Day 6 Triacastela to Sarria: From Blood, Sweat and Tears to the Fifth Dimension

For any non-boomers out there not privy to the references, yesterday we learned that what went up, had to come down. And today, it's up, up and away to Sarria with a 1000 ft ascent over the hill.

Up, up and away, but not at too steep a grade, praisethelord!

Living in East Tennessee has been great prep for this walk. Unlike England and Andorra, the grades here on climbing are very gentle and designed in a way that nearly any reasonably fit peregrino can achieve the goal of Santiago de Compostela. It was a very pretty walk as well through forests and farms punctuated by either fresh air or fresh cow poop. We walked amongst birch trees and forest roads with intermittent views down the valley toward our goal city of Sarria.

Was it black cow poop or white cow poop? Only Dan McCoig will get this reference. Paul explained it to me and it defies understanding!

Bovine love!

Seriously? A coke machine in the middle of nowhere? And it had a security camera.

 At the halfway point today, in Furela we stopped at a small bar/café called Casa de Franco for a cracker thin crust pizza and a diet soda. Heaven! It’s the only place for miles and really drew a crowd. From there we trekked on into Sarria, a town of approximately 15,000 sans pilgrims. It's an important hub for the pilgrimage as just beyond the city limits marks the 100km mark--the minimum for having the office in Santiago issue you a compostela document in Latin no less.  So many folks start their peregrinations here. And apparently, that pisses off the folks who started in Roncevalles to do the entire 33 day trek. We've not often encountered large crowds or had to walk for prolonged periods amongst them, but we are told that is likely to change tomorrow. We'll see!  After arriving and finding our hotel, the Alfonso IX, we went for the daily celebratory beer--this time a Mahon which was very tasty after 12 miles of hiking.   We were very pleased with our hotel after a couple of nights of cubicles, but it's always unnerving staying at a place named after someone who died in the town while walking the camino!

We soon our naps and then explored Sarria which is surprisingly Celtic in origin. I guess I should have noticed Galicia and Gaelic are the same word?😀 We walked up stairs into the old city which is footpath only. Although we saw the main cathedral, no visits were permitted as mass was in session. We continued upward to find the monastery of Mary Magdelene and get our "credential stamped."

Mary Magdelena Monastery.

From there, we saw the large city cemetery with crypts galore ala New Orleans and the remains of a castle, long since abandoned.

The city of Sarria from Castle Hill

Then it was off to dinner. Today we ate pizza and hamburgers. Oh well. Paul topped it off with his favorite dessert since we arrived--torta de Santiago, a moist almond cake that pretty much tastes exactly like my grandma's pound cake with a few almonds decorating it. We are very grateful for another lovely day, the strength and legs to walk it and the eyesight to enjoy all the amazing sights.
Some of the highlights were the scenery, the ferns and birches along the way and the vegetable gardens as we got closer to Sarria. There were also some surprises: A British artist with a watercolor gallery quite literally in the middle of the woods away from all towns. He appears to live below the gallery and be completely dependent on the passing peregrinos. The watercolors were beautiful, usually depicting scenes along the Way and some had inscribed scripture. He was quite personable and told us to watch for the ribbon of fog sitting on the city of Sarria as we descended the mountain. Other surprises: Amorous bovines, potato harvesters nearly in a fist fight, messages on rocks from passing pilgrims, and the soft drink vending machine smack dab in the middle of nowhere.

Daily meditation was on Plato. Paul's comment: Ahead of his time. I admire him for saying "do not repay evil with evil. Strive to always do good." That was in the BC time zone!


 Paul's Ponderings:  We hiked around 14 miles today, including extra stuff, from Tricastela to Sarria.  The guidebook said "steep" but compared to East Tennessee steep it was not so bad, with most of that coming out of Tricastela.   After that it was mostly forested paths of reasonable grade.   The day was pretty much cloudy all day with no rain, but the temperature stayed pleasant (mid 60s).   We were in Sarria by 1:30 pm and averaged about 2.8 mph despite the hills.   So, we stopped for about an hour in a café and had a snack before heading to the hotel.    For 14 miles, not too shabby.   Sarria is a lovely town of about 13,000 folks.   As such it's large compared to what we've seen since Leon.   As an editorial comment, I've noticed the following happening in rural Spain…very unusual to me.   Lou booked the lodgings in her name and when we show up they've been ready.   In typical European fashion, they take down your passport information and then finalize the check in process.  Despite the fact that she has paid for the lodging in her name, they ask me to sign the paperwork.   And it's pretty clear they want the man in the party to sign it too.   It's a bit odd to say the least, but we just roll with it.   I've never seen anything quite like this in the US, even though they often think I am "Lou" due to the androgynous name, although there is a quick recovery once they figure it out.  Our next two days are continued big mileage with around 14 and 15 miles coming up.  But, we are already 25 miles into a 100 mile foot trip, so once we pass those days, we are way beyond the halfway point. 

