have no partner to worry about. I can do exactly as I please.

It’s an amazing opportunity, but sometimes I feel a little self-conscious talking about yet another summer in Europe. But I work hard, and maybe never harder than I have this year. And for vast stretches of time during the 10 months of the year that I’m not traveling, my life is pretty simple. I have hermit-like tendencies. I am very, very careful about money; if I weren’t, I’d never be able to travel like I do.

Where am I going with this? I’m starting to ramble again. I’ve missed blogging, but as ever, it’s because my focus has been so wrapped up in writing this book. I’ve slipped just a bit from my weekly word-count goal in the past month, and I blame spring and sunshine and all those blooming trees out there. Makes it hard to get my butt in the chair. But here I am, with a simple and easy lemon cake in the oven and the last few fingers of wine in my glass and I am going to tell you about my summer plans, the ones I’ve worked hard for, the ones that I sometimes agonized over.

Here is my main problem this year: I want to do it all. I already wrote a bit about maybe buying a new car and driving across the country, I wrote a big list of travel goals that included Guatemala and writer’s retreats and long hikes. I want to do it all! (and don’t we all?) I tell myself not to think too big, that I can’t possibly do so much with only two months off, that I shouldn’t try to do it all, that there will be time for it all, one day.

But still, I couldn’t settle down or settle into a decision about this summer. I took the cross-country trip off the list, Guatemala too, but the other things were still up for grabs. I knew that I wanted to spend some of the summer focused on my book, so a writer’s retreat was high on the list. But- and if this comes as a surprise then you need to go back and read more of this blog, maybe from the beginning– I wanted to do another Camino. How could I go to Europe and not also go on a long walk?

I figured out a way to do both of these things, a very doable way to do a writer’s retreat and a Camino, and I thought that I should have been satisfied, that I immediately should have scooped up a flight. And, can we talk for a moment about flights? About the deals that I saw come and go? About the $500 round trip flight between Philly and Milan that pretty much worked with my schedule? Every day for over a week I checked to make sure that the deal was still there, until it wasn’t, and I never bought the flight.

Because something was holding me back. In the past few years, a little travel bug has nudged its way into my head and my chest and most certainly my legs and my feet, and I have a growing list of places to go, things to see, paths to walk. So while another writer’s retreat in France and another Camino in Spain would make me happy beyond belief, I still hesitated. I wanted something new, too.

All those thoughts of not trying to do it all, having time ‘one day’? One day is right now. I’ve been telling myself this for a long, long time, but it always bears repeating. One day is right now.

This isn’t leading up to anything epic or earth-shattering. I’m not quitting my job, the book is nowhere near finished, no radical changes (not yet anyway). But I’m going to try to do a lot this summer, a combination of things that seems just right, so right that now I certainly am happy beyond belief, at the thought of getting the chance to do it all.

There are three parts to Summer 2016. The first is another writer’s retreat, which takes me back to La Muse, the same place where I spent three weeks in 2013. When I was there the first time, I had that deep and knowing feeling that one day I’d return. But I also knew that in order to return, I’d need to be in a different creative place. That first trip was simply about learning to call myself an artist. I didn’t have a dedicated project to work on while I was there, I knew I loved to write and take photos but I’ve never really been serious about it before. So those three weeks in southern France were more about the experience of entering a different kind of world, a world where I could start to consider myself an artist, where I could learn what it takes for me to feel inspired and focused, to give me confidence moving forward.

And in the past three years, I’ve moved forward. Slowly, slowly, one small step at a time. I’m returning to La Muse as a writer, who is working on her book.  How great does it feel to say that? Pretty great.

During my last retreat I would spend a few hours a day writing, but otherwise I was out in the mountains that surrounded the small French village of Labastide-Esparbairenque. I took long hikes and hundreds of photos, and more than anything soaked up the inspiration and beauty of where I was. This time around, there will surely be more hikes (photos too), but I also have a big project to work on. I’m excited to see what kind of progress I can make on the book with three solid weeks to do nothing but write.

Terrace-La-Muse-Labastide-Esparbairenque-France

Terrace of La Muse, July 2013

 

The second part of my trip will most likely be another Camino. Nothing is set in stone yet, but that’s also the beauty of a Camino… nothing really needs to be decided until I arrive. I’ve gone back and forth dozens of times on this, too: if I walk another Camino, which one do I want to walk? Return to the Frances? A path in France? In Portugal? My thoughts ran in circles until finally I stumbled on something that felt just right. Start in Leon (a city about two-thirds of the way towards Santiago on the Camino Frances), and walk about 5 days on the San Salvador, a short Camino that extends south to north, from Leon to Oviedo. I passed through Oviedo last year, when I left the Norte to go down to the Primitivo. So now, I’ll make my way back up to Oviedo on the San Salvador, and from Oviedo will continue north up to the point of the Norte where I veered off last year. If the timing works out well, I should have a dozen or so days to finish the Norte and arrive in Santiago.

I’m sure that explanation was super confusing. Basically, all you need to know is this: I’ll have roughly 17 days to walk a Camino, I’ll be back in Spain, I will drink cafe con leches, and it will be beautiful.

Map of Camino del Norte

This map doesn’t show the San Salvador, but imagine a line extending from the Frances up to Oviedo. From Oviedo I’ll follow that dotted line to Aviles, and then continue on towards Santiago.

 

And finally, the third part of the trip gives me something brand new. My return flight to the states is out of Glasgow, Scotland, and I’m leaving about a week at the end of my trip to walk the West Highland Way, a popular long-distance footpath in the Scottish Highlands. This area of Scotland is rugged and remote (though the path itself could be crowded in August), there could be lots of rain, and there will definitely be lots of midges (small flying insects that will certainly be a pain). But what I’ve read and seen of this 96-mile route is nothing short of stunning. I’m only going to have 5-days to walk this path, and while it’s doable it’s also going to be challenging. But after a summer of hiking in southern France and walking a Camino, I hope that I’ll be in tip-top shape for the Highlands.

west highland way

Photo by Bart vanDorp  / CC BY

 

Big plans, exciting plans. Plans to do it all, at least all that I want for this moment in my life. And I can’t wait to share it all here.

In the footsteps of Monet and Hemingway; Day Two in Paris, and the end of my Camino

I’ve been trying to write a post about the last day in Paris and the end of my trip, and I’m reminded of why I loved writing in the moment so much: writing about something that happened several weeks ago is a completely different experience than writing about it when the memories are fresh, when they’re all around you.

So I’ll start how I often do, with what’s around me in the moment: it’s just after 8am and I have a half finished cup of really strong coffee on the table next to me. I’m in my living room and despite the early hour it’s dark in here; the skies are a thick grey and rain drizzles and pours through the trees, onto the stone porch that’s just outside my door.

