Two more solitary days on the meseta

There are two kinds of towns on the meseta --those you see 15 kilometers ahead of you and you think you´ll never get there, and those that are hidden down in some little ravine that you can´t see till you actually get your head up to the top of the hill, and there it is right below you. I´ve had my fair share of both, and with no people anywhere in the horizon, just fields and fields and villages. The meseta may have the reputation of being the flattest place around, but it doesn´t hold a candle to Illinois. I am from flat, and this isn´t flat. It makes the walking much more interesting, up and down to little streams, around the ridge of some big depression in the terrain, step after step. And the fields of grain are all various shades of green and turning gold, and with the wind rustling through, you really do see those amber waves of grain.

The town of Villalon de Campos has a terrific albergue, in the house formerly used by the town priest (the town now has a priest who comes to town once a week or something like that), and a pretty square with a pillory that is not your ordinary plain place for tying people up.

The walk has been flat, from Villalon to Santervas del Campo, birthplace of Ponce de Leon and home to a beautiful romanesque church (closed of course).

But my solitary days are over. I am now officially back on the Camino Francés, where it´s like a moving sidewalk of people. Yesterday I squeezed two days walk into one, since I could not bear the thought of another night alone in a big albergue and a town of four or five people. So, 39 or 40 kilometers and one huge downpour later, I arrived in the town of Sahagún, where the Camino de Madrid officially ends and the Camino Francés begins.

It was a long hard slog, but well worth it. I called my friend Rebekah, who lives on the Camino about 12 kms from where I arrived. She came to pick me up and brought me back to her home right on the Camino. Since I had been sleeping alone for days, having my own bedroom wasn´t such a luxury, but having real fluffy towels and clean sheets was pretty special. Plus a yummy chicken curry dinner and some good red wine from the area just hit the spot. Rebekah keeps a blog and you can see what her life is like at moratinoslife.blogspot.com. It seems enticing and daunting at the same time, they have chickens and a garden, and a bodega and four dogs and a cat and a canary and they live in a town with a year round population of 15.

 

 

 

I am taking today "off" after yesterday´s ordeal and will start on the camino tomorrow, I´ll just get up early and walk back into Sahagún. I feel like a social misfit, not quite sure how to react to these lines of people pouring through their small town. It´s a shock to see them all, but I knew it was coming. 7 days to Ponferrada!

Three days all alone

Well, not really totally alone, since there were people in the towns where I stayed. But there are very few peregrinos on this camino, which is a shame, because it is beautiful -- especially in spring with the flowers. Though I lost the shade of the pine forests three days ago, the beauty of the meseta is that the flowers are incredible and sometimes just stretch endlessly. Lots of red, yellow, white, pink, purple, and blue, with fields of wheat, potatoes, lentils, and barley.

I´ve had to walk a couple of very short days because of the location of the albergues. My first day out of Valladolid, I was in a town called Ciguñuela, only about 13 kms from Valladolid. But the albergue was in the house where the teacher used to live and had been made into a very nice sleeping place for peregrinos. At about 5 in the afternoon, a bunch of women from the tiny town came to use the big industrial kitchen to make traditional sweets. They are having a bake sale to help pay attorney´s fees for a tae kwan do teacher they believe has been falsely accused of something (they didn´t say what, but I take it it was something connected with a young female student). They baked for hours and hours, concoctions made of lard, sugar, eggs, wine, and flour -- not exactly for those watching their weight, their blood sugar, or their cholesterol. It was fun talking to them, they thought I was crazy of course, but it was nice to have some human contact.

The next day was a more standard 24 km to a town called Castromonte, which the guide I´m using describes as having a "delightful" plaza mayor and an "imposing" church spire. I´m all in favor of being generous with the adjectives, but these two were quite a stretch, IMO. But the albergue, now THAT was delightful! It is located in a school built in 1930, half is now the Casa de Cultura (where women go to dance and exercise, not sure what else happens there), and half is the albergue. I had a huge bedroom with about 10 bunks all to myself, not to mention the kitchen with fancy dancy washing machine (soap there for using, too!), stove, micro-wave, not to mention boiling hot water in the showers.