Salud y amor  on the walkway in front of the river Sarria



 Words  of encouragement from a passing peregrine to fellow pilgrims. Apparently some of the municipal dorms are not segregated, including showers. Paul found this inspirational slate

Day 5 O Cebreiro to Triacastela: Pilgrims in the Mists

The road ahead--like life--unknown and shrouded in mists"

O Cebreiro was a beautiful location and the beginning of my camino. And like a kid waiting for Christmas, I woke up at 5 AM in anticipation of the coming day...and couldn't go back to sleep. But that's okay. I have been planning this journey for 2 years. Ever since the day my friend, Elaine Lebas had watched the movie, The Way, and asked me if I would be willing to do the walk with her. Even though I didn't see the movie myself until about a year and half later, I was possessed with the thought of this ancient pilgrimage..walking the same steps that counterparts did in medieval Europe. And probably with a lot cushier surroundings, at that.
We got up at a decent hour, had our breakfast and hit the camino about 9 am. There weren't too many people starting. We were the "tweeners." After the early risers, before the bicyclists and those in need of a bit more sleep.

Misty morning Pablo at the second highest point of the day.

Before we went to bed Monday night, Paul read two things: (1) the weather forecast: sunny and clear and 72 degrees and (2) beautiful views from O Cebreiro to Alto de Poio, the highest spot of the day.

As you see here, maybe the weatherman here isn't so much better than the one at home :) and the views, although likely spectacular, weren't visible for the first several hours. We felt fortunate to get the beautiful views last night.

After hiking for an hour, we arrived at the statue of the pilgrim.

Monkey see, monkey do

And this is what we saw:

The view---fogged out on the top of the hike!

But we motored on. There were some uphill segments but the theme for the day was the 2000 feet of descent from 4400 feet to 2400 feet into Triacastela. It did clear visibly during the day.

Starting to clear about 11 am.

For the most part, we walked in solitude, enjoying the cool morning, the occasional breeze, the cows and dogs and the feel of light misty rains on our faces. Occasionally, we would pass a group and things would get loud for a few minutes until we passed by. They all seemed to be having fun and to be quite an international crowd. I knew we passed a group of about 12 Brits when I walked past a guy who said, "Right when I was walking out of the bleeding car park..." As we got close to Triacastela, our destination for the night, we also ran into a lot of folks forging their way to the rest stop...and the beers.

Paul in solitude

About noon, as we were fully in descent for a while, the sky cleared and we saw the beautiful hills and valleys.

Still trying to clear. Alot of this reminds us of the Appalachians. Ups and downs and green.

As good as it got!

Unlike the coast to coast trail across England or the hike across Andorra, we are sporadically passing through villages throughout the day. Today we passed through about 5 villages.At Hospital da Condesa, we stopped for a diet coke.  In one of them, a pensioner was making a living selling crepes on the camino. Paul bought one and it was yummy. We were able to stop in the village, As Pasantes for a beautiful lunch. These villages all most likely have well under a hundred people living there.

A lovely lunch at As Pasantes.

By lunch time, we were about 11.5 miles into our 14 mile trek. The lunch was a welcome respite from walking for about 45 minutes. Then we were off toward Triacastela. We could eventually see it from about 2 miles away.

Triacastela from the distance. White buildings and slate rooves. 

It definitely caused a smile for these pilgrims! Although we were not "weary," our legs were not opposed to the end of a happy trail.

All smiles at 13 miles!

We made our way into Triacastela. The name means three castles, but the best anyone can tell there are no castles. They may be gone, although there isn't a trace. Some scholars think it is a misinterpretation of words that mean instead "toward Castille." The town is home to about 900 people...about 900% more than the town of O Cebreiro.  We loved the whitewash buildings and the narrow lanes.

Triacastela

The church was unfortunately closed today :(

Triacastela's 18th century church: Iglesia de Santiago. It replaces a Romanesque structure. CLOSED today?