I’ve had a disjointed and crazy and wonderful few weeks since I’ve been home: a day in my apartment, a week on the road. A few days home again and a few days back out. Back and forth, home and away, over and over. I have one week left of vacation before I return to work, and at the start of the summer, I was tempted to pack in as much as possible: go to Europe, walk the Camino, come home and travel south for a wedding and to see friends. Then take off again- maybe California, maybe Maine, maybe an impromptu backpacking trip in the woods. I realized I was totally unprepared to do any of this, and what’s more, I didn’t want to do anything big. I wanted to sit still for awhile- and even though I’ve been back and forth and continuing to move, there’s also been so much calm in the past few weeks.

I moved so much on my Camino. We all do- anyone who walks a Camino- and I certainly moved last year, but this time? I was running, sailing, gliding through Spain. I could feel it- even in the early days of pain and fatigue and blisters, I pushed on, I pushed harder, I made myself move. And by the end, I felt like I was flying. I’ll write more- hopefully- about how I did this walk, why I decided to walk those long days and what I got out of it- but what I’m thinking about now is my mental state, especially at the end of the Camino.

My mind was strong. It was solid and confident and settled. I was so present in my moments on the Camino, but towards the end, I was also aware of what would happen when I returned home, aware of how I felt when I returned home last year. I’d thought about this as I walked, I thought about this during my conversation with Andrea, on my last night in Santiago: the Camino begins when the walking ends.

And I thought about this on my last day in Paris. I did a small day trip out to Giverny, the home and gardens where Monet spent the end of his life, and where he did some of his most famous work. I lingered over this trip- I could have rushed to the Gare du Nord and made it on the first train out to Vernon (a town near Giverny), I could have hopped on a bus that would take me with the first wave of tourists into the property, I could have tried to enjoy the gardens and the pond before the crowds would arrive. But instead, I lingered over my MIJE breakfast, I slowly wandered through the streets of my quartier and over to the nearest metro. When I arrived at the train station I learned that the next train to Vernon wasn’t for nearly two hours, so I walked through the streets around the Gare du Nord, and found a café near a church. It was on a bustling street corner but inside the café was quiet. I drank a café crème and wrote in my journal and chatted with a man delivering gallons of milk.

I’d become confident with my French- or, at least, confident in attempting to speak- and the attempts paid off. The delivery man laughed with me, tried to teach me a few words, told me I had a beautiful smile. On my way out, I passed a waiter who was standing alongside the bar, and dancing slightly to some pop music that was coming from the stereo. When he saw me he grinned, “Il faut dancer!” he declared. I shook my head, laughing. “I’m not good at dancing,” I told him.

I waved goodbye, and the waiter, the woman who served me my drink, the delivery man- they all stood together and smiled and waved at me and wished me a good day.

It was strange- in a way- to experience something like that in Paris. I love Paris, but Parisians are often rushed and reserved and formal and they just don’t seem to smile so much. Not at tourists, not at people they don’t know. But those moments in the café were different, and I thought about this as I rode the train out of the station and into the countryside: I could have sat quietly at my table and not engaged with the man delivering the milk. I could have smiled politely and not tried to speak. I could have kept to myself, and remained to myself, as I so often do. But I thought of my conversation with Andrea, the Italian, and I thought of what I resolved to myself, just two nights before: that I want to keep the energy of the Camino with me. I want it to shine through and into my life. Maybe I was already practicing this.

When I arrived in Vernon, a town about 5 kilometers away from Giverny, there were buses lined up outside of the station to deliver tourists to Monet’s home. But I chose to walk. Of course I did! There is a flat walking path that runs behind houses and past fields, leading straight from Vernon to Giverny. Most took the bus and several rented bicycles but a few others, like me, chose to walk. And when I arrived in Giverny, an hour later, instead of going to see the gardens, I first sat down to a long lunch. I’d heard great reviews about the restaurant which is part of the Hotel Baudy- just down the street from Monet’s residence- so I found a table on the terrace and ate like a queen: a glass of Bordeaux and slices of fresh baguette. Salad with goat cheese, salmon, broiled tomatoes, crème brûlée.

When I finally made it to Monet’s home, it was packed with people. The gardens were beautiful but so crowded. I walked up and down the rows, admiring the flowers, but I didn’t feel particularly overwhelmed with the beauty or inspired by the setting. But then I walked through a small underground passageway and over to the Japanese water garden and when I saw the weeping willows and wisteria covered bridges and the pond full of water lilies- all of that green- for a moment, it took my breath away.

On my return to Paris I felt full of a quiet energy and inspiration. Those feelings followed me to Shakespeare and Company, an independent bookstore on the Left Bank. I’ve been there before- maybe I’ve been there every time I travel to Paris- it’s my favorite bookstore in the world. As I walked through the stacks of fiction I saw a pile of slim paperbacks, a black and white photo on the cover of a man standing in front of a building. I picked up the book- it was Hemingway’s ‘A Movable Feast’, and I promptly took it over to the register and handed over some euros. My dad had just mentioned this book, when he was driving me to the airport before my Camino. “Have you ever read Hemingway?” he’d asked. “You would like ‘A Movable Feast’, it’s the memoir of his early days as an ex-pat in Paris.”

I’d had no idea. For as many times as Hemingway has ‘appeared’ in my travels these past two years, I’ve never read a thing by him. And yet, ever since I walked into Café Iruna last year in Pamplona, with Ibai and Mirra and Ji-Woo, I’ve felt some sort of small connection with Hemingway. I think maybe it had to do with being a foreigner in Spain- out on this strange adventure, stepping through towns where he spent so much of his time. When I was in Venice, this past winter, I discovered a bar where Hemingway had spent his time, stationed at a corner table in the cold winter months, working on a book. It was Harry’s Bar, and I made a point to walk inside. I’m not sure why, but suddenly it seemed like if I happened to be in the same places where Hemingway used to be, I should try to track down his favorite spots. Maybe I was trying to capture those same feelings that I had when I was gazing over the water lilies at Giverny: that quiet, energizing inspiration.

And this year, on my Camino, there were the words from a local, as I was sitting in a bar, writing: “Hemingway started like this, you know.”

I started reading ‘A Movable Feast’ right away- that night on the stiff, narrow mattress in my hostel room, the next morning, leaning against the concrete wall in the underground of the metro, waiting for my train that would take me to the airport. Twenty pages in and he writes about Shakespeare and Company, how he was shy and poor and had to ask to borrow books. I ate up his words as I read, and I realized- amazed though I probably shouldn’t have been- that I really like the way he writes.

And this is how my time in Paris ended, these are the feelings that I carried back with me from my trip this summer: feeling strong, feeling peaceful, feeling quietly energized, feeling ready to come home, feeling ready to write, feeling ready to figure out how to keep walking my Camino.

café crème, ParisJapanese bridge, Giverny, FranceFlowers and pond, Giverny, FranceJapanese water garden, Giverny, FranceShakespeare and Company bookstore, Paris, France

Next Post: Don’t Stop Me Now

Crêpes and Cathedrals; Day One of Post-Camino traveling, Santiago to Paris

This is going to be a disjointed post; I thought about not publishing it at all, but I wrote the first half while I was in Paris and I like reading the immediacy of it. In fact, I loved writing that way while I was on the Camino: in the moment, from cafés and bars and sometimes the high perch of my bunk bed in a crowded albergue. But I’ve been home from Europe for over a week now- nearly two weeks- and the ‘real time’ of this post is no longer real. I’m not in Paris (however much I wish I were). I’m home and I’m writing about Paris and some of this I wrote while I was in Paris and some of it I’m writing from where I am at the moment… at a small round table in a Panera cafe, drinking an iced cafe mocha that was supposed to be a hot mocha despite this 93 degree heat, but I didn’t have the heart to tell the sweet and kind barista that she had made me the wrong drink. I don’t even really like chocolate coffee drinks, but this was something I used to order when I was 22, the year after I graduated college and wasn’t sure what to do and would spend time writing at a Panera in my hometown.

