hiking Archives - Page 10 of 12

Camino #2 Updates: New Shoes and Making Plans

April 2, 2015

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.

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 #5: Snow Walks and Green Bagels

March 22, 2015

Another photo of the week! This goes back to last Sunday (so… I guess that was the start of my ‘photo of the week’ week? I’m not really sure how I’m measuring these weeks, but I suppose it doesn’t matter too much).

I joined the Philadelphia Chapter of APOC (American Pilgrims on the Camino); I’ll write more about this in a future post, but for now I wanted to share a photo from the hike I joined them on last Sunday. It was the longest day of walking I’ve done since the Camino- 14 miles in about 6 hours, with a few stops and breaks in between. The first few miles were the most difficult, and required us to navigate through snow and over ice; not my ideal walking/hiking conditions…

And, for a bonus photo… the best way I can think of to celebrate St Patrick’s Day (how did you celebrate?):

Green bagel!

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

March 20, 2015

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.

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.

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.

“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.

Best and worst meals of the Camino (and other thoughts on pilgrimage food)

March 16, 2015

A return to the Camino means a return to the food of the Camino, and it should be no surprise to any of you that I sometimes dream about daily café con leches. In fact, I dream about a lot of the food I ate along the way.

But this wasn’t always the case. By the end of my walk on the Camino Frances, I was getting tired of the food. It happened all at once; one day, I was marveling at how I would never tire of tortilla or tuna or pilgrim’s menus with their slabs of meat, french fries and ensalada mixta (usually a very, very basic salad). By then suddenly, a few days from Santiago, I lost my appetite. Don’t get me wrong, I was hungry, but nothing seemed appealing. Maybe it was having eaten the same food for 30 days, or maybe it was being so close to the end of my pilgrimage (in those last days my body hurt and my mood was a bit off and I didn’t want to eat the foods I had been loving for weeks. My sub-conscious telling me that I didn’t want my journey to end? Or that I was ready to end? I’m still not sure).

In any case- now- I’m craving those Camino foods again. I was on a long walk yesterday, and while it would be nice to always be thinking deep thoughts when I walk, or maybe puzzling through some piece of writing that I’m working on, the truth is that I’m often thinking about food. And yesterday I was thinking about Camino food, and all of the things I’m looking forward to having again when I return to Spain.

This isn’t going to be a comprehensive post about the food of the Camino or all of the unique and wonderful things you can find in the north of Spain (although it will be picture heavy… wow, did I take a lot of photos of my food!). I certainly got to eat some incredible food while on my pilgrimage, but there was a lot I missed, as well. I’ve always been satisfied with simple food, so for the majority of my Camino, I was happy with coffee, bread, wine and a pilgrim’s menu. Sometimes I read blogs about what other people eat on their Caminos and I wonder: were we walking the same path? Where in the world did they find that incredible meal?

Here’s a run-down on my Camino eating routines: I’d wake up early and try to be walking around 6:30am. If possible, I would have a café con leche before I started walking, if I could find an open bar in the town I’d stayed in the night before. If that wasn’t possible, I would stop at the first open bar that I would come across, sometimes 30 minutes away, sometimes a few hours away (those mornings were tough). After walking for an hour or two, I would always eat something at that first stop: either tortilla (egg omelet with potato), a croissant, or toast. I’d walk for another few hours, and then sometimes stop for a second breakfast: sometimes just another café con leche, sometimes another tortilla or croissant or toast if the walk was strenuous or if I was hungry.

If I didn’t have a ‘second breakfast’, I might opt for a pre-lunch ice cream break, on the really hot days.

Lunch was nearly always a combination of food that I had stowed away in my pack. I know that some pilgrims stopped at a bar or restaurant for a sit down meal and a menu del dia (menu of the day, which is a great alternative to the pilgrim’s menu and usually offers a better selection of food). But I didn’t like taking really long breaks and preferred to have a sit-down meal in the evening instead. So I would cobble a meal together with whatever I could find in tiendas (shops) along the way: bread, cheese, ham, peaches, cherries, tuna, tomatoes, crackers/cookies. There was really nothing better than ripping off a crusty piece of bread and dipping it into a can of tuna drenched in olive oil, then biting into a juicy tomato and nibbling on a chunk of cheese. Basic stuff, but so, so good.

In the late afternoons, I settled into a nice routine of finding a place to have a drink and/or some tapas. At first I would go with a glass of red wine, but somewhere along the way another pilgrim recommended a drink called ‘tinto de verano’, basically a summer red wine. It’s popular in Spain and like sangria, but simplified: one part red wine, one part carbonated lemonade (and usually served over ice). The perfect refreshment after a long day’s walk (for this non-beer drinker, anyway).

And dinners were often a pilgrim’s menu (three courses, my choices were usually a salad, some kind of meat/fish with french fries, and ice cream, if available… along with bread and wine), or I would cook with friends if our albergue had a kitchen. The nights of cooking were wonderful and economical, and more often than not we would throw together a big salad with all the vegetables we could find (fresh veggies can be hard to come by on the Camino, at times).

There were highlights along the way, of course. Churros y chocolate at the Cafe Iruna in Pamplona. The wine in Rioja. A local man directed my friend Mirra and I to an amazing restaurant in Burgos, where we split a menu del dia and couldn’t stop raving about the quality of the food. The best plate of grilled veggies I’ve ever had at the O Mirador in Portomarin. A dish of pulpo (octopus) in Galicia.

But hands down, the best meal of my Camino was, in some ways, the most basic. It was before I’d really tasted anything, it was at the very beginning. On my first day of walking through the Pyrenees, I went off the route and found an isolated little spot over a crest and tucked away from other pilgrims. I had bought a jambon-buerre (ham/butter) sandwich at the albergue in Orisson (so technically, this was a French meal, and eaten just before I crossed the border into Spain). And really it wasn’t about the food, it’s about what that meal represented: the first day of a big journey. Sitting, alone and free, somewhere in the Pyrenees mountains. Sunshine, a cool breeze, feeling excited at the start of a big adventure.

By contrast, the worst meal was at the very end of my Camino, 17km away from Santiago. I’d walked a longer than expected day, not ending until after 5pm (which was a very late day for me). I ordered a plate of pasta in the only bar in the “village” where I was staying, and I could barely eat it. The pasta was swimming among bits of unidentifiable meat in an oily “sauce”. Dinner ended up being sleeves of Oreos and a few glasses of wine. Here is the very unflattering photo of that meal, and my disappointment.

Are there any standout meals from your travels that you can share? Any disappointments? Is there something (like a café con leche) that you dream about having again?

Camino de Santiago: Round Two

March 2, 2015

On Friday morning I was stretched out in my bed, my computer on my lap, a giant mug of coffee in my hands. I had about 5 minutes before I needed to start getting ready for work, and almost a bit mindlessly I clicked over to Kayak’s site to check on prices for flights to France/Spain.