But it was a good think I brought the draft of my article to work on because it was a LONG afternoon. Luckily, the Bar Caribe in the "delightful" plaza mayor managed to scrounge up some eggs and chorizo for my lunch. When I went in to eat, there were several tables of workers eating their lunch, so I asked the guy behind the bar if I could eat. He asked -- ¿Trajiste la comida? (Did you bring your lunch?). Then I looked at the tables and saw that the workers were all eating out of their own lunch boxes, just drinking the bar´s wine and water. When I told him no, he graciously told me his wife would make me eggs and salad. Turns out the couple running this bar is 91, so you can imagine how guiltly I felt having her go to the special trouble of making my lunch.

Today was another short day to this town of Medina de Rioseco. Just 15 kms, through endless fields, but with a ton of birds singing. Here the albergue is in a convent from the XVI century run by the nuns -- private room, sheets, a towel, all for 6€. And the town itself is hopping with weekend visitors, since it has a lot of pretty squares, all colonnaded, and a big exhibition in the Santiago church, which I will be sure to visit this afternoon.

 

And then, bright and early tomorrow morning, my walk starts towards a town called Villalón, and the first 8 km are right on the side of the Canal de Castilla, heavily shaded and cool. The weather has been great so far, not a drop of rain has fallen on me, but I´m sure that will come at some point!

In Valladolid

These Spanish cities never cease to amaze me. I don´t know many people who have even heard of Valladolid, much less been here. It´s an old city in the middle of the sunny meseta, but it has one wow-zer historical core. There are lots of beautiful renaissance churches, squares galore (all loaded with cafés), Cervantes´home, a museum of sacred sculpture which is pretty incredible -- all within a 15 minute walk of each other. And I always marvel at how the plazas and streets fill with people of all ages in the late afternoon, linked arms, just strolling or sitting or watching the kids play around. They sure have got the public life part down pat.

I have had a very nice rest day because in addition to all those top notch tourist attractions, my hotel has a computer with internet in the lobby and I have been able to wash many clothes. I am kind of embarrassed to admit it, but this is the first time I have washed my pants this trip. My standards have plummeted, I remember caminos when I washed them almost every day!


So, yesterday morning I said goodbye to my two walking companions who were forging on ahead to the next town. I will now probably be alone for the next 6 days or so, but you never know, I may meet someone else on the Camino de Madrid. The information I´ve been getting about the "pilgrim traffic" on the other caminos is quite sobering, and it has made me drop my plans to go back out to Finisterre (end of the world), a three day walk after arriving in Santiago. I have heard that it is just mobbed, albergues overflowing, people pushing past each other, etc. Just not worth it, so I will take an extra day now and then an extra day or two on the third segment of this Camino, which will also be very solitary. But I will be surrounded and mobbed for the 6 or 7 days walking on the Camino Francés, so I´ll get a taste of how this has all changed so much.

Last night I spoke with all three of the Love clan, and I realized it was the first time since May 16 that I had spoken a word of English. I´m happy to report that I´m still fluent.


Off for a café con leche in the Plaza Mayor and then I´ll be on my way to Cigueñela, tonight´s destination, where there isn´t likely to be much going on in a town of about 150.

Four days on the Meseta

I am in the small town of Puente Duero, with an amazing Roman bridge, about 11 km from Valladolid. I have had four hard days of walking on the meseta from Segovia, but fortunately there have been lots and lots of pine forests, which are very welcome for the shade. Tomorrow morning, I will say goodbye to my camino friends and take a detour to the city of Valladolid, where I´ve never been. I hope to find a better computer so that I can write more.

But these last four days have been really something --we have found albergues in all of the towns and have seen some amazing castles,churches, old walls, etc. One night we slept in a house where the gallegos used to sleep when they came to the meseta to do the harvest, in a town with an old church with a beautiful cloister (Santa Maria la Real de Nieva)

the next night we were in the old teachers´ house in a town called Coca with an amazing castle

another night in an albergue in Alcazaren, which run by the town but where the floor hadn´t been cleaned for at least a year. The apse of the Romanesque church, however, was a show-stopper.