So I came here today, because I think I wanted to sort of recapture those feelings I had when I was 22, at least a little. I wrote a lot about France back then- my time abroad- and writing felt like this thing that was so full of possibilities, that had no limits. I didn’t think much about what I was writing and I didn’t share it with anyone and I only wrote for myself, and it was probably the easiest writing I’ve ever done. So I thought I would recreate the scene a bit and write about Paris and see if I can keep writing like I did when I was young(er), keep writing like I did on the Camino.

So here are some thoughts from Paris:

This could practically be called the 32nd day of my Camino even though my Camino ended. I’m counting it because I was following yellow arrows, in Paris, inadvertently, because I took the metro in the wrong direction. I shook my head at myself because I felt like I should have known better. When I realized my mistake I got off and switched platforms and tried to go in the right direction, but I wasn’t fast enough and almost got caught in the closing doors of the metro car. I should have known better about this, too. But I was flustered, maybe not used to traveling this way after walking for so long, maybe still half asleep, my body moving slowly. Whatever it was, I decided I needed to get out from under ground and find some fresh air, regardless of how far I was from my hostel. Far is sort of a relative term for me these days.

I started walking and soon came across yellow arrows. I think they could have been Camino arrows- maybe- and in any case they made me smile. I’m not sure how far I walked, but it didn’t feel too far (what is ‘far’, anyway, after having just walked across Spain?), but I was tired. I AM tired, I think I need to tuck myself away somewhere and spend all day in bed. But first I have this fast trip in Paris. It’s a little difficult to be in this city that I love so much and to feel so tired, but I’m trying to reframe the experience and just enjoy it how I can. If that means meandering around aimlessly, stopping a lot on park benches, finding a chair by the Seine and settling in for awhile, sitting in cafés and drinking coffee… I think that’s a fine way to spend time in Paris.

Leaving Santiago was easy and hard. In some ways I really felt like this Camino ended well and that I was ready for the end, but it’s always hard to leave something you love. And hard to leave people you’ve grown fond of. I have this scattered family all over Spain right now: they’re days before Santiago, in Santiago, on the way to Finisterre, on the way to Muxia, on their way home. I got to say goodbye to some but there are lots still out there, still walking their Camino. So in many ways, I wish I were still walking, too.

But leaving wasn’t as hard as it was last year. Maybe it’s because I was able to come back, and it showed me that if I really want it, I can always go back. Leaving Santiago doesn’t have to mean leaving forever, leaving the Camino doesn’t have to mean leaving forever. I don’t leave these people forever, either; the best parts of my day were the messages I received: one from Jill, wishing me a safe journey to Paris. One from Nicolas, telling me that he is 40 kilometers from Finisterre. And a comment on my blog from Krysti and John, two friends from last year’s Camino. We haven’t been in touch for a year, but they told me that they’d been following my journey this year since Day One. I was standing at the luggage carousel in the airport in Paris when I read that, and I had the biggest smile on my face.

It was right around this time when I looked up and noticed an older man and woman across the room, waving at me and pointing to the corner. That was when I saw what I was waiting for: my walking stick. How this couple knew that I was waiting to pick up my stick I have no idea, they must have seen me checking it in Santiago. There it was, in oversized baggage: my tall wooden stick, covered with a fluorescent green wrapping. Getting it to Paris wasn’t as much trouble as I feared; just 20 euros to check a “bag”, 7 euros to wrap the stick.

So maybe that’s another reason this feels like a Camino day- I walked through the streets of Paris with my pack on my back, the walking stick in my hand. I found my hostel- the MIJE, my home away from home- and put my stuff up in my room. I’m in a shared room, but right now there’s only one other person’s stuff next to a bed on the lower level. I’m on the second “floor” at the top of a narrow set of heavy wooden stairs. There are six beds up here but maybe I’ll luck out and have the space to myself.

(later)…

It turns out I was the only one in my section of the room, and I was grateful for it. I had been wishing for this, wishing I could have a single room somewhere. That I could just have an early night and settle in, curled up on my bed with my phone and some wi-fi and a Twix bar. I got to do this, but that came a little later. First I had to spend a few hours in Paris.

I remained tired throughout the day. I thought that maybe I should have had a plan, that I should have picked one thing I wanted to do and forced myself to do it because I was in Paris and even though I think I’ll always end up coming back, I never know for sure how long it will be until I return to this city. But instead I walked for far too long down the Rue de Rivoli, stopping in one shop after another looking for a plain and cheap t-shirt. Shopping was the last thing I wanted to do but wearing a fresh t-shirt was the thing I wanted the most, so I forced myself to do a little shopping. (I came away with a 5 euro blue t-shirt from Forever 21, which might be considered a little sad considering I was in Paris, but I was satisfied. I just wanted something clean and new).

And then I did the only thing that I ever really HAVE to do when I’m in Paris, and that was to walk by Notre Dame. It’s one of my very favorite places in the world, and it’s one reason I like staying at the MIJE so much; Notre Dame is just a 5 minute walk away. I stayed in this general area the entire night: sitting on a bench behind the cathedral, occasionally admiring the architecture, watching kids play in the park. When I was hungry I walked a short distance to the Ile Saint-Louis and found a small crêperie. The restaurant was narrow, the kitchen off to one side with a man flipping the thin crêpes by the front window, three tables tucked against the wall in the front room, and a larger seating area in the back. An older couple were eating in the front of the restaurant when I entered and I was seated nearby- feeling a little self-conscious being alone, but also comfortable in this small and quiet space.

I ordered off of their ‘menu of the day’- maybe I was still in the habit of pilgrim menus and menu del dias, or maybe I just wanted to eat a lot of crêpes. The first plate was a crêpe complet: ham, emmental cheese and an egg. A mug of cidre, a buerre/sucre (butter and sugar, simple but the best) crêpe for dessert. The crêpes were enormous and delicious and unlike anything I’d eaten for the past month in Spain. I ate slowly, dipping each forkful of my crêpe into the runny egg yolk, savoring the simplicity of the handful of salad arranged on the side of my plate.