I’ve been checking flights every day for almost a month, and the only changes I’d noticed were that certain flights were filled, and others had increased their price.

So when the Kayak page was fully loaded, I blinked in confusion at my computer screen, and triple checked my flight criteria. Were my cities correct, did I have the right dates?

Because overnight, not only had prices dropped by over $200, but I was looking at a direct flight, from Philadelphia to Paris. For as much fun as my long layovers in Iceland and Denmark had been… they added time and expense and a bit of stress. A direct flight is a dream.

In fact, the whole thing seemed like a dream. Could this price be right? I decided that I couldn’t risk waiting- not another second- to miss out on this deal. So I flew around my apartment: grabbing my wallet and throwing on work clothes and signing up for rewards programs and, finally, clicking “Purchase” on a flight to Europe.

So it’s done. I’m going back. Camino de Santiago, Round Two.

The specifics are completely up in the air. For the past few months I’ve been dreaming about the Norte- the path that runs along the very top of Spain and often offers dazzling views of the ocean- but suddenly I’m changing my mind. Or, considering my options.

Ever since starting this writing class and slowly making tiny steps of progress towards my goal of writing a book, I worry about the momentum I might lose if I take 5-weeks off this summer to walk another Camino. And I remember my three-weeks at the writer’s retreat in the south of France: the incredible view from the window of my room, the quiet mornings drinking coffee on the terrace, the inspiring conversations with other artists and residents, the hours spent hiking through the mountains. I had time to write, time to hike, and time to connect with other people.

And then I think about the Camino, and the incredible freedom I felt each morning as I set off with my pack and onto a path that took me closer to the edge of Spain. How happy I was to simply walk, every single day. I’d bonded with some of the other residents at my writer’s retreat, but I BONDED with people on the Camino. I remember how I felt when I arrived in Santiago; that I wanted to keep walking, that I felt like, in some ways, I’d only just begun.

So how do I choose? How do I know which option is best, when each feels so right and so perfect?

Well, what if I could do both?

That’s where my head is, at the moment. I just spent hours reading about the Camino Primitivo, a route which could fit very nicely into the 11-day time frame I’d have before needing to head to France and over to the writer’s retreat. I’ve read that 12 days would be better on the Primitivo, but that 11 could work. And I would have exactly 11 days.

The Camino Primitivo– the Original Way- was actually the very first Camino route to Santiago. It’s challenging, with lots of mountain walking, but judging from the descriptions and photos I saw from the hours of “research” I did yesterday afternoon, the scenery is stunning.

There’s still so much I don’t know. I haven’t given up on walking the Norte, not at all. So much of me wants to do another long Camino- 11 days doesn’t feel like quite enough, not when I know I have the time to do more. And, I don’t know if I could do another writer’s retreat, even if I wanted to: if they still have space, if my availability will work with their schedule.

But regardless of what I decide, here is what I do know: in June, I’ll be flying to Paris. Part of my time in Europe will involve walking another Camino. There’s already a spring in my step just thinking about it.

Any thoughts from those of you who have walked the Primitivo?

I’m holding up two fingers to indicate my second baguette in Paris; but for now, we can pretend that I’m referring to my second Camino

Learning how to be a hiker

February 23, 2015

I don’t consider myself a hiker. A long distance walker, yes, but hiking is something different. To me, hiking involves mountains, rugged terrain, shaded trails, sturdy boots (though I’ve never owned a pair).

I consider myself a beginner when it comes to hiking, and things like difficult trails and scrambling up or down rocks makes me nervous. And yet, I also love hiking. In the past few years, I’ve accepted every opportunity to go on a hike that I could, and I’ve pushed myself to do a few hikes that were out of my comfort zone.

When I first started thinking about this post, I wondered, “Do I have enough to say about the hikes I’ve been on?” As I scrolled through my photos from the last couple of years, I realized that I’ve done more hiking than I realized. I’m still going to call myself a beginner, but maybe I have a little more experience under my belt than I let on.

I started to become more confident about hiking two years ago, when I was dating a boyfriend who lived in Vermont. He was a hiker, but more than that: he lived in Vermont. I loved exploring the state and driving around to find trails to climb. I didn’t do any really big climbs, mostly just sticking to 3-6 mile trails with some descent scenic views. My favorite was probably Snake Mountain, a moderate hike through a heavy forest that opened up onto panoramic views of the Champlain Valley and distant Adirondack Mountains.

Then I went to the south of France, to a writer’s retreat in a small village called Labastide Esparbairenque. The village is nestled in the Montagne Noir (Black Mountains), and every day I would fill a backpack with water, cheese, chocolate and an apple, grab my camera and go on a hike. There were several trails that ran out of the village and onto mountain paths, and I spent the three weeks at the retreat exploring every day. (A fun side note: this is when I first decided that I would walk the Camino. It was just a vague idea at this point and something I didn’t think I would do for years, but when I realized how much I loved walking through the mountains and stumbling across tiny French villages, I had a suspicion that I would love the Camino).

After France I hiked a little more in Vermont, and then started checking out trails in Virginia, after my best friend moved down there. I still don’t know it well but I’ve fallen in love with Shenandoah National Park, and I’ve been able to hike small portions of the Appalachian Trail. My favorite hike in Virginia, so far, was the hike up to McAfee’s Knob- one of the most photographed sites on the Appalachian Trail. The hike was about 8-miles round trip from where I parked, and I picked a clear day, so the views were stunning.

And then I went on the Camino. While the Camino is more of a long walk than a hike, some sections were definitely a bit rougher than others- one day in particular. Along with 5 of my friends, I chose to do an alternate route called ‘Dragonte’, which had us going up and down three mountains. The day alternated between moments of strong sunshine and swirling dark clouds, and we got rained on, quite a bit. It was tough. And a lot of fun. If I hadn’t just spent the previous 3 weeks walking 300 hundred miles, I’m sure it would have been a lot more challenging. As it was, it gave me the confidence that, one day, I might actually be able to consider myself a hiker.

Finally, there were the calanques in France. These might eventually get a post of their own, but for now, here was the experience in a nutshell: my friend and I decided to explore these narrow inlets bordered by steep limestone cliffs while we were traveling around the Cote d’Azur and Provence. I was fresh off of the Camino and feeling pretty satisfied with myself- maybe even a bit cocky. We hiked to the first two calanques without a problem, but the third one was no picnic. After a strenuous climb that seemed to go on forever, we looked down a vertical rock wall to an incredibly steep descent. My friend turned back to find the beach we’d passed an hour before (which I think could be called the smartest decision of the trip), but I decided to brave the descent. The clincher was when a skinny French girl wearing a bikini and strappy sandals flounced by. I was wearing hiking shoes AND had just walked 500-miles across Spain. If she could do it, so could I.