 And tonight, we are in the town of Puente Duero, where there is a very nice albergue where we will have a communal supper.

So, I will try to write more tomorrow, as a tourist in Valladolid, where there is a phenomenal museum of sculpture, so they say, and a very nice historic center.

A few hours to wander in Segovia

Last night´s stay in a youth hostel was quite the experience. There were three classes of middle school kids spending a few days there, and they were having quite the time running around the grounds shouting and screaming. The three of us got the "private wing" where I had a single room with private bath, and IRONED sheets if you can believe that, for 12 euros. Unfortunately, the noise level was pretty high till around midnight, but there were a lot of happy screeching children running up and down the hills outside, so I decided I was happier they were doing that than sitting inside playing video games.

This morning, we were on the road by 6:45. We had a long day, almost 20 miles, and it was hot and sunny at the end. The first few hours were just gorgeous, up to the Fuenfría pass, which included several kms on the Roman Road. I´ve walked on a fair number of Roman roads, but it always makes quite an impression. Once we got to the top of our ascent, we walked along a ridge in the Guadarrama range for at least 5 kms, through pine trees, with lots of waterfalls and wildflowers in meadows. And we had to cross over three Roman bridges, none of which had been renovated according to the information posted nearby. Pretty amazing.

 

As we got close to Segovia, one of the Spanish guys said, well, there´s not too much to do in Segovia other than the cathedral, a few romanesque churches, the Alcazar (castle), and the aqueduct. I don´t know what kind of places he´s used to visiting, but that was a pretty full plate for me. I´ve spent a few hours just wandering, poking my head into places along the way, and there´s enough to fill several days here. But, no rest for this peregrina, so tomorrow at 6 am, José Manuel will knock on my 32 euro 1-star pension door and off we´ll be. From here for the next week or so, we are not going to be in any major towns, so I am not sure how much internet there will be.

Aside from one toenail turning black and looking ugly (which happens every year), I´m doing fine and am having a ball!

Made it to Cercedilla

Well, day three is done. I´ve had two really nice days of walking, with a huge downpour all night but so far not a drop of rain while walking. Yesterday I had a long-ish walk to the town of Manzanares el Real, where there is an incredible castle -- according to the pamphlet, the best example of XV Century Castilian military architecture. I got the reduced price ticket, not sure whether it was for being a pilgrim or for being old, and I was able to spend an hour or so without my pack, walking around and climbing turrets.

As I left the castle, I saw two obvious pilgrims, my first. They are both Spaniards, and know all the ins and outs of the albergues (the places pilgrims sleep), which I was kind of confused about. They told me we could call the village priest at 3 and he would give us the key to the albergue that was 3 km out of town, high up on a sacred rock, in the back of a little "ermita" (I suppose it´s something like hermitage in English). What a great place, though a little far from town. We even figured out how to turn on the heat. I had my own room of 15 bunk beds, totally quiet. There are views of incredible austere mountains and boulders all around. This is the Sierra de Guadarrama, lots of Spanish Civil War history here, where Hemingway wrote.

This morning we packed up early, it had been raining all night, but we were lucky. At 7:15, not a drop was falling. And I was also lucky that one of the two guys volunteered to take the key the extra 2 kms back to the priest´s house. Seems like a silly way to do things, having the pilgrims go a total of 4 km out of their way to return a key. But the priest is a bit "unusual," we were told, and if he doesn´t like you he doesn´t give you the key at all!

 

Albergue in Manzanares on the Pena Sacra

 

                                             View of the Guadarrama mts. from the albergue

Today´s walk was through meadows with lots of streams, marshes, wildflowers, just beautiful, with the mountains in the background. We´re in a mountain town called Cercedilla, which is more than anything a slew of summer homes and tacky apartments with a little old town center that has this internet place. Our albergue doesn´t open till 5 pm, so we will have to eat and buy groceries before heading out there. Once again it´s way out of town, another 3 km or so, so I will not be coming back to town today! This is so different than the other caminos, where the albergues are right on the way, all you have to do is turn to get off the camino and enter their door.