I wandered around after dinner, crossing a bridge over the Seine to head back to Notre Dame. Families waited in line for ice cream, a man played an accordian, an endless wave of people snapped photos. I found a bench and settled in to watch the sun set, with the Seine in front of me and Notre Dame just off to my left. After a few minutes a young man approached me and began to talk. He thought I must be Swiss, I think I let him down by saying I was American. He stayed with me for ten minutes, telling me how he had just moved to Paris, that he loved this area of the city, that French wine was the best. I was polite but reserved and eventually he got the hint and left. Over the past month I’ve gotten used to talking to new people- it seemed as though I met a handful of new people every day- and for as much as I was craving company and connection at the end of this Camino, on this night- in Paris- I just wanted to sit quietly and watch the sun set.

And so I did. The night was soft and quiet and I was tired and satisfied and full. Full of crêpes, full of happiness, full of the Camino and everything I got to experience in this past month. So, one more day in Paris- one last little bit of travel and exploration- and then time to go home.

MIJE courtyard, ParisMIJE staircase, ParisNotre Dame, ParisCrêpe, ParisNotre Dame, sunset

Next Post: In the Footsteps of Monet and Hemingway

The night I jumped over a fire; Day 5 on the Camino del Norte, Monastery Zenarruza to Albergue Eskerika, 27kms

Each day on the Norte seems to bring something completely new. Maybe it was like this last year on the Frances- I’m sure it probably was- and yet, on this Camino, it feels like I’m getting a very, very different experience with each day.

I’ve had my walks alone, I’ve had my walk in a group, I’ve stayed in a train station and in a monastery.

After walking for so much of the day with others yesterday, I had anticipated that I would set off on my own today. And I did, but just ahead of me was Christine, a 63-year old French woman with a 14 kilo pack who can outwalk just about anyone here (except maybe this other French guy, who literally runs down the trail. Man, can the French hike!).

For much of the morning I wanted to be alone, so I would leave some room between Christine and I, but inevitably I would catch up with her when she would stop to check her guide. She’s fast, but what slows her down a bit is a need to always know exactly where she is on the route. So on and off I would catch up to her, and finally thought I lost her for good after I stopped for a break on a bench next to a church on top of a hill (for someone who doesn’t often check her guide, I had no idea where I was).

It was 10am and I’d been walking for about three hours and here’s the thing: I hadn’t had coffee. The Norte is a beautiful route and while it’s difficult, I can handle the hills and the rocks and the horrible ascents and descents IF I can start my day with some coffee.

Sometimes, I have a feeling it’s going to be inevitable: I’ll stay in a place without a kitchen or a bar and I’ll have to walk for hours before I can reach the first town big enough to be selling coffee. But today I made a mistake. The monastery offered breakfast, but it didn’t start until 7:30. Once I ate something and had coffee I wouldn’t be hitting the road until 8:00, and that’s late considering I had another nearly 30km day planned and by late morning these days get HOT (maybe these are unseasonably hot June days; all I know is that walking in the heat of the afternoons has been really difficult).

So before setting out this morning I studied my guidebook and saw that a town about 4km away from the monastery would have two bars, so I planned to stop there for my first coffee of the day. Except when I got to the town around 8:30, it was deserted. I tracked down a woman and asked her if there was a bar nearby and she said it wouldn’t open until 10. Noooo!!! The guidebook warned that there would be no more services until Gernika, a further 13 kilometers away. Oh boy.

At one point when I was walking with Christine I tried to tell her about needing coffee (she doesn’t speak much English so our conversations are in French) and she said, “Oh, I had coffee this morning at the monastery.”

“But weren’t the others in your room sleeping?” I asked. (The small ‘kitchen’ was in the same room as the top floor bunk beds).

“Yes, but I used the microwave and I didn’t care. They are pilgrims, they should be waking up early.”

So next time, if there’s a kitchen with coffee tucked away in the cupboard, I know to make some for myself regardless of whether others are nearby sleeping or not. Because my morning walk without coffee was tough. I thought walking all day in the rain was tough, and it was, but now I’m not sure which is worse.

So it was 10am and I had been walking for three hours and I sat down outside of a pretty church and Christine was next to me, chattering away in French. My head had a dull ache, I had a high suspicion that there was a small blister forming on the ball of my right foot (there was), and the last thing I wanted to do was talk to anyone, much less in French. Eventually Christine walked on when she saw me open a can of tuna. She probably thought I was a little crazy to be eating so early but I needed something for energy, and a can of tuna fish was about my only option.

The day turned around for me a few kilometers before Gernika where I found an open bar, and once I had my coffee I was good to go. I ran into Christine again in the city, she had just been to the tourism office and was headed to the Assembly House- a quick and free stop for pilgrims. I followed her and did a 15-minute sight-seeing stop and as we were leaving the Assembly House Christine reaches around in her pack and pulls out a tall can of beer. She pops it open and while walking takes big swigs, and it’s all I can do to keep up behind her.

I laugh to myself, because she is something else. As we walk out of the city we talk a bit, and I learn some things about her: that she is recently retired, that she has been wanting to do the Camino for 30 years, that before this pilgrimage, she rarely drank. I already knew that Christine had started her walk in Paris, just over two months ago. Paris! She truly started this pilgrimage from her doorstep, and she is more full of life than anyone I’ve seen here, yet.

I’m writing about Christine a lot because she is the only other pilgrim I encountered on my walk today. After leaving Gernika we pretty much stuck together, although she was always a bit ahead of me. And today, for some reason, this arrangement suited me. Yesterday I felt a strong need to go off on my own, and was so happy when I went off to do my own thing. But today, I didn’t mind so much that Christine and I were headed to the same place, and that we were sort of walking together.

The Camino is a funny thing. I’ve said that I want to be open to whatever kinds of experiences the Camino gives me, and I also want to be open to and aware of whatever I’m feeling, moment to moment. If I’m able to, I want to follow my feelings, even if they change one day to the next. So yesterday, I continued to the monastery even though I was leaving my friends and it would have been so easy to stay with them and have a comfortable evening. And today, I didn’t fall behind Christine or attempt to move ahead of her. I stayed close.

I’m now at my albergue for the evening- Christine and I arrived together around 4pm (so many late days on the Norte! It wasn’t like this at all for me on the Frances, and the only thing I can say is that the difficulty of the walk makes each kilometer take that much longer). When we arrived there was only one other pilgrim here, a man from Spain (who can’t speak English but can speak a little French… so it seems like another evening of practicing my French!). It’s now 6:30 and we’re still the only three here.

It’s a place called Albergue Eskerika, about 10 kilometers past Gernika. And once again, it’s a beautiful albergue. Our bunks are upstairs in a large, lofted room, and since there are only three of us we’re spread out around the room, giving us each our own little space. There’s a lovely outdoor space with a covered kitchen area where we can make food (unfortunately I didn’t know what the eating situation would be like here, only that meals were ‘available’, so I didn’t bring much food with me. Turns out that you can cook anything you have with you, or you can purchase something from a small list of items for sale. Since there’s no town nearby, I’ll probably buy some pasta here for about three times the cost it would have been at a grocery store. So future pilgrims take note! If you stay at Albergue Eskirika, bring some food items with you!).