Well, I don’t know how she did it. Because after sliding and swinging my way down the rocks, resting at the beach for 30-minutes, and then using every ounce of strength I had to pull me back up the rock wall, I was done. I was more physically exhausted than any single day on the Camino, and my sore legs had me hobbling around Provence for days afterwards.

I still have a lot to experience when it comes to hiking. But the hiking I have done- in Vermont and Virginia, in France and in Spain- it’s ignited something in me. Several people have asked if (and when) I’ll be hiking the entire Appalachian Trail, and I always laugh and say, “Probably never.” And while that’s true, for now, I wouldn’t be surprised if I begin to do some increasingly challenging hikes over the next few years. I know, almost for a fact, that I’ll never be climbing Everest… but wouldn’t Kilimanjaro be pretty amazing?

Photo of the Week #1: Snowy walk

February 20, 2015

I’ve been toying with the idea of doing a ‘Photo of the Week’ on this blog, and today I’m giving it a whirl. I’ve always been interested in 365 projects: doing something every single day for a year. There was an ill-fated attempt at my own 365 photo project, and I think I only lasted three days. A photo a week might be more my speed, and will encourage me to remember to pick up my camera (or, as is increasingly the case, my iPhone) and snap a few pictures.

This week’s photo comes from one of the trails that runs through the woods behind my apartment. We finally got a little snow this week, and despite the temperatures being below freezing, I bundled up and went out for a walk. Tramping through the snow I passed kids with sleds, and an elderly neighbor on his cross-country skis. The air was brisk, the sky was a robin’s egg blue, and it felt good to move my legs after days of being cooped up inside.

A few weeks ago I found a blog called A Winter Camino and saw some incredible photos of the Camino Francés covered in snow. You won’t be finding me doing a winter Camino any time soon (or, ever), but there is so much beauty in walking through freshly fallen snow.

So here’s my favorite photo from my winter-y walk. Has anyone else ever tried a photo project? Or done something every single day for a year? Anyone else out walking in the snow these days?

I Found Myself in Paradise: Hiking and Relaxing on the Islas Cies

February 8, 2015

This post is taking us back to late July 2014, in the days after I finished my Camino and arrived in Santiago. I spent several days exploring Galicia before continuing on to Finisterre; the first post about my time in A Coruna is here, and read on to hear about how I found myself on a beautiful island.

It was when I was still on the Camino that I first heard about the Islas Cies, an archipelago off the coast of Vigo in Galicia. I’d been asking Ibai if he had any recommendations for me during my gap of time between arriving in Santiago and leaving for Finisterre. I’d been thinking about dipping down to Portugal but paused when Ibai started talking about these islands. “It is the most beautiful place, you won’t find a more beautiful beach in Spain.” The thought of hanging out on an island and resting my weary feet was very, very appealing.

So weeks later, after I’d explored the northwestern city of A Coruna, I took a train down to Vigo. When I arrived in the city my first stop was the tourism office, and the woman working behind the desk said, “If you hurry, you can catch the next ferry to the islands.” I bought a ticket and with maps and brochures in my hand I went running to dock, and before I knew it was on a large ferry heading off for the Islas Cies.

There are technically three islands in this archipelago: the south island- San Martino, the north island- Monteagudo, and the middle island-do Faro, which is linked to Monteagudo by a stretch of sand known as Rodas beach (which, in 2007, was named as the world’s most beautiful beach by The Guardian).

I was headed for the small dock at Monteagudo, and after the 45-minute ferry ride I disembarked with crowds of Galician families toting small children and giant coolers and umbrellas. It was a beautiful day and Rodas beach was already packed with sunbathers. I headed off to the right, and after consulting a large map at the information booth, picked a trail that headed up to a lookout. These two islands have four walking trails, and being fresh off of the Camino, I wasn’t too interested in spending my entire day being still.

These islands were given a National Park status in 2002, which has helped preserve the landscape and ecosystem by restricting the affects of human activity on the land. And thank goodness. After hiking for ten minutes, I was far removed from the crowds at the beach and I felt like I had the island to myself. When I arrived at my first destination- Alto do Principe- I shared the lookout with several other groups, but it was in no way crowded. I stood at the top of a flat rock and looked out over the island and couldn’t believe that I was in a place like this. Only a month before I had been crossing the mountains from France into Spain, and after walking myself across the country, I was standing on this beautiful island. It was incredible.

From this first trail I connected to another, and walked across the north island until I couldn’t walk any further. I’m not sure about exact distances, but I think I walked about 3 miles between the first trail and this second one (so it would be about 6 miles, round-trip, from the information booth). This trail was even more isolated than the first; just me and the seagulls.

As I’d been hiking I had noticed several little inlets, and on my way back towards the dock I decided to explore a bit. What I found felt like paradise: a tiny beach that I had all to myself. I kicked off my shoes and wished that that I was better prepared for a beach day. I rummaged through my Camino pack and pulled out my sleeping bag, which I stretched out over the sand. I propped my head against my pack and my Icelandair pillow (I finally got to use it!!) and stared out to the water.

I think I could have spent days exploring these islands and lounging on the beach. There is a camping option and if I ever return to this area I would definitely reserve a campsite and spend the night sleeping by the ocean (there are sites were you can pitch your own tent, or, for an extra fee, you can rent one of the tents already on the site). There’s a restaurant near the campsite, along with restrooms and showers, but other than these buildings and a small snack shop near the dock, the island is unspoiled.

My day on the Islas Cies was one of those magical travel moments: when nothing was planned but everything worked out better than I ever could have imagined. It was just what I needed after my pilgrimage on the Camino: a day of peace and quiet in a beautiful setting, with a little walking and a little relaxing. After this day, I felt ready to return to Santiago and begin my walk to Finisterre.

Should I Walk Another Camino?

February 5, 2015

Prices are already increasing on flights to Europe this summer, and from what I can gather, they’re not going to get any lower. It’s only the beginning of February, and while it seems like I should have plenty of time to make a decision about what I want to do this summer, if the answer is “walk another Camino” then I think I’d better decide soon.

The biggest question that I’m asking myself is this: Do I want to spend a month doing something very similar to what I just did last year?

As an American, I’m very lucky to have two months of vacation time every summer. Right now, I don’t have to make big sacrifices in order to travel to Spain and walk for a month: I have the time, I don’t have to quit my job or leave a husband and kids, and with most of my gear already purchased, this is a fairly affordable trip (if you consider what it would typically cost to spend a month in Europe).

But by the same token, I look at this chunk of time and think: I have two months (well, actually just a month, since there’s a July wedding back in the states that I don’t want to miss), and I might not always have this same freedom and flexibility. Is there anywhere else I’d like to go? Is there anything else I’d like to do?

The answer, of course, is yes. There are so many new things I’d like to try and new places I’d like to travel to, but maybe the real question is this: Is there anything else I’d rather do right now than walk another Camino?