I was glad I met these two guys, they met on the camino about ten years ago, and they walk together every year. One is an Asturian miner, who spent his working life going down into mines (in Spain, miners get three years´credit of work for two actual years of work for purposes of social security and pesnions). The other worked in nuclear power plants and has some stories to tell -- he was sent on detail to Chernobyl and has also been to Three Mile Island. I don´t think I´d like that particular line of work. These two are what is called "pre-retired" in Spain. What that means, I was astonished to find out, is that they are not working but still receiving their entire salary. When they reach retirement age, they then go on the pension, but till then they enjoy full benefits with no work. I´m not really sure why this is in the employer´s interest, but they say it´s fairly common. They have been walking a month a year for the last ten years and like me were looking for alternatives to the busy Camino Frances. They are not going the same way I am, but we will probably walk together for at least another 7 or 8 days.

When I opened my email today, I saw with horror that I had 85 new email messages -- I was expecting to find some bad news, but the source of all these emails was one of my favorite topics, pension reform. It looks like the Illinois legislature is going to adopt some very serious cuts to our pensions going forward, surely it will bring about a lawsuit, but who knows what will finally make it out of our dysfunctional legislature. Luckily I had already written a legal memo on this particular bill (which we thought was dead), because otherwise I would be unable to give my most sagacious legal opinion from here in Cercedilla!

Tomorrow up and over the mountain pass, I think it´s 2000 or 2500 feet, so it won´t be too awful. Should be beautiful as well, because between this town and tomorrow´s destination, which is the town of Segovia, there is nothing, no fountains, no bars, no towns, nada. 31 km of mountain bliss, I´m expecting!

Thanks for all the news and encouragement, I am well and hope you all are too. Abrazos.

Day 1 on the road

I am now in the Casa de Cultura in Colmenar Viejo, which has a few old remains from the town´s origins and a few computers that are almost as old. But I am not complaining since they are free and easy to find.

I have made my first day´s walk, 27 km (well, actually 30+ if you count the kilometers I walked while lost -- no matter how well marked, I am a PRO at getting lost). It´s pretty amazing how you can leave a giant city like Madrid and in a few minutes be in the country, and in a few more minutes not be able to hear the whizz of cars. This path is basically part of the nationwide sheep´s path, which is set aside by royal decree and the herders are still authorized to bring the herds from north to south in winter. I believe they put them in trucks to get them through the city of Madrid, however. And if my memory serves, the whole phenomenon is called the transnumancia (with a few letters missing or wrong). I did see a fair number of sheep and cows today, but they weren´t going anywhere. But I saw no other walkers for the entire time, just a few cyclists on a bike path that crossed mine from time to time.

The camino is well marked but nobody knows anything about it. That´s a curious combination, usually if no one knows about it, it´s not well marked. But the Madrid friends of the camino group is very careful to keep the way marked, even though very few people walk it. So I do get a lot of strange looks and kids pointing. That will change in about ten days, where I´ll join up with the masses.

Weather is late spring, high 70s maybe. There are still tons of flowers, red poppies, yellow bushes overflowing with flowers, and then the yellow, purple, orange, and white wildflowers that dot the fields. The camino went alongside a river for a few hours, and I got to practice my "rock-hopping" at about 5 or 6 crossings. Well, hopping is a stretch.

So, now with clothes washed and my blog done, all that´s left is to buy food for tomorrow and be thankful that I brought a second credit card (since I just learned that my first one was blocked because someone tried to use it). Tomorrow, my day is either 16 or 35 kms, it´ll just depend on how I feel when I get to that first town. 16 is too few and 35 too many, so I´ll just have to take second best.

Thanks for the many notes and good wishes, I am enjoying every single step, even those when I´m lost!