There are picnic tables and a large sunny yard, tables and chairs in the shade, a small dog named Lolita running around and begging for food scraps, small trees and red flowers in green pots. It’s another ideal spot, and so peaceful and quiet, especially with only three of us here.

I’m starting to get used to the solitude of this Camino. There’s still part of me that longs for the vibrancy and fun of the Camino Frances, but it’s important for me to remember that most of the time, I found that Camino to be a little too noisy and party-like… that I intentional needed to carve away time for myself, and work hard to seek out smaller albergues in tiny villages in order to find some peace and quiet. And here, so far, I’ve loved these peaceful and quiet spots.

I’m also beginning to accept that this is a difficult Camino for me. So often last year I remember thinking, “This really isn’t bad at all!” And most of the time, it wasn’t. I trained well and started slow and lucked out with next to no rain or blisters.

But this Camino? It’s been so different. Every single day has hills to climb, mountains to climb. My mind knew it, but I don’t think my body did, because the road is taking it’s toll on me. Towards the middle of the day my legs sort of say, “Okay, we’ve had enough of the hills. No more going up.” And then when I force them to go up, they protest every step of the way. Each step is a slow slog through molasses. And then my feet begin to protest as well; they don’t like the rocks I have to climb over. So much so that the right foot has decided to stage a protest and grow a nice little blister on the ball of the foot. How did this happen?? Maybe I thought I was immune to blisters after not really getting any last year, and never getting one on a training hike. I’m sure my days have been a little too long, this early on… and the rocks aren’t helping either. The end of today had me limping a bit into the albergue. We’ll see whether this blister becomes an issue or not…

To end the day, we celebrated San Juan Day. The French were talking about this last night, it’s an annual celebration of the shortest night of the year, the summer solstice. I heard talk about fire and making wishes, and a few hours ago the hospitalero said that we would celebrate. I was sitting outside, studying my guidebook when I heard him call out something in Spanish. And then, slowly, “The fire is burning!”

The three of us walked over- Christine, the Spanish man and I- and when I saw the fire I made a face and said, “This is the end of my Camino.” The fire was huge, and laughing, the hospitalero said, “You jump later, when it is lower.” So we waited and watched the fire burn, and when it was only small flame and embers we took turns jumping over and making a wish.

What a way to usher in the summer.
So that’s Day 5 on the Camino: quiet, lacking in coffee, full of French, a little painful and lots more beautiful scenery and stunning views. And fire jumping. Tomorrow, Bilbao!

        

Previous Post: Day 4 on the Camino del Norte

Next Post: Day 6 on the Camino del Norte

But I would walk 500 miles, and I would walk 500 more…

In about an hour, I leave for my second Camino. A few weeks ago, even a few days ago, I figured that this blog post wouldn’t be written until I arrived at the airport and settled in to wait for my flight. Or maybe it would be written on the flight, or else on the train ride from Paris down to Hendaye.

But instead, I’m ahead of schedule. I’ve been ahead of schedule these last few days, and it’s throwing me off a bit. Where is the scrambling, the rushing, the panicked feeling that I don’t have everything done and I’m not prepared and that I’m going to forget something?

A small part of me worries that there’s something I’m not remembering to do, but mostly, I’m on top of stuff. It’s strange. I know I’m still going to have that feeling of “what am I doing??” when the plane takes off and, better yet, when I arrive at the train station in Hendaye and set off to cross the bridge from France to Spain and into Irun, my first official steps of the Camino del Norte.

But right now, this sort of feels ‘old hat’. I did a small training hike the other day with my pack ‘Camino loaded’, and as I was stuffing things into compartments, it all came back to me: how the sleeping bag fills out the bottom, how my soap and toiletries come next, topped with my rain jacket and ziplocs filled with clothes, how my bag with electronics and cords settles in at the top. Without having to think, my hands just moved along, filling my pack in the way that I used to last summer.

I’m at my parents house right now, where I’m leaving my car for the next month. I only arrived here yesterday, having spent most of the day finishing up work for the year. I imagined that I would spend my evening with maps spread out in front of me, jotting down notes, sending off emails, doing all of those last minute, pre-trip things. But instead, I went for a stroll around my neighborhood and saw lightening bugs blinking across the corn fields. I sipped a coke slushey and watched Apollo 13. I had one of the most relaxing summer evenings that I could imagine.

And now I’m sitting in my old bedroom with my Camino things spread out before me, not quite fully packed. My outfit is arranged on my bed, I’ll change into it shortly: a long pair of hiking pants, a deep blue t-shirt, underwear, socks. I remember this moment so vividly last year, how I was struggling to take a deep breath, panicked about what I was about to get myself into.

This year I feel so calm, and I love it. I think I’ve been ready to get back on the Camino for months, and now it’s here. Round two. The weather is supposed to be beautiful for my first day’s walk on Friday, so stay tuned for some gorgeous photos of the northern coast of Spain. Here’s a photo of a map of the route, taken from my guidebook (so pardon the poor quality of the map… but you’ll be able to see the route, which is the most important thing).

map of Camino del Norte

The solid red line is the route I’m walking this year, the Camino del Norte which branches off to the Camino Primitivo; the dotted red line is the Camino Frances, which I walked last year.

So here we go, 31-days on the Camino del Norte and Camino Primitivo… 500 more beautiful and strenuous and magical miles through Spain. Stay tuned!

Next Post: Day 1 on the Camino del Norte

Camino Magic in the Real World; Continuing to Follow the Yellow Arrows

As I was driving out of the park yesterday, I saw two little fox cubs playing on the side of the road. I’d just finished a 7-mile hike and I was feeling good; I started off slowly, weighed down by the humid air and hot sunshine, but soon found a rhythm and was marching along with strong legs and solid steps. Lately, my hikes have been good, almost the kind of good that I felt when I was on the Camino last year.

And then I saw the fox cubs. At first I wasn’t sure what they were- whether it was one animal or two, whether it was a large cat or a dog with an orange coat, or some other animal all together. I pulled up alongside the cubs and slowed my car to a stop. One of the foxes ran off into the grass, but the other just sat there, staring at me.

“What are you doing, Little Foxy?” I asked.

He seemed to tilt his head a bit, as if he were listening.

“You’d better move off the road, it’s dangerous for you here.”

I probably would have kept talking to him but I noticed that there were a few cars lined up behind me- but they, too, were peering out the window at the small foxes.

A fox sighting is always a little thrilling to me, and seeing two fox cubs felt really special. It felt like a good omen.

I’ve gotten several good omens lately, and it makes me think of last summer, and my moments of “Camino magic”. On the Camino, good omens or moments of magic seem to happen all of the time, and by the end of my walk I truly believed that wonderful things not only happen on the Camino, but they happen a lot on the Camino.

Yellow arrow, Camino, Galicia

Losing sight of Camino magic back in the real world is a common thing. We usually don’t call it ‘magic’ here, I’m not sure what we call it. Good omens, perhaps. Luck. Coincidence. Signs from God. Or sometimes we might not call it anything at all because we don’t notice it: too much routine and task and obligation get in the way of the tiny magical moments that are still probably happening every day. Or could be happening, if we open ourselves to the possibility.