And I’m struggling to come up with anything else. There are lots of factors, of course. There are places I could travel to and experiences I could have, but they’d require me to go alone, and to be alone for most of the trip. I don’t mind solo-traveling- and in fact, there are lots of things about it that I love- but I worry that long-term solo-traveling would be hard for me. The writer’s retreat in France was perfect, and so was the Camino: I had lots of time alone, AND the chance to interact with the same people for weeks at a time.

But honestly, I just want to walk another Camino. I felt this as I arrived in Santiago- I want to keep walking. I’ve felt it in the months since I’ve been home, and when I think about this summer, nothing that I can come up with is as enticing as another long walk.

There are fears and worries. Is it too soon to walk another Camino? In many ways, I’m still processing my trip from last summer, and I worry that rushing off to do another walk is going to blur the lines between the first experience and a new one.

I had such an amazing time on the Camino Frances and I know that the next walk is going to be different. I worry that I will compare the two, that I will always be chasing that first experience and that I am going to be disappointed. While the Camino del Norte is gaining in popularity, the numbers of pilgrims who walk this route is significantly fewer than the Frances. Of the pilgrims who received a compostela in Santiago in 2014, 68% walked the Frances and about 6% walked the Norte. I’ll still be able to meet other people, but it is going to be a very, very different atmosphere than what I knew last year.

I have these visions of myself on the Norte: waking up early and stopping whenever I want for a café con leche, arriving at my albergue in the early afternoon and then lounging on a beach for a few hours. Meeting up with friends at night for tapas and wine. Honestly, is there a better way to spend a month than this??

But the reality is going to be different. The Camino Frances wasn’t exactly a walk in the park, and the Camino del Norte is definitely not going to be a walk in the park. This is going to be a much more physically challenging route, and I should probably kiss goodbye my multiple café con leche stops, as the route is more isolated and doesn’t pass through as many towns and villages (although past pilgrims, please correct me if I’m wrong!). My walking days will probably be longer because of the challenge of the walk, and there may be many days when I will be forced to keep walking in order to find a town with an albergue.

Having not studied the route very closely, I have no idea how often I’ll actually be close to a beach. And even though I should have learned by now that I can make friends and that a Camino is one of the easier places to do it, I still worry that without as many pilgrims, I’ll spend a lot more time alone.

All of this being said, I still feel the call of doing another Camino. It’s not out of my system, and if anything, it’s only just gotten into my system. I love the idea of attempting something even more physically challenging, and I love the idea of entire days of walking where I don’t encounter very many people. Those were my favorite days on the Camino Frances, after all. I love the idea of trying to learn a little Spanish before I go, I love the thought of getting to see even more of Spain, I love the idea of being by the mountains and the ocean, and maybe I won’t get to drink as many café con leches, but I love the idea that they can once again be part of my daily routine.

And finally, here’s the thing: I’ve already done a pilgrimage. Maybe the Norte will be another one (and certainly in some ways it will be), but I don’t necessarily need to have the same kind of experience that I did last year. On that first Camino, I knew that I wanted to be on a pilgrimage. I wanted to walk the entire thing, I wanted to always stay in albergues, I wanted to stop in churches, I wanted Santiago to be my destination.

This time? I just want to walk again. I want to be open to whatever kind of experience the Camino will give me, and maybe it will just be a long, quiet walk. Maybe I will make some really strong connections again. Maybe I’ll find that it’s even more of a pilgrimage for me than the Frances was. Maybe I’ll finish and immediately want to do another Camino. Maybe I’ll finish and know that I’m done walking.

If you’ve read this far, thanks for bearing with me as I get all of these thoughts onto the page. And feel free to chime in with your opinion: Should I walk another Camino? If you were in my shoes (speaking of shoes, I’ll need to buy a new pair), would you do another long walk? Or would you decide that it’s time for a different kind of experience?

Still Walking

December 5, 2014

This afternoon I found myself walking (hiking?) down an empty, paved road through a wooded park. It was 4pm and the day was turning dusky, light rain drops were falling and I could see my breathe. I walked quickly, my pack a comfortable weight against the small of my back, the hood of my raincoat pulled across the top of my head so I could stay dry.

I took a few walks in the cold, a few walks in the rain, in my pre-Camino training days. Back then, it felt like every walk mattered (and maybe each one did; only a couple tiny blisters and minimal physical pain on my walk across Spain), but why am I walking in the cold, wet weather now? The answer you might want to hear is that I’m training for another Camino, but that’s not it (although, I reason that if I never really stop walking with my pack, then I’ll never fall entirely out of “Camino shape”).

I’m walking because it’s still the thing I want to do most. I don’t think a day has gone by since I returned from the Camino that I haven’t wanted to be outside, walking.

It takes coordination and effort to walk, these days. Here’s a photo of my kitchen this morning, of all of the bags I needed to take out the door with me:

Five bags full of stuff for one day. Compare that to my summer: five weeks of walking and only one bag. What happened to the simplicity?

And what happened to my time? A few miles into my drive to work I realized that I had left my hiking shoes in my apartment (I may have left behind multiple things on the Camino, but I never started a day without my shoes). I would be late for work if I turned around to get the shoes- I didn’t have time, not even 10 minutes.

There wouldn’t be time to return to my apartment after work, either. Some days I’m lucky enough to finish work by 3:00, which means if I leave on time and don’t hit traffic, I can make it to my state park and fit in a 75 minute hike before the sun sets. But everything has to be planned and scheduled and running on time. Luckily, I keep piles of shoes in my car (don’t ask me why), and I routed around to find my first pair of Camino shoes, bought in the spring- the ones that caused me a few tears and a few blisters. I’d always meant to return them and eventually I will, but in the meantime, they served as the perfect pair of backup hiking shoes.

So I hiked- or walked- and it was great. The park was empty and I like it like that. It was cold but not so cold that I couldn’t warm up after walking a mile or so. I passed Christmas ornaments hanging from the bare branches of a tree, and I paused to take a photo.

It was good to go on that walk, but it didn’t fill me like my Camino walks filled me.

A month ago I was lucky enough to meet up in New York with a few of my Camino friends. I had a great conversation with Saskia, a high school teacher in Boston (this was fitting, as she was someone I’d had a very needed and timely conversation with on the Camino, as well). We talked about the frustration of returning home to regular life after an incredible and transformative experience. Others are making changes: for these Camino friends, their walk this summer marked a large transition in their lives, and I watch them enviously. Now, they are full of energy, a similar kind of energy that we all felt on the Camino, an energy that I’m afraid of losing.

I thought about this on my hike today, how I need to steal small moments of my day in order to hunt down those energizing feelings. There are days when I struggle to find them at all, days that are too cluttered with other stuff, or when there is no time.

I’m not sure where, exactly, this post is going. I guess it’s a not very clear way of saying that I’m still working to find my direction. I’m still walking to find my direction. I know that the Camino changed some things for me, and I’m a little impatient while I’m in the in between: feeling in my gut that I need to make a change, but uncertain of a hundred different things. Not changing yet, wondering what my life will look like in a year, wondering how I will get from here to there.