Nothing left to do but walk

The Camino gods were on my side for this terrible plane trip. Plane left Champaign 45 minutes late, meaning I had to run to catch my plane to Boston, which then sat on the runway in Chicago for almost an hour, which meant I had to get to Terminal E rapidamente as soon as I landed in Boston. Luckily, the AVIS bus driver was very nice and took pity on me, let me hop a ride over to Terminal E. I got there as the plane was boarding. Whew.

Then everything got smooth and worked like clockwork -- I´ve spent the day doing all those pre-Camino things like buying a phone, buying food and water for the walk, getting my credencial stamped at the Church of Santiago in Madrid. This church was not exactly an inspiring place to start a pilgrimage, as it was filled with images of St. James the Moorslayer. But I did find one large statue of St. James the Pilgrim, and spent my time near him instead of his alter-ego.

I walked about 12 km today, made it to the northern point of Madrid where the Camino takes off. So I´ll take the metro there tomorrow and start walking. Madrid seems prosperous and frenetic as usual, lot of newly refurbished old buildings, beautiful well tended gardens in parks everywhere. But there are a few signs that not all is well. The number of panhandlers is much greater, and they seem more aggressive. This morning a man and his teen-aged son came into a metro car, and the dad let loose with a long impassioned speech about his two years of unemployment and the evils of the system and the despair it brings. I´ve never seen something quite so "in your face" on the metro before.

One thing I was unable to do because of my frenetic plane chasing experience yesterday was buy a book for the Camino. But as all the peregrinos/pilgrims know, St. James tends to provide, and lo and behold, on my way to the Santiago church, I passed a used English book store (Calle Campomanes 15 for future reference). I bought two books, ignoring my inner voice telling me to not add more weight to my pack -- one, The Remains of the Day, I´ve been meaning to read for a long time, and it´s small and light. Then I went on a hunt for a fat book with small print (to get the maximum words/weight of book ratio possible). I don´t even remember the name, it´s some chick lit book that was No. 1 on the NYT list, so it will probably be just the thing for reading after a long day´s walk while resting the tootsies.

See the arrow on the bottom right side of the above picture?  It's the first arrow on the Camino de Madrid in Madrid!

So, here my long and babbling post ends. I hope to be on the Camino by 7:30 tomorrow and reach Colmenar El Viejo, about 27 km away, for the night. Only thing left to do is to go to the beautifully renovated Plaza de Olavide and sit in a cafe with my Camino friend Yolanda and eat some of the world´s best tortilla de patatas. I haven´t done that for at least 20 years!

The Best Laid Plans

I don't think I've ever stuck perfectly to a Camino itinerary, but I make one anyway. Since I live across the ocean, I have to buy a return ticket before I leave -- so some scheduling is necessary. And I admit it, I'm a planner. I like to play around with stages for walking, it gives me a better sense of security that I know where I'm going and when I should arrive in Santiago. It also allows me to make a reservation in my favorite little Santiago hotel, the Hotel Costa Vella. http://www.costavella.com/ And, on this trip, since some of my Spanish friends will come meet me for weekend walking, they need to know where to find me.

On this Camino, I've got four separate segments, and I've worked out tentative dates and places. So in case you're wondering where I am, here's a day by day. I plan to post here regularly and I'm sure there will be changes, but here's the basic idea. And by the way, the numbers in parentheses are kilometers, not miles. I may be a Camino addict, but I'm not a Camino maniac!

Camino de Madrid
Monday May 16 – arrive Madrid early morning, buy supplies, get credencial stamped at the Church of Santiago; see Camino friends
Tuesday, May 17 – Colmenar (27)
Wednesday, May 18 – Manzanares (16) (Happy Birthday, MARK!!)
Thursday, May 19 – Cercedilla (19)
Friday, May 20 – Segovia (31)
Saturday, May 21 – Santa Maria el Real (32)
Sunday, May 22 – Coca (22)
Monday, May 23 – Alcazaren (25)
Tuesday, May 24 – Simancas (31) (detour off Camino by bus to visit Vallodalid, sleep there)
Wednesday, May 25 – Bus back to Simancas late afternoon, walk 6 km to Cigunuela
Thursday, May 26 – Castromonte (23)
Friday, May 27 – Medina de Rioseco (13)
Saturday, May 28 – Villalon (27)
Sunday, May 29 – Sahagun (30-35???)