Lately I’ve wondered if my ‘good omens’ have anything to do with my approaching Camino. Knowing that another Camino is close has put me in the “Camino frame of mind”; is it possible that this slight shift in attitude is helping to bring good things to me, or helping me notice the beautiful things around me? Sometimes I think of these magic moments or good omens as signposts, indicators that I’m moving in the right direction. As if the little foxes were there to acknowledge my strong hike. “We like it out here, too,” they seemed to be saying.

Green door, yellow arrows

Several weeks ago I was hiking in the same park and stopped by a picnic area to use the bathroom. Balanced on the very top of the corner bathroom stall was a book- it caught my eye right away because I usually don’t see anyone or anything in the park bathrooms. So I picked up the book and looked at its cover: The War of Art by Steven Pressfield (the book’s subtitle is: ‘Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles). I’ve heard about this book a lot, especially in the last few years and especially as I’ve been focusing on my writing. I flipped open the book at random and saw the words ‘Resistance and Fear’, things that I’ve been thinking about a lot in this past year. After I left the bathroom and looked around the deserted picnic area, I stashed the book in my pack. Maybe the owner would come back to look for it, or maybe not. In any case, it sort of felt like that book had been placed in my path.

You might remember my last post, the one I wrote a few weeks ago about not being able to get a reservation in my favorite Parisian hostel, the MIJE. I wondered where I would stay, I wondered how a different ‘home base’ would change my experience of Paris. When I woke up the next morning and checked my email, there was a message from the MIJE. “Thank you for the kind words in your post,” they said. “When do you need to stay in Paris?”

So I’ll be staying at the MIJE this summer after all- in a shared room but if a single opens up, my name is on the waiting list. How is it possible that this even happened? It all feels a little magical; even though I know how easily information can be shared these days, it feels improbable and unlikely that anyone from the MIJE would have seen or read my post, and taken the time to write to me. I was already a huge fan of their hostels, but now they have me for life (luckily, even though they are youth hostels, there is no age limit. So the MIJE is stuck with me for years to come!).

And this, too, feels a bit like a message. Keep traveling. Get to know places. Settle in. Come back, again and again.

So I think that these are some of my yellow arrows. On the Camino the yellow arrow is a signpost, the symbol that directs you towards Santiago, and they are everywhere. At home, they are much harder to see. But suddenly I feel like they’re all around me, and it makes me want to keep my eyes open for more.

Yellow arrow and walking stick

Sleepless in Paris

There are a lot of reasons that I love Paris, and one is that I always know where I’m going to stay when I’m there (plus I love the fact that I can say ‘when I’m there’, as if I go to Paris all the time… which lately has been true. Using Paris as my arrival/departure city for the Camino has it’s perks! Mostly, it’s that I can spend a few days in Paris pre or post trip, because otherwise Paris is rather far from the starting point of most Camino routes… unless I start walking from Paris… which is possible… but I digress).

I stay in a place called Le MIJE, a network of hostels in the Marais district of Paris. The hostels are in renovated 17th century mansions, breakfast is included in the price (which runs from around 30 euros for a shared room to around 55 euros for a single), and the location is, in my mind, perfect. Two summers ago, I stayed in a single room in Hotel Maubisson, and when I opened my window and sat on the very corner of my bed, I could see the spires of Notre Dame. And then I could exit the hostel and be standing in front of Notre Dame in under 5 minutes.

I first stayed at the MIJE back in the fall of 2000, during my college year abroad. So my affection for these hostels stems from great nostalgia: that very first trip to Paris, sharing a room with 5 of my friends, nights racing through the streets of Paris to make the hostel’s 1am curfew, a spiral staircase that led up to my bed, the heavy red curtains, playing UNO late into the night, endless café crèmes and large hunks of bread for breakfast.

MIJE breakfast, Paris

It became my go-to place for future Parisian travels that year: when I was a day early to meet my family, when I spent Easter in Paris with my best friend. And, more recently, on my summer trips in Europe: after my writer’s retreat in southern France, the night before I flew back home after my Camino last year.

So naturally, I tried to book a room at the MIJE following my second Camino this summer, when I’ll have two nights in Paris before I return home. But when I tried to make a reservation, I was told that the hostels were full, that no rooms were available.

And I’m at a complete loss. It’s possible that I’ve tried to book too early, I remember something about a 30-day or 45-day or 60-day policy on making reservations, and I can also get more clarification by actually picking up the phone and making a call, rather than using an online reservation form. So I’m not ruling the MIJE out, not yet.

But it leaves me to consider what it would be like to stay in Paris in some place other than the MIJE- with its uneven stairs, squares of pink toilet paper, scratchy red blankets, lukewarm café crèmes. It’s only a hostel, and I’m sure it’s not even the best by most measures and yet… it’s special to me. It’s like this little safe haven, a small place in a large city where I feel secure and comfortable. The three hostels are located close to each other, and I know the neighborhoods around them. I know the closest metro stops, I know the closest Monoprix where I can buy groceries, I know my favorite café where I can sit outside and drink a coffee or a glass of wine and watch people walk by.

Parisian café

I think it’s also that I love that I can say this about a place in Paris, that I can say this about a place in any city, anywhere in the world. Because I don’t have this anywhere else. I’ve lived outside of Philadelphia for 11 years and except for the art museum, I’m not intimately familiar with any part of the city. There’s not a city in the world that I know as well as Paris (although I’m by no means an expert), but this familiarity relies upon being able to return to the places and streets that I can find without a map. I wonder what I will make of Paris if I need to sleep in a hotel or hostel in a different arrondissement. Will it feel like my Paris? Will it change my connection to the city? Will it encourage me to expand my knowledge of the city, to explore different corners, to form new memories and traditions?

It’s a little funny that this is what I’m focused on, as my second Camino approaches. Not the path of el Norte, not whether I have all of my gear or how heavy my pack will be, not whether I need to book a room in Irun or at the end of my walk in Santiago… but my last days in Paris. Maybe it’s because, after my Camino experience last year, I am prepared to embrace the ‘not knowing’ aspect of a Camino. I learned that I don’t actually need a guidebook, I don’t need to have any reservations, I don’t need to have my daily stages planned out. I can just walk, and figure it out as I go.

So maybe I should embrace this same attitude with my days in Paris. I’ll make a reservation somewhere, but I want to try to trust that wherever I stay is where I should be (but I’m still hoping that the MIJE comes through!!).

Courtyard of the MIJE

Camino #2 Updates: New Shoes and Making Plans

The other day, my mom asked me how this year’s Camino training and prep are going. “It’s probably no big deal this time, right?”

I had to agree. Camino Prep, Round Two- so far- is relaxed and fun. Thinking back to a year ago, I remember the anxiety I felt with two months to go: all of the things that I still needed to buy (at that point, I didn’t have my pack or the right pair of shoes), all of the walking I still needed to do, all of the details I needed to figure out.