So in the meantime, while I work to figure it all out, I’ll keep walking.

Eating Cheetos Alone in a Hotel Room: An Unexpected Paradise

November 17, 2014

For months now (about three, to be exact), I’ve been wanting to go back and fill in some stories from the traveling I did this summer. I wrote all about the Camino, but I never described my long layovers in Iceland. Or the solo-traveling I did around Galicia in the days after I arrived in Santiago, and before leaving for Finisterre. And then there was the trip to France: the Côte d’Azur, Provence and Paris.

I sat down just now to write about the towns I visited in Galicia, and started to look through my photos from those days. One of the photos caught my eye and I clicked to enlarge it. It is by no means a very good photo, but it captures the essence of an experience better than so many of my other shots did.

It’s a picture of my hotel room, the very first room I had all to myself in over a month of traveling. I was in the town of A Coruna, a coastal city in the northwest corner of Spain. I’d arrived that afternoon after taking a train from Santiago. I was alone, and, also for the first time in over a month, I felt unsettled. So many pilgrims along the way said things like, “I’ve gained so much confidence from walking on the Camino. I know that if I can do this, I can do anything. Traveling anywhere- using public transportation- will seem so easy after this!”

I felt exactly the opposite. I had mastered walking, of putting on my shoes in the morning and setting out on a well-marked path, always running into people I knew, or at least recognized. But hopping on a train and arriving in a bustling city and seeing not a single pilgrim? I didn’t know what to do with myself. It felt completely foreign, in a way that my previous month of travel never had. I was a fish out of water, walking through town with my heavy pack and my hiking shoes.

But I figured it out, of course. I asked a man for directions, and he couldn’t have been more helpful. I found the tourist office (after asking a woman for help), and they directed me to a few inexpensive hotels. I checked in, the guy behind the desk seemed amused at my backpack and my tales of walking across Spain. I felt like I had to tell someone, like I had to explain everything I’d just done, to somehow mark the change that was taking place. I was in a new city and for the first time since I’d arrived in Spain, I hadn’t walked there. For the first time, I wasn’t sleeping in an albergue or meeting up with other pilgrims. The Camino was so fresh, so recent, and now I was in a strange town, alone. The clerk handed me my key, and waved me upstairs.

I walked into the room and it was a bit grim but it was also wonderful. Because, for a night, it was all mine. After arriving in Santiago I had four days to kill before my friend from home would come to join me on the walk to Finisterre. I’d tossed around a few ideas: stay in Santiago for those four days. Walk to Muxia and take a bus back to Santiago. Travel with a Camino friend to Portugal.

It was when I was sitting in the cathedral, the morning I’d arrived in Santiago, listening to the Spanish mass when I decided what to do: I was going to travel around the region alone. I needed something to mark the end of my Camino, and to separate the journey I’d just completed, alone, with the small Camino journey I was about to take with my friend. I also knew that I had so much to process from my walk, and I just wanted a few days away.

The hotel room felt a bit lonely, initially, so I just emptied a few things from my pack and then set off into town. I walked along a pathway next to the water, I explored the city center and I drank a glass of wine in the square. And then I went to the grocery store.

The last thing I wanted to do was bide my time until 10pm when it was acceptable to sit down at a restaurant to have dinner. And besides, I didn’t feel like sitting in a restaurant alone. So I found a grocery store, and I splurged.

I bought everything that looked good to me and then headed back to the hotel, where I settled in for my feast. After a month on the Camino with 3-course meals, endless glasses of wine and tapas, mid-afternoon cafe con leches… this felt decadent. Spreading my goods out on my bed (a real, stand alone, non-bunk bed bed!), pouring myself a glass of cheap and mediocre wine from a small cardboard box, popping open a bag of Cheetos and digging into a huge chunk of cheese with my Spork… this was decadence. I kicked off my shoes, laid on the bed, turned the television to a Spanish pop music channel, and scrolled through my phone to catch up on a month’s worth of facebook posts.

The photos of the gorgeous Spanish coast can wait; for now, for that night, this was my paradise.

Camino Lesson #1: Be here, now.

October 23, 2014

Fall, as a season, is a transition. It’s warmth to cold, sunshine to darkness, long days to short. In the past five years it’s been a strange kind of season for me; it’s either been the start of a slide into something not so great, or else the beginning of something new and wonderful. It’s like my life transitions coincide with this season. The days change, and so do the circumstances of my life.

Two years ago I was in the beautiful beginnings of a new love, and life was great. Fall was great, because life was great. I was enjoying the season, but I was also full of the feeling of change. I was so focused on where my life was moving and how to get there, always thinking about the future: about the next trip to Vermont to see my boyfriend, about his next visit to see me, about the next year and whether I would still be living in my apartment, about searching through craigslist and monster.com for new jobs.

A year later my relationship was falling apart (or, it had already fallen apart, but I was still holding on as tightly as I could), and fall was practically nonexistent. I didn’t want to see the changing leaves, I didn’t want to enjoy the pumpkin-flavored-everything, I just wanted to figure out how to make my relationship work, and how to be happy in my partnership again. I constantly thought about the past and what had gone wrong, and I kept looking to a point in the future, when I would feel better and when things would work out.

This fall? I’m trying to be here, now. I think I only really started trying in the past couple of weeks, and in a way, I’m amazed that it took me so long to practice this Camino lesson: don’t dwell in the past or the future, but just enjoy where you are.

I’ve always known that this is a valuable life lesson, but it’s a tough one to put into practice. On the Camino, it was almost effortless. There was so much going on, so much change every day, so much to engage your senses that it was almost impossible (for me, at least), to focus my mind on what had happened the day before, or what would happen tomorrow. And it was a strange practice for me, to not be constantly reflecting on what I had experienced, or preparing for what was to come. I was just letting things be- doing my best to process stuff through blog and journal writing- but otherwise just letting it be.

And it was a wonderful lesson for me to put into practice. Being present made me so happy: when I walked, sometimes I had a smile glued to my face because of the beauty and wonder of where I was and what I was doing. I’ve written about leaving my guidebook behind (and the lost guidebook ties into several Camino lessons for me), but it helped with the act of staying present: I didn’t read about what was going to happen in the future. For the most part, I stopped planning. I just woke up each day and I walked. I didn’t know who I would see or where I would stay, and it was an incredible and freeing feeling.

But when I came home, I got a bit stuck in the past and the future again. Missing my Camino, thinking about it and reflecting on it, going through my photos, even reading my own blog posts to try to get back to that time. And I’ve been very preoccupied about my future, about figuring out what my next step is, about whether I want to make a change, about how to know what is right for me.

It’s important to remember the past and to prepare for the future- what would life be like if we didn’t do either?- but it’s also extremely valuable to sometimes just let it go, and be in the moment. To just enjoy where you are.