Casa David: Our gentle home for the evening

We found our way to our "hotel" for the evening: Casa David. We have a nice private cubicle of sorts with twin beds: Laura and Rob Petrie strike again! But we are so "blessed" to have it. Most of our campadres on the walk are sleeping in big open air dorms...full of snorers, farters ...wait, I guess it's no different here!

Our end of the walk daily tradition: Beer! And a book in this case. Paul peruses perambulations.

We then followed another tradition. Back to the room for a shower and a nap before dinner. We ate at a lovely place called Restaurante Esther which we highly recommend to the future peregrinos for the great food, exuberant service, low prices and the amazing view of the sunset.

We split a pilgrim meal which in most establishments is two courses for 10 euros. Here we have the charceuterie.

The day fading in Triacastela.

A wonderful Rioja wine. El Coto, the elk for about $10 US. You can get this in some parts of USA for same price.

Overall a very amazing day, a nice hike of 14 miles and at the end, the treasure of Triacastela, a village of 900 that we would never dream to visit any other way.  To quote Ina Garten: What's not to like?

Daily meditation: 

In two parts. We remembered my mom whose 90th birthday is today. She passed away in 2011. Paul remembered that she was still for the most part taking care of herself, doing her laundry and most household chores, active and attending her church until almost the day she died. He also was grateful that she came to our engagement party a few days before her passing. I remembered that my mom sewed toes into hose at a factory when we first moved to Chattanooga to pay my brother's college tuition and how determined she was that we get a good education. It's a gift that never stops paying off.

We then read about the namesake of the Camino, St. James, patron saint of Spain. Paul's observations were that he was beheaded by Herod. And that he was passionate about his beliefs. He correlated this to a recent event in Syria with the destruction of the ancient ruins of Palmyra. This site has been seen over by a professor for many years and when he refused to divulge any of its secret contents to ISIS, the cowards beheaded him and hung him from its columns. Paul said he had the courage of St. James.  My observation is that when Christ passed by James and his brother John fishing on the sea of Galilee with their father he said, "Come follow me." And they did. He had little to offer them other than a philosophy. Their father was reasonably well off for the day and they left to follow an itinerant preacher with no absolute credentials. How many of us today have the gonadal fortitude to leave everything behind to follow an idea? Courage indeed. We have very little reason to believe St. James was ever in Spain, but it is an honor and privilege  to walk in the beautiful way of ancient pilgrims honoring a man of valor.

PAUL'S PONDERINGS:

We started in mist and ended in sunshine, which is a great metaphor for the entire day.   The hike flew by -- 14 miles -- which I guess means we are in shape.   We were in Triacastela by 3 pm.   We'll see how the rest of it goes!   We watched the sun go down from the porch at Restaurant Esther, which is highly recommended.   We could not be luckier to be where we are right now, enjoying the moment.   Good walk, good food, good times, good fun.

We averaged about 2.9 mph walking, with a fair amount of steep downhill, which is a fairly brisk pace for 14 miles and change.   The overall descent was about about 2000 feet from the high point of the hike.   By 11:15 pm local, our feet and bodies felt pretty good after a good rest and dinner, which is a good sign.

Tomorrow has more ascent than today, so we'll see how it goes.   But, we are 14 miles into 100 as of this moment.

Note to Chad Helms:  I changed my shirt :-)

Weather continues to look promising for the rest of this week -- wish us continued luck!

Day 4: O Beautiful O Cebreiro

El Camino, here we come!

Considering that I often only garner about 40 hours sleep in a week, today was a luxury in so many ways, only one of which was a 7 hour night sleep in Leon. Whoo hoo! We enjoyed a breakfast next door at Bar Velasquez. (On the eve of my mom's birthday, please don't tell her I ate breakfast in a bar! But it was only 7 euros for Paul and me, so maybe her frugal nature would forgive me?)

Bar Velasquez...you could have a gin and tonic at breakfast, but we did not.

                         Paul had a hamburger for breakfast with a big fried egg on it. 

 Then we set to the task at hand--getting to our starting point: O Cebreiro. 