This year looks very different (although check back at the beginning of June and I will probably be running around frantically, picking up items, cramming in last minute hikes). But for now, I’m calm. Except for a few new clothing items, I’m just going to re-use everything I took on my Camino last year. I have my flight and my train ticket (more on that later), I have several word documents storing notes on the Norte/Primitivo, and I already have a couple of good training hikes under my belt. I’m even (slowly) learning a bit of Spanish.

Someone once said (I can’t remember who or where… whether in a book, on a blog, in a comment on my blog), that preparing for a Camino is part of the Camino experience, and that in some ways, they wished they could go back to the time before their first Camino. Everything was unknown and thrilling. There was so much to figure out, but so much joy in the process.

And I think I can understand that. Last year’s training and prep really were part of my Camino, and in some ways it consumed my winter and spring. While I was certainly stressed over finding the right pair of shoes and worried about how physically prepared I was for the walk, I also loved those months of throwing myself into the ‘prep’. I loved how much I was learning about what it would take to walk 500-miles; I could feel myself growing and expanding even before I set foot on the trail.

So this year is different, but that’s also okay- actually, in some ways, it’s a relief. Last week I walked into REI and left 15 minutes later with a new pair of shoes: the exact same pair that I walked my Camino in last year. I loved my Keen hiking shoes, and after wearing them for hundreds and hundreds of miles, they felt like they were perfectly molded to my feet. But with holes and broken shoelaces and very worn tread, I was ready for a new pair.  These new shoes are stiff and clean and feel a little foreign on my feet, but after a few hikes are already starting to break in.  What a relief to not have to go through the same process as last year! Lets just hope that Keen makes this exact pair of shoes forever.

Camino shoes

New shoes, old shoes

I think I’m also very relaxed about the ‘how’ of walking this next Camino. Last year I wanted to have the pilgrimage experience, and make it to Santiago. I was so focused on the goal. This year? I want to just go in with an open mind and do this walk however I want. If I find a charming sea-side village and want to stop for a few days and relax and write, then that’s what I’ll do. If I never make it to Santiago, I think that will be okay. Mostly, I just want to spend my days walking and meeting people and eating good food and seeing a new part of Spain.

Speaking of this walk, I realize that I should probably explain my plans. I last left off with a big question mark, not sure if I should walk another month-long Camino (the Norte), or if I should do 11-days on the Primitivo and then hop over to France for a few weeks at a writer’s retreat. Well, the Norte won. It was probably always the answer, but I didn’t fully realize it until I was in the process of buying a train ticket (a cheap one!) down to Hendaye (a town in the southwest of France that is steps away from the starting point of the Norte). Just before I purchased the ticket, I thought to myself, “Oh! I guess I’m going to walk the Norte.”

And that’s the plan, for now: spend a month walking the Norte (and maybe branching off onto the Primitivo) for my second Camino. I don’t have a lot of time- only 31 days of walking- but if I’m feeling as strong and as motivated to walk as I was last year, getting to Santiago should be no problem. But maybe I’ll never make it to Santiago: maybe I’ll walk short days and take advantage of being along the ocean. Maybe I really will hunker down and do mini writer’s retreats along the way. Maybe I’ll make some friends and decide to walk with them. Maybe I’ll speed walk and arrive in Santiago ahead of schedule and have time to walk to Finisterre/Muxia (very unlikely, but you never know).

What I like about this year’s Camino is the flexibility I’m allowing myself. I’ve already done this once, and I know what it means to have a goal and walk 500-miles to get there. Now, I think my only goal is to fully embrace the experience of the Camino, and I’m excited to see what’s in store for me this time.

Photo of the Week #6: Steak-frites!

Today finds me in a warm Panera Bread cafe, on a cold day in western Virginia. I’m here for a mini spring-break trip to visit my best friend, and last year around this time I was treated to sunny skies and 60-70 degree days. Just now, at 11am, it is 25 degrees. I’m not amused. No one is.

Last Saturday, however, was pretty beautiful. I was in DC visiting another friend, and at one point we sat on a bench with a view of the Capitol to our left, the Washington Monument to our right, and the warm sun on our faces. My photo(s) this week come from that trip- a weekend of good food, good coffee, good wine and good bread. And some art.

steak frites, le diplomate, washington dc

Steak-frites at Le Diplomate, a French restaurant in DC. As I took my first bite, I realized that this is a meal I’ve never actually had in France, and I promised myself that I would change that this summer, during the day I have in Paris at the end of my trip.

Union Market, Washington DC

A “gourmet” food hall with a stall selling some of the best bread I’ve had outside of France (there seemed to be an unintentional French theme to the weekend…)

The Beginning of a Season: Snow and Water Ice and Answering the Big Questions

Something I’ve always loved to do is to use a point in time- New Year’s, my birthday, the beginning of a season- and think back to the previous year and where I was/what I was doing. I’m not alone in this, it’s a natural way to mark our progression (or regression??) through life.

Today is the first day of spring, and I am staring out my kitchen window to at least 5 inches of snow piled on top of the bushes, on the trees, covering the ground. It snowed all day long. Sometimes light flurries, sometimes heavy, large flakes. But once again, everything is white, and still, and quiet.

spring snow

This landscape is at odds with the season, it’s at odds with how I feel. I want the world to feel bright and alive, not silenced and soft. I want to feel some sunshine on my face and see a scattering of purple wildflowers on my neighbor’s lawn. I want the lengthening days to encourage me to be out and to be doing more; but instead, today, the snow forces me home, and inside.

I feel confident in saying that this is the last snow, for awhile. And spring is here. But it looks a lot different than last year.  A year ago, I’d returned from a 5-ish mile hike through my state park and stood in a long line snaking around the block, waiting for a free cup of water ice. I stood in between families and groups of teenagers, I was dressed in hiking pants and an old pair of sneakers. I knew I would be walking the Camino and these were early training days: wearing shoes that gave me blisters and feeling my muscles ache after walking 5 miles through wooded trails. But it was satisfying: a long hike. A free cup of water ice. Spring.

Free water ice from Rita's!

The winter before had been a hard one for me, and it was a victory just to make it to that first day of spring. It was a victory to have decided to walk the Camino, a victory to push myself to go on long hikes after work. That first day of spring felt so full of promise and warmth and light, and I suppose that it was a good indicator of things to come.

This year? Maybe I don’t need the sunshine-y symbolism of the past. This year’s winter went by faster than any winter I can remember; there was cold, ice, snow, rain, and lots of gray… but there was something else. I’m struggling to put my finger on how exactly to describe it, I don’t know if I can. There’s been hope, and promise, and excitement for the future. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I haven’t had days of doubt and frustration. There have been times when I’m a bit down, even a little sad. Confused about how to go out and get the kind of life that I want for myself. But there’s also been this thrill, this… wonder. And it’s sort of underneath everything else, and it doesn’t feel like it’s going anywhere.