So this fall, maybe it will end up being a time of transition for me, but I can’t know that right now. Right now, I’m in my kitchen, and I just pulled a warm loaf of pumpkin bread from the oven. I’m listening to XPN’s 885 Greatest Songs of All Time countdown (which is simply wonderful, right now ‘Wouldn’t it Be Nice‘ by the Beach Boys is playing, and just before was a long jazz number from Miles Davis). I’m noticing the changing leaves and the cooler air as I walk in loops through my neighborhood. I’m cooking foods like chili and butternut squash soup. This weekend, I’m going camping with two of my closest friends.

The last two weeks have been a great time, and I wonder if it’s because I’ve been trying to just be in my days, and to enjoy them as much as I can. I know that I’m going to continue to miss things from my past, and that I’m going to be a bit anxious about figuring out my future, but I’m trying to give those feelings a time and a place. And then I’m moving on… to now, to this beautiful fall season.

Walking to the ocean; Day 34, Olveiroa to Cée

October 4, 2014

Since I’ve been home, I’ve been measuring time by Camino milestones. As in: “It’s September 27th… three months ago, I started walking out of St Jean Pied de Port!” and “It’s October 4th, two months ago, I was one day away from Finisterre.” Two months since the end of my Camino? Time is a funny thing. So much living was packed into my 5 weeks on the Camino, and it feels like I’ve done a fraction of that kind of living since I’ve been home. Which makes sense, I suppose, because “real life” isn’t “Camino life”.

And yet, my pack sits on the kitchen chair closest to my back door. Ready to go, at all times. I take it with me and wear it when I go out for a hike. I don’t need to wear it, but I like to wear it. The feel of it on my back reminds me of the Camino. And, maybe, part of me doesn’t want to get out of practice. I reason that if I continue to walk, continue to wear the pack, I’ll be ready for another Camino at a moment’s notice. I like to pretend that I could leave for another Camino at any time, even though the reality is that it will take time- maybe a lot of it- before I will go again.

This was a long way of getting around to the real topic of this post, which is, the last days of walking the Camino. I think there’s a part of me that didn’t really want to write about the ending, because it means that I’ve finished writing about the Camino (which isn’t true at all, because so much of the future writing I want to do is about the Camino); but still, putting the ending into words makes it real.

But I did finish, and the ending was incredible. Here are some of the highlights from the second to last day of walking:

Since my friend from home, Sonal, had joined me just in Santiago, we decided to divide the walk to Finisterre into four days. Most pilgrims do it in three long days, but since we had the time, we split up the last 30+ kilometer day into two smaller days. Which was perfect.

On Day 3 we walked from Olveiroa to Cée, which was about 20 km (I think), and it might have been one of my top 5 Camino walking days. It was like the night before had brought the Camino magic back: a good, strong cafe con leche and croissant a few kilometers into the day. A perfectly placed ‘rest stop’: a church with picnic tables under the shade of large trees (Sonal and I were walking and talking about when to take a break, and I think one of us said something along the lines of, “Wouldn’t it be nice if we rounded that corner and there was a place to stop and take a break?” and then a few minutes later we came upon the church and picnic tables). We ran into some of the people we had talked with the night before, further strengthening these ‘late’ Camino friendships. The walk continued, the sun came out, and as we walked, far off in the distance you could see the ocean.

It’s hard for me to describe how incredible this was for me. On the Camino, my destination had always been Santiago, but I also knew that I would be making the trip to Finisterre. Seeing that ocean gave me a sense, maybe for the first time, of the distance that I had walked. I’d started in France, and now I was approaching the very western edge of Spain, and the Atlantic ocean. I was walking to the ocean! I had just walked across a country and I was going to walk until I couldn’t walk any further.

And it was all so beautiful: the cool air, the sunshine, the green grass and trees, that light blue sky and the darker blue of the water. We stopped to take a photo at a marker that read: ‘To The End’, and then we found a spot nearby, took off our packs, and settled down on the grass to take it all in. Mo-mo, a girl from Japan who we’d met the night before, came over to join us. We stretched our legs out in the sunshine and snacked on cookies and looked towards the ocean. Then we continued walking, that ocean getting closer and closer.

We stopped for the day in Cée, a coastal town about 11 kilometers from Finisterre. As we approached the town, we talked about finding an albergue. Jokingly (somewhat), I said, “We need an albergue with a kitchen. And a view of the ocean.” Guess what we found? Not only a clean albergue with a kitchen and a view of the water from our bunk beds, but we also found Emma, the friend we’d made the night before. She was making her bed in the albergue as we walked in, and we looked at each other and laughed. “Of course I’d see you guys here,” she said. “It’s the Camino.”

The three of us went to the beach, sat outdoors in a square and drank coffee, made a big salad in the albergue kitchen and later smuggled glasses and our bottle of wine outside to sit on a bench along the water. I ran to a pastry shop we’d seen earlier in the day and arrived 5 minutes before they closed. I came back with Tarta de Santiago- an almond cake famous in Galicia- and we ate pastries and drank wine and looked over the water as the sky darkened.

What a great day. But the last day was even better. Stay tuned.

Endless coffee, top bunks, and delirium; 7 things I miss about the Camino

September 29, 2014

Today is National Coffee Day, and as I sit here in my apartment, listening to the rain, I think about all that great coffee I drank in Spain. And that gets me thinking about the Camino, and the walking and the people and the food and the conversation and all of the things that I miss. So here are a few things that come to mind:

1. Giving myself permission to drink as much coffee and wine as I liked.

Was there anything better than multiple café con leches or the 1-euro glass of (really, really good) wine? Sometimes an entire bottle of wine was only 2 euros. I could sit and drink coffee and write in my journal, I could sit and sip wine and talk with new friends, and I could do this every single day.

2. Spending my days outside.

It just felt so healthy: the cool, fresh air of the morning. The sunshine on the back of my legs. Walking through forests and vineyards and mountains. The sound of the wind blowing through a field of wheat.

3. The moment just after I finished doing my laundry.

One day I was hand washing my socks and underwear and t-shirt, and I turned to the person next to me and said, “This is my favorite part of the day!” This person stared at me and responded with, “Doing laundry? Are you crazy?”

“No,” I explained. “Just after this. When everything is finished. After those first kilometers when you haven’t had coffee, and the last kilometers when your legs feel like lead. After finding an albergue and showering and charging your phone and washing your clothes. Just after it’s all done, that feeling of complete relaxation and open time. You’ve done all of your work for the day, and it’s 2:00pm and you can eat and drink and meet up with friends or just do nothing. That’s my favorite time.”

4. An open church.

It was so easy for me to get caught up in all of the other stuff on the Camino: the physical aches and pains of the walking, the socialization and new friends, the changing Spanish countryside, the language and the culture, the nagging thoughts in my head. But when I passed a church, it was nearly always a reminder that I was on an ancient pilgrimage route. The churches connected me to a sense of the history of the Camino, and to my own personal pilgrimage.

