I’d heard something of The Camino de Santiago before we came to Spain, but I was very vague about the details. I remember seeing a video of people walking around the side of a crumbling mountain, with a wire to hold onto, and not much else. I thought it was some kind of old road that was now seen as a challenge to walkers and climbers, but that’s as far as my knowledge extended. Well, shame on me.
The Camino de Santiago is one of oldest pilgrimages in the world, and in the middle ages, was in the top three: the other two routes lead to Rome and Jerusalem. Millions of travellers have set out on this road, over hundreds of years, and it is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
I encounter it as we drift down out of France, across the Pyrenees, and into Spain. The route we are on leads all the way across country to the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, where lie the bones of St James The Greater (St. Iago, in Spanish). He was the son of Zebedee (and you could stop right there, and that would be good enough for me), one of the original twelve apostles, and the very first person martyred for his faith.
Or so they say. Other theories include the fact that he and his brother were known as the ‘Sons of Thunder’, on account of their fiery tempers; so who knows what really kicked off? But he’s the patron saint of Spain, so fair enough.
After his beheading, his remains were shipped from the Holy Land to the shores of Spain, where a storm capsized the boat. Then it all goes a bit Disney: one story claims his body washed up on the shore, intact, and covered in scallop shells. Now I find that a bit grizzly, but in the world of saints this counts as a miracle, so who am I to judge? The scallop shell became the symbol of The Camino, and endures to this day.
Pilgrims
I’m not a big fan of religions that operate from a position of fear of what will happen to you after you’re dead. I find the carrot is more effective than the stick, and anyway, I’m not good at taking other peoples’ words for things (especially when they are men who lived thousands of years ago). If that floats your boat, and gives you purpose and comfort, then fine: it just doesn’t work for me.
To be honest, the idea of doing penance in this life, to atone for sins you may have done, or are yet to do – that there is a balance scale somewhere that you can adjust – is one that makes little sense to me. But the idea of a spiritual journey – a long, arduous, and contemplative journey, alone with your thoughts and fears and yearnings: I find that rather admirable. I find that brave.
Routes
The pilgrims on The Camino traditionally start at their own front doors and make their way to the Cathedral (like going to Mecca or, sadly, these days, Graceland.) Sometimes this took years: imagine that. They followed the Milky Way, which is associated with The Camino: the legend being that the stars were created from the dust of a thousand travellers, as they journeyed to pay homage to their Saint.
These days the minimum requirement is to walk 100km or cycle for 200km. Or you can go by donkey but that’s got to be harder to arrange accommodation for.
The route is marked by the symbol of scallop shell in various forms, and there are hostels for the travellers in every small town or village along the way. Our first pit stop in Spain is in the car park of one and, as it’s good manners to eat where you stop, we have dinner in the little cafe there.
The other diners are a mixture of locals and pilgrims: the latter set apart by their walking gear, of course, but also by the atmosphere of self-reflection they generate. The couple next to us are an elderly lady, with a much-needed stick, and a younger woman, who clutches her side and hobbles slowly to the counter to pay. I am shocked: we’re nearly 500km away from Santiago, and they’re both struggling to walk five feet.
But the next morning they’re already well on their way as we drive past them. What pushes people to do this, year after year, over 200,000 at a time? Are they seeking some miracle of healing for their infirmities, or reassurance that, with death approaching, they have put their afterlife affairs in order? None of the surprising number of dogged, persistent, walkers we see that morning are young, or fit, or seeming to be there just for the physical challenge of it.
It is all rather humbling, if mystifying. When I walk the twenty feet of Camino from van to cafe, I try to do it with respect, but somehow I don’t think it counts.
The gift of an answered prayer
Spain is hot, and flat, and dry. The long roads stretch as endlessly as the fields are boundless. Steve and I agree to stop near Salamanca. Other than that, we’re going straight on to Portugal, planning to return to Spain later in the year.
We also agree to pause at the next truck stop or petrol station so that I can have a wee and a tea. But we pass one, after another, after another, and he doesn’t stop and I’m getting headachy and desperate.
The nice thing about driving Nibbles behind Georgie is that I get to vent in the happy knowledge that it affects no one. I can shout, or sing, or curse as much as I like, and still arrive at my destination perfectly serene. So I have a damn good shout at Steve and it goes something like this: –
‘Where the fuck are you going? Really? We’ve just passed another one, you twonk. So what was wrong with that one then? Eh? I NEED to STOP! Or I can piss my seat, I don’t care. Whatever you like. Oh please God, just stop soon.’
You get the gist. And while it isn’t exactly a prayer, it is definitely a plea. I’m beginning to think that he’ll drive all the way to Brazil without stopping, when I suddenly see it …
…the sign of the scallop shell, high above a sea of green. An oasis, calling me. And whoever’s up there must have heard, because Steve indicates and pulls off the road. And into a BP Shell service station with a loo, and a café, and a shop that sells Jaffa cakes called Pims (that’s a gift that keeps on giving).
So thank you, St. Jim. You’re my kind of guy.
A long line of wanderers
The pilgrims on The Camino get me thinking about my own ancestry. My family history covers continents. We have always put our faith in the unknown, often with an ocean linking our past to our future.
My father is a case in point: his family were originally from Ireland but his antecedents also included Hapsburgs, and Voortrekkers. He was born and bred in Rhodesia, and used to tell me tales of going gold prospecting in the bush, with his elder brothers.
He met my mother while she was working as a nurse in Zambia. She’d already lived in Mauritius, and was now near her elder sister, Ruth (herself a missionary, working in a leprosy hospital in the bush). He knew straight away that she was the woman he’d marry. After my brother was born and my mum got homesick, my dad did as his forebears had, and crossed a continent and an ocean, for the woman he loved.
My family do this: we up sticks and spread out, searching for other sunsets on different soil. A new place offers new possibilities. Why read the same book over and over? Why not find a new story? I, myself, have moved house thirty-one times. My sister packed Antigua, Botswana and Kenya into her short life.
Only my brother inherited the clearly recessive security gene. He provides the stability and permanence from which the rest of us boomerang out.
The one thing Steve and I have always had in common is our delight in travelling down an unknown road. However much I love a place, it can never compete with what else might be out there. If that’s sounds dissatisfying, it is not. I do not yearn for bigger, better, shinier. I am happy when I arrive at a new place, and happy to settle in. And I am also frequently sad to leave (though that is usually more because of the people I am leaving behind, than the place itself).
But I am greedy for life, and aware that there is so much out there, undiscovered by me. Waiting for me. Irresistible.
And this life – this wandering life – suits my vagabond heart, and answers the call of generations of footsteps locked in my DNA.
Where now? Where next? These were surely the whispers I heard in the crib.
1 Like