Camino Frances
May 30-June 5 – 7 days walking on Frances, Sahagun to Ponferrada (I'm familiar with this route and can play it by ear here , about 170 km with a stop in Leon)

Camino de Invierno, starting in Ponferrada
Monday, June 6 – Las Medulas (28) (Happy Birthday MOM!)
Tuesday, June 7 – Barco de Valdeorras (26)
Wednesday, June – A Rua (14)
Thursday, June 9 – Quiroga (28)
Friday, June 10 – Monforte (33)
Saturday, June 11 – Chantada (29)
Sunday, June 12 – Rodeiro (27)
Monday, June 13 – Laxe (27)
Tuesday, June 14 – Ponte Ulla (34)
Wednesday, June 15 – into Santiago (16?) (Hotel Costa Vella)

Camino de Fisterre/Muxia
Thursday, June 16 – Day 1 on Finisterre/Muxia route – Negreira
Friday, June 17 – Day 2 – Olveiroa
Saturday, June 18 – Day 3 – Muxia
Sunday, June 19 – Day 4 – Fisterre
Monday, June 20 – back to Santiago (Hotel Costa Vella)
Tuesday, June 21 – to Madrid
Wednesday, June 22 – HOME

One week from tomorrow and I'm off!

The Camino de Invierno

Although it isn't an "officially recognized" Camino, the Camino de Invierno goes south of the well known Camino Frances. For me, it has two advantages. First, it goes through some spectacular parts of Galicia, like the Sil River Gorge, which Joe and I visited about 4 or 5 years ago. And second, it avoids the crowds/masses/hoards of the last 100 kilometers of the Camino Frances.

I know several people who have been the intrepid trailblazers, and I now have a good guide written by some fellow peregrinos, who should get a scout badge for Public Service to the Camino. I hope to walk this pretty stretch in about 10 days, as my third stage of this walk, arriving in Santiago on June 15.

And I almost forgot a third attraction of the Camino de Invierno -- lots of beautiful romanesque architecture!

A week and a half to go

If you look closely, you can see my route, or most of it. From Madrid up to where it ends, then turn left past Leon and Astorga. Unfortunately, my next route, the Camino de Invierno isn't on this map, but I'll see if I can find one. It heads over to Santiago after Astorga, staying north of Ourense, through a beautiful river gorge area of Spain, the Sil River gorge. Then to Santiago and on to Finisterre.
I copied this map from another pilgrim's blog, which I hope is legal.

Last year, my Via de la Plata blog had no pictures. THIS YEAR, I am trying to correct that problem. I've been spending time asking my Camino friends to help me learn to take pictures from the camera card onto the blog. And I may actually be able to do it. Stay tuned.

So, the prologue. This year, I am walking on four different, but connecting, Caminos. I will start in Madrid, and take the aptly named Camino de Madrid. It ends about 300 kms north of Madrid, in Sahagun.Sahagun is on the Camino Frances, the most popular and most crowded route. I will "turn left" at Sahagun and walk for another 170 kms to a small city with a Templar castle, Ponferrada. At that point, I will detour off and away from the crowds to take the almost unknown Camino de Invierno (the Winter Camino, so called because it goes south of one of the mountain passes on the Camino Frances and was an easier route to follow in winter). That's another 250 kms or so.

Finally, in Santiago, I will once again walk out to the "end of the world", Fisterre and on to Muxia, another coastal town, for my last four days of walking, the Camino de Fisterre.

I am not very good at placing photos in the midst of text, sorry for the bad design.

So, though this may be a somewhat shorter camino for me than usual, it has the real attraction of putting me on two very untraveled segments. According to friends who have walked on these routes, they are just beautiful. I can't wait!