When passing a church I usually tried to open the door to see if it was unlocked, and often it wasn’t. But that made the time when I could find an open church pretty special. I loved the little chapels, especially. So small and simple, with tiny details and still spaces. I loved when I could stand alone in an empty church- stand at the back and look up towards the altar, close my eyes and say a little prayer- and then quietly continue on my way. It always brought me a strong sense of peace.

5. A top bunk by an open window.

By the middle of my Camino, I started to get used to sleeping on the top bunk. I think my ratio of top to bottom bunks was 8:1, and at first this seemed like bad luck. But eventually I found my upside: sleeping by an open window. Sometimes this was purely chance. But whenever I got to an albergue on the early side and could choose a bed, I’d opt for a top bunk if there was a window close by. These were some of my best nights of sleep, when I could bundle into my sleeping bag, sometimes with a wool blanket stretched across the bed, and feel the cool night air blow in through the window. In one albergue I had a view of stars and a nearly full moon. In another, I could hear distant howling (and the next day someone mentioned that there were wolves in the hills, could this be true?)

6. Those hilariously delirious moments when you’ve simply been walking too long.

I think everyone had them. I kind of hope that everyone had them, and it wasn’t just me. Because usually by the last few hours of a really long, hot day, I could get a bit loopy. Once, I was walking with my friend Mirra and I looked ahead and exclaimed, “Look! A horse!” There was no horse. It was just another pilgrim, walking along.

There may or may not have been a time when I was walking alone down the very long, very straight, old Roman road under a very hot sun, looked around to make sure no one was within earshot, and shouted out, “Caesar!!” Just because he also walked down this road, a long time ago, and it seemed like I should somehow acknowledge it.

And there was definitely a time when I sang American Pie over and over and over because it was my 7th hour of walking on a hot day when I had lost my earbuds and all I wanted to do was listen to music. “Drove my chevy to the levee but the levee was dryyyyy…”

Caesar!!

7. Waking up every day and feeling like anything was possible.

I know that some people got a bit bogged down in the routine of the Camino, but for me, I felt like every day was full of possibility and surprises. This feeling increased after I lost my guidebook; I didn’t always know what the terrain would be like, if I would have to climb big hills, if I would pass through large towns. Where would I get my coffee? Who would I run into? Where would I stay at night? Would I make a new friend, would I have an inspiring conversation? Would I see a castle or a cathedral or a field of sunflowers or a long line of cows? When else in life do you get to ask yourself these kinds of questions?

The toughest, the prettiest, the luckiest.

September 15, 2014

I’ve been thinking about this blog post- the one I’m about to write- for weeks. It started to form in my mind as I was doing all of my post-Camino processing: thinking about the things I experienced, the people I met, the lessons I learned. Some of what kept coming back to me were the things people said to me while I was on the Camino, things they said at the end. And things that I told myself on the Camino, things I told myself at the end.

This could be a long post.

I was called, several times, three different things on the Camino: tough, pretty, and lucky. Someone called me the prettiest. Someone called me the luckiest. No one called me the toughest but sometimes it was implied that I was one of the toughest.

And I was a bit uncomfortable each time I heard these words.

And I often denied it. “No no,” I’d protest. “I’m not that tough. Really. I’m not sure why I’m handling this walk so well, but it’s not because I’m tough.” I didn’t even know what to say about being called pretty. And lucky? Well, maybe I agreed with that one a bit. But it was always about more than just luck.

You’ve probably gathered, through reading my posts while on the Camino, that I didn’t struggle with this walk in the physical sense. I had some aches and pains, but they were minor. I sailed through the majority of the walking, not feeling the pain in my body like the majority of pilgrims do. I was always, from day one, a fast walker. I must have sometimes been an amusing sight- this somewhat petite, compact girl swooshing up the hills, her socks swinging wildly on the back of her pack. I would often get into a rhythm and just go, my mind far off, zoned out, in some sort of semi-flow state. It became a bit of a joke by the end that I somehow always missed stuff. At the end of the day people would talk about the things they’d seen on the day’s walk, and I had no idea what they were talking about. Sometimes it was just about a grove of trees, or things growing in a garden, but later it was the bigger stuff. Did you see that cathedral? they’d ask. What cathedral? I’d say. Somehow I missed the official 100 kilometer marker- I have a photo with a 100 kilometer marker but it’s not the “real” one, as I later found out. I missed the ‘Santiago de Compostela’ sign as I entered into the city (don’t ask me how, I walked right past it). I missed the first glimpse of the ocean as I walked to Finisterre.

People- myself included- thought this was hilarious. It’s not like I wasn’t taking in the space that I was walking through, because I was. In a big way. But sometimes I would just get into a zone and I could only see right in front of me. Or I could only see what was far beyond. In any case, when I got in these zones I was a walking machine. I could plow through kilometer after kilometer and even at the end of the day, I’d felt like I could just keep going and going. I loved the walking.

But does that make me tough? I think some people thought so. The Korean boys all joked that it was impossible to catch me, and sometimes they tried. I walked the Dragonte route- three big mountains- and every time someone heard that I did this they had a big reaction. “Wow, you’re tough,” they’d say. Is it because I’m a woman? Is it because I’m not that big? Is it because I was out there alone? Is it because I never fully attached myself to anyone, and insisted on doing this by myself?

And isn’t this tough, in some ways? Shouldn’t I be able to say that traveling alone to a foreign place to walk 500 miles across the country is tough? That, at least in some part, it requires a bit of toughness?

Because it does. It does for everyone that completed this walk, everyone who attempted this walk, everyone who walked even just one little portion of this walk. It takes some toughness.

But I’m not the toughest. People were battling out there. You can’t call me tougher than that 75 year old Frenchwoman I met. Or tougher than the mothers and fathers out there with their children. Or, for that matter, tougher than the children. In fact, I think I could probably go through just about every single person I met on the Camino and find a reason that they were tougher than I was.

And yet, that’s not what this is about. I wasn’t the toughest person on the Camino, but the truth is, I was tough to do that. I’m tough. It’s a hard thing for me to say, but there it is: I’m tough.

And here’s the next one: I’m pretty. This one is also so hard for me to say. Always- growing up, in my regular life, on the Camino- I see so much beauty in people. So many pretty girls and women all around me. Women who have it all together: the hair and the makeup and the clothing and the demeanor. All of it.

I’ve never had that. I make sure that I’m at least satisfied with my appearance, that I can appear in public and not be embarrassed (although, quite frankly, there have been a few close calls), but that’s about it. I don’t often try to make myself look very pretty, and I prefer to just blend into the background. Not to be noticed.