The Camino opened up some things for me. It’s taken me a long time to really feel its influence, but it happened sometime during the winter. I settled into the short, dark days, and let myself think about my life and my future, and then I just started moving. I started writing, but it’s been different than my dozens of other attempts: this time, it feels sort of permanent. I have a different kind of confidence about it, despite the days that I struggle. Because honestly, most days I sit at my computer and I want to bang my head on the table. Sometimes my eyes fill with tears of frustration because the things I am writing are just so, so bad. Some days I don’t write at all, and just watch Netflix. In the past though, these frustrations would have made me stop, they would have made me think that the elements of my life weren’t just right, that I needed to do x, y and z before I could actually start to write.

Now, I just recognize that this is part of the process. This is what it takes to write. I’ve said this before: it’s a lesson I learned on the Camino. It was the Camino: needing to start slowly, start with a single step, in order to get to the end of something very monumental. What I didn’t realize 6 months ago, however, was that the Camino gave me confidence: confidence that I can undertake something very big and scary, confidence that I can find my way through it.

I still have a million questions about my life and my direction. Will I be able to write a book? Will I be able to spend at least a year or two supporting myself from my writing? Will I be able to travel in the ways that I want to: back to Europe but also to Africa, to Turkey, to China and across the US? When will I focus on dating and trying to meet someone? Will I have a family? How can I set up my life so that I can have all of these things? Is it possible?

These are big questions, questions that I know can’t be answered all at once. So instead, I focus on today: Today, everything is great. I spent my work day talking and laughing with teenagers. I went to IKEA and had a $1.00 frozen yogurt. The snow is slowly falling outside my window. I have several writing projects on the desktop of my computer. I have a list of Spanish phrases to practice before I go to bed. Yesterday I walked through a park. Tomorrow I will drive to DC to spend the weekend with a friend.

Spring is here and I’m excited for the next three months. I don’t know if this season will answer any of the larger questions of my life, but I don’t think it needs to, not yet. Because what I’m doing is laying the groundwork for my future: the writing and the walking and spending time with people who make me happy. And for now, that’s all that I need to be doing.

Because in three months, my life will look a little different (in three months, I’ll be on a Camino!), and three months after that, maybe my life will look even more different. And on, and on, until each small step adds up to something monumental. Until they add up to the answer to all of the big questions of my life.

Sign, St Jean Pied de Port, Camino

“The impossible remains to be done.” I saw this sign within the first few minutes of walking out of St Jean Pied de Port on the Camino.

Returning to Paris, Returning to the Camino; (‘You Can’t Go Home Again’)

Have you ever gone back to a place that you loved and found that it had changed? Or that your experience of it was very different?

Two years ago I was planning my first return to France in over 10 years, and I was nervous about seeing Paris again. Paris had defined travel when I was in my early 20’s; it was the place I’d always wanted to go to, and the place I traveled to the most during my year abroad in college. I’d imagined that it was a beautiful, magical place, and my actual experience of it didn’t let me down: Paris did feel magical. Being there made me feel alive and so full of hope and possibility.

I was young, and I hadn’t traveled overseas before. I learned- in small doses- how to be brave in Paris, and it was something I didn’t even really think about because I was desperate to see as much of the city as I could. So I would set my alarm for 6am and wake up before the other students in my program. I’d wander through the streets with my camera in hand, then return to the hostel and join my friends for breakfast. I learned how to ride the metro, I learned how to find my way around cemeteries and museums, I learned how to drink coffee.

When I returned to Paris, on the eve of my 33rd birthday, the city felt different. The buildings still seemed to glow, Notre Dame was just as majestic as I’d always remembered, but something was off.

I still wandered through the streets, taking photos and drinking cafe cremes. Weaving through the tombstones of Pere Lachaise, I tracked down Oscar Wilde and Jim Morrison. I slept in the same hostel that I had when I was 20, I ate the same baguette breakfast. Climbing up the 400-odd stairs to the top of Notre Dame, I put my face up to the wire fence and looked out over the city.

This was still Paris: beautiful and enchanting and foreign.

The changes that I noticed? It wasn’t Paris that had changed, not really.

It was me.

Drinking my first cafe creme was probably the biggest tip-off. It’s difficult to explain how important cafe cremes were to my year in France, when I was a college student: I’d never really drank coffee regularly before, and I’d never made  ‘sitting in a cafe and watching people and spending hours talking about life with my friends’ an everyday thing. As I moved through my twenties and looked back on my time in France, the cafe creme became symbolic. It was France, and it was travel, and it was me, at that time.

So when I returned to Paris and sat in the basement room of my hostel with my red breakfast tray spread out before me, a cup of creamy, hot coffee in my hands, I smiled before taking my first sip.

I took the first sip, and then I frowned. This was what I had been waiting for, all of these years? This was a cafe creme?

From 20 to 33, I’d changed. It wasn’t just about the coffee, although that was part of it. Back when I was 20, I didn’t know what a really good cup of coffee tasted like. And I suppose I didn’t know what the world tasted like, yet. I still haven’t traveled all that much, and there’s still so much more life I need to experience. But I’d grown in 13 years. I still have a somewhat childlike sense of wonder and innocence, but it’s very different than what I had at 20, when it defined so much of my life and how I saw the world.

Recognizing these changes, as I wandered through Paris, was a little unsettling. I walked through the city and wondered what I was looking for. I knew I wouldn’t be able to find the 20-year old girl who had been here that first time.

As the days passed I realized that these changes were okay. On my 33rd birthday I walked into a cafe that I’d remembered being in with my friends on that first trip to Paris. On that night, years ago, we’d crammed around a table on the terrace of the cafe, drinking hot chocolate and giggling about life.

On this night, I walked into the cafe and I asked for a table. I was seated outside, with a view of the Seine and the spires of Notre Dame. After ordering a glass of wine, the waiter complimented my French. I’d made several mistakes- fumbling over the word ‘boisson’ (which means ‘drink’)- and we laughed. I wasn’t self-conscious in the way that I used to be; my French was more rusty than ever, and yet, I was more confident about speaking than when I was 20.

I’m thinking about changes and how we experience the same place in different ways because of my upcoming Camino. I’m nervous about returning for a 2nd time, even though only a year separates my two pilgrimages, whereas over 10 years separated my visits to Paris. I haven’t changed all that much in the past year, and yet, I know that my second Camino will be very different from my first. Will my return to the Camino be like my return to Paris?

Will I be more confident? Will I relax a bit about my fears? Will I use the knowledge that I gained on my first trip and hit the ground running on my second? Will I be able to work on the lessons that I feel I was just beginning to learn as I ended my first pilgrimage?

Will I still love the walking? Will I still avoid blisters and still make some friends? Will I still love the cafe con leches??

I’d love to hear about your experiences of a place or an experience that you returned to- whether it was the Camino or something (somewhere) else. Were you disappointed? Did the return exceed your expectations? Will you continue to return again and again?

Paris at 20

Paris at 20

Paris at 33

Paris at 33

 

Inspiration

 

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”

-Lao Tzu

 

 

“… For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”

-Wendell Berry, The Peace of Wild Things

Camino Packing List

Nadine and backpack on beach, Camino del Norte

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