This is the sum total of O Cebreiro

Note to future hikers of the Camino. If you don't want to be a total slacker and start in Sarria (you must walk at least 100km to be considered a pilgrim and Sarria is the 100km mile marker.), don't choose O Cebriero (100 mile marker as opposed to the 100km marker)  as the starting point. Not because it is not quaint and lovely (it is) or the first town on the Way in Galicia (it also is) or nearest to the highest point of the Camino (once again, yes, that's it), but because it is danged hard to get here! There is no plane, train or autobus. The closest you can get on public transportation is a town below it about 6km away with a straight uphill hike. As slackers with a suitcase, we decided that was probably not going to work. So as complete dweebs, we elected to take a taxi…for 150km. Let's NOT talk about how much that cost us, but needless to say, we made it. Apparently, note to self, people start their partial treks in either Leon or Sarria for a darn good reason. 

The lovely cobblestone streets and slate buildings of O Cebreiro

But once we arrived, no complaints. This place is gorgeous. There is 270 degree view and if someone spun you around and you took a random look, it's all equally lovely. 

The other side of the valley looked just as nice.

Thatched roof

The village predates the Romans in the region and consists of about 20 buildings total, all built of stone with thatched or slate rooves.

Typical slate building and roof

There isn't much except the preRomanesque church, a few eating establishments and a few rooms here and there and the alburgure--the open sleeping dorms for the non-slacker pilgrims. We walked out from the "hotel" and saw a lot of wildflowers in addition to the valley view.  Even though we live in mountains, we rarely get this open of a vista outward. 

one of many mountain wildflowers

Looking out the valley through the wildflowers

We trekked back to the 9th century church which is famous for its chalice--supposedly has some relationship to the holy grail and is credited for saving the lives of the parishoners in a blizzard in 1200 AD, it's baptismal font from the 18th century and somewhere that we could not find, there is yet another piece of the holy cross of Jesus. Overall, a very historic church called Sanctuario de Santa Maria a Real do Cebreiro. When I get that old, I can only hope to look half as good.  

Maybe I will look this good when I am 1200 yrs old?

The Holy Grail of O Cebreiro

18th century baptismal font

We then had a little lunch at one of the bars and tried the Galician pie. Portion size is somewhere between East Tennessee obesity size and downright embarassing.

A lot like an empanada but with tuna! Paul also loves the almond cake and ate it lunch and dinner!

Another

18th century baptismal font

Belly up to the bar, pilgrim!

thing we noticed, that would probably NOT happen in east Tennessee, is that they actually put a religious pilgrim emblem on the beer taps!

Our meditation for today was by Ralph Marston about appreciating the moments we are in. GOOD advice for an upcoming 100 mile walk.  I also saw many Bibles in the church and they were all turned to the same passage: Paraphrase is that Jesus observed that Jewish texts said to love God. But he gave a "new commandment." LOVE ONE ANOTHER. And he commented, "That's how other people will know you are my followers." It's good advice for all of us. Spend each day showing love. (Maybe some religious FACEBOOK posters should read this before they write!) 

Paul's Ponderings:   We slept in once again while in Leon and then took a long taxi ride to O Cebreiro.   Unfortunately, this place is very remote and not easy to reach.   It's also nearly the highest point on the Camino, missing that distinction by about 5 meters.    There's not a lot of here here to paraphrase that old saying.   The town has about 70 inhabitants at most.   The good news is that if we are at the high point on the Camino, we have mostly downhill to go!    This place is pretty stunning from a view perspective, with a very wide view of both sides of the valley for miles and miles.   That said, it's supposed to get down to in the 40s tonight, so we are glad we brought jackets and such.   The weather the next few days is supposed to be mid 70s during the day and 50s at night though, so all is good.   Wish us luck!

Day 3, Leon: Trains, Tapas, and Paul's dad's name to boot!

The ancient Roman wall of Leon

This morning, we got up in Madrid and made our way to Chamartin station for a high speed train ride to Leon. For the most part, we departed the vestiges of cities and travelled across arid Meditteranean topography with mountains in the distance. The closer we got to Leon, the more fields of corn and sunflowers we saw and the mountains got closer. It was a gray day with threat of rain.  As we got closer to Leon, things got progressively more green outside. After only about 2.5 hours, we reached our destination.

It looks like Paul didn't enjoy his train ride, but I think it's more about the camera. He enjoyed a good long inner eyelid inspection on the way here. Our seat mate had a cute little part terrier mutt that kept getting out of his carrier and inspecting my feet and legs.

Leon is not a popular city for tourists, we are told, but I liked to just fine. The Camino de Santiago passes through it and we walked the length of it  as it passes through. It's a city of about 140,000 people and it is steeped in history and churches. 