But on the Camino, people noticed. I was walking- fast- down a rocky hill one day and came upon two Frenchmen. The older one turned around when he heard me approaching and called out to his friend: “Attention! La jolie fille nous passe.” The pretty girl is passing us. It made me smile (and I think I startled them by responding with, “Ah, merci beaucoup!”), but it also caught me by surprise. I was just referred to as ‘the pretty girl’? Really?

The day after I arrived in Santiago I ran into two people I’d seen time and time again on the Camino, a Spanish girl and her brother. They were probably both around my age, and neither spoke much English. On the Camino I always gave them a big wave and a bright smile, and they always smiled back. That was the extent of our interactions, until we saw each other in Santiago. On that day, in Santiago, I spoke for a few minutes with the girl- saying hello, saying goodbye. I was about to walk away when she said to me, “There is one thing I must tell you. We think,” and here she pointed to her brother, “that you are the prettiest girl on the whole Camino.”

I had no idea what to say, and I think I just stared at her, mutely shaking my head. “Yes,” she continued, “you are! Even my brother thinks so, so it is true.” Her brother was staring off into space, probably not understanding a word of the conversation but most likely would have been mortified if he knew what we were saying. “We refer to you as the pretty American, with the pretty smile and the pretty eyes.”

I still didn’t know what to say, and probably just protested for awhile and then said goodbye. But this, too, surprised me. The prettiest? Not by a long shot. There were some very, very pretty girls on the Camino.

But this was another Camino lesson for me, just like needing to be able to admit to being tough. I am pretty. I’m not the prettiest, just like I’m not the toughest. But I am pretty. On the Camino, my hair wasn’t always clean, I had an extremely uneven tan, I wore the same dirty clothing every day… but I was pretty. I almost always wore a smile, my face was usually bright and shining. And I think there was probably some beauty in that.

I’ve already written about being lucky, maybe the luckiest. I don’t know. Once, on the Dragonte route where it had been raining off and on, I said aloud that I just wished the sun would appear. Less than a minute later there was a small break in the clouds and warm sunshine poured down on us. Vicool turned around, gave me a look and said, “Angel asks for sunshine, Angel gets sunshine.”

Luck? Coincidence? Maybe. But I think it goes a bit beyond luck. I already talked about the Camino providing and I still believe that’s true, but it’s also more than that. I prayed to God while I was on the Camino, and as I moved closer to Santiago I had more and more conversations. I was provided with what I needed- by the Camino, by God, by a few guardian angels I suspect I have working for me. I was lucky, and I’ve asked myself time and time again why, but really it doesn’t matter. I tried to never take my luck or my walk or each day or any of the trip for granted. I tried to appreciate as many moments as I could while I was on the Camino, I tried to practice gratitude. And maybe that’s why I sailed through the kilometers, or had a shining, happy face. Maybe that’s why I felt like so much good was coming to me. Maybe.

So, the toughest, the prettiest, the luckiest? No, not really. But I am tough, and I am pretty. And I was so, so lucky.

The Camino’s not done with me yet; Day 33 on the Camino, Negreira to Olveiroa

September 4, 2014

I’d thought that my Camino had ended in Santiago. I was continuing on to Finisterre with a friend, but when I last wrote from ‘the road’, on the first day’s walk out of Santiago, I said that I felt like I was on a long walk to the beach with a friend, and no longer on the Camino.

Oh, famous last words. If the Camino could laugh, it was laughing at me then. She thinks I am finished with her? Has she not learned anything on this walk?

After that first day, walking from Santiago to Negreira, I felt like it was a sort of ‘in-between’ experience: I was still a pilgrim, and it was a Camino of sorts, but very separate from the journey I had just been on. My pilgrimage was done.

But things started to change on the second day. Sonal and I walked to Olveiroa and met so many other pilgrims on the way. It reminded me of the beginning of my Camino, that first week out of St Jean when everyone was new and eager and forming friendships and connections. Maybe it was because we were new to each other, and there weren’t many of us on the road. But suddenly it felt easy, once again, to meet people and to make connections.

We stopped at a quirky place for a second breakfast: a family’s home, the patio and grounds opened up for pilgrims to stop and have a drink or a bite to eat. Hammocks were stretched out between trees, picnic tables and multicolored adirondack chairs were scattered across the lawn. I was excited to find this place: a Camino gem. But just before Sonal and I arrived a group of loud Spanish pilgrims, probably in their early 20’s, had descended on the place. We’d been trying to move away from their group for the past two days but they always seemed to show up wherever we were. We hesitated outside as the Spanish group took over, and just as we decided to leave, an older woman came out of the house. She gestured over, motioning for us to come inside.

We did, and settled into cushioned chairs in a quiet room off of the kitchen. High, wooden beamed ceilings, antique furniture, old musty books, black and white photographs on the walls. I couldn’t figure out what this place was: a family’s home, it seemed, but also an establishment for pilgrims. The mother was bustling around the kitchen, a daughter came out to take our order. Our coffee was served with little orange flavored pastries, and our tortilla was warm and fluffy, with a basket of soft, crusty bread. When we finished I signed the guestbook, and I wrote that it was like a small paradise: unexpected and magical.

And unexpected and magical are the words that I would use to describe the rest of my experience on the Camino.

After a long day’s walk we arrived in Olveiroa, and as I walked through the bar to find the hospitalero to check in for the night, I noticed Richard, a British guy we’d met earlier in the day. I stopped to say hi and sitting with him was someone I’d known from my “real” Camino (as I thought of it at the time). Since I’d started walking to Finisterre nearly a week after arriving in Santiago, all of the people I knew had already moved on, or gone home. “Everyone from my Camino is gone,” I kept saying. So to run into a familiar face, even if it was someone I didn’t know well, felt a bit mystical. I was walking to Finisterre, he was returning from Finisterre. We greeted each other with a strong hug, and later, stayed up late into the night- each of us, I think, clinging to our last Camino moments.

And that night Sonal and I made a new friend, Emma. She had walked the Camino Frances six years ago, ending in Santiago, and vowed that she would return one day to complete the walk to Finisterre. She kept her promise and had started out from Santiago the same day as Sonal and I did. We talked with her that night, sitting around a long table outside of the albergue’s bar, as the stars came out and the air grew cool. People kept joining our table, sliding up chairs, laughing at jokes, pouring shots of hierbas from a tall bottle. We toasted, all of us. I looked around the table and marveled at the combination of people sitting with me: a pilgrim who had left St Jean on the same day that I did, but who I hadn’t talked to until the very end of my journey. New pilgrims I had just met that day. A pilgrim who had walked six years ago and had just returned to complete the journey. And my friend from home, a brand new pilgrim two days into her walk, but someone I’d known for 20 years.

So many different connections: so unexpected, so magical.

As I drifted off to sleep that night- top bunk, muffled snoring from the corner of the room- I realized that my Camino hadn’t ended after all.

“What’s next, Camino?” I asked. “What comes next?”