Our hotel here was the Eurostars which at about 45EUROS per night, we found to be clean and the staff helpful and the beds are quite comfy. There's even AC even though we didn't need it. In fact, Paul and I soon donned jackets after our arrival. This is the view outside our room. We started with sunshsine but  spent most of the day in a slight spit of rain.

One of the reasons Leon is in this location is that The River Bernesga passes through the center of the city. A good water source in ancient times, it is a source of renewable hydroelectric power now, although the dams are hardly "east Tennessee" size. 

The city is home to a number of churches including the Basilica San Isidro pictured here, the main cathedral and the Monastery of San Marcos. Most of the churches were closed to tourists today, since they were celebrating mass. But we were able to go inside San Isidro

It was quiet and we took a good look around the sanctuary. We sent up a prayer for our friend, Tommy, who luckily found out yesterday that his lung cancer is probably resectable. So for thank we had to say a thanks.

Alas, however, we were struck by the hunger bug and someone in this group whose name shall remain a secret (but it rhymes with mall), gets "hangry," so we found a gastropub called Clandestina. It was all about good food, but pretty. We had some fish, pasta with mushrooms and a deconstructed Ceasar salad (what else do you have inside a Roman wall?) For dessert, we had this "false mandarins with coconut ice cream." The coconut ice cream was some sort of liquid nitrogen creation that looked like dippin dots surrounded by a cold orange slurry. The oranges in the middle--FAKE!  But the dessert was tasty and a feast to the eyes --as long as you didn't bite into the plastic...okay, I admit it. I bit into the plastic. 

We continued walking along the St. James Way. This is our first day to see it, although we don't start the walk in earnest until Tuesday morning. We saw a few pilgrims, but maybe less than we expected. One Asian man was carrying a tripod which Paul says is evidence that it isn't that steep. Hope he doesn't have any words to eat! They have made it fairly easy to find the way through town with yellow arrows and the scallop shells implanted into the side walk. The scallop shell is the sign of the peregrino.

We walked past the old fort of San Marcos which has been many things over the years including a concentration camp during the Spanish Civil War. But now it is city museum of Leon and the Parador Hotel. For those who saw the movie, The Way, you will remember Martin Sheen becoming a slacker one night at the Parador. Apparently the rooms are all very unique. 

The beginnings of the structure were in the 16th century and it was built to house the Military Order of St James. It's been a hostelry of sorts since the 1920s with the current hotel management owning it for the last 50 years. It is magnificent to see night or day. 

We made up our minds to come here for dinner later in the day...really later as in about 9pm. There were diners still arriving at 11pm when we left. Oh how Paul loves Spain. It's his kind of dining.

Entry way to the Parador, a site of war, pilgrims, concentration camps, friars, military men and now peregrinos of the St James Way.

We went back to our hotel for a few minutes of my favorite Spanish tradition, SIESTA, and returned to the Parador for the evening meal. What is nice about the restaurant is that they specialize in food from the region of Leon. We had ox carpaccio, gazpacho and shrimp croquettes. We enjoyed a lovely wine from Leon with it and topped it off with great dessert pictured below.

All in all, a great day and we managed to walk about 7 miles and get acquainted with Leon. Most of the touristy places were closed since it is Sunday, but we didn't mind. The stroll through the many plazas, along the river and through the old Roman walls was refreshing, even in a drizzle. And the food didn't suck either. 

Our meditation for today was about Noah of the Old Testament and the flood. Paul says he learned Noah was a man of faith. He likes him because his name is used with the first Biblical reference to wine. If Noah had vinyl this would be a match made in heaven. I remember learning about Noah as a child in Sunday school. What he taught me then and now is follow your own path. Only you know the truth as your heart allows you to become aware. Keep the faith!

Paul's Ponderings:
Headed to Leon today from Madrid....we had a 2.5 hour ride on a high speed train, which went well and arrived at the Eurostars Leon Hotel afterwards.  Leon is a fairly good sized town and full of historic churches and squares but very walkable.  We had fabulous tapas for lunch at Clandestino -- a very modern place with fabulous modern tapas.   We then walked a bit of the St. James Way around town and ended up back at the hotel for a nap, followed by a great meal at the Parador Hotel, which dates back to the early 1920s.  One thing is that it is quite cool here and blustery -- jacket weather!  Quite a change from Knoxvegas!