Spain

Camino XII: Strange Bedfellows

/ Benjamin Barnabas / Leave a comment

The pilgrims at the albergue talked a lot of game about getting on the road for 5.30am this morning, but when I was out the door today I was the first to leave by some twenty minutes at least. No matter how Spanish I feel sometimes, the Englishman in me is a stickler for a prompt schedule. On the plus side, I did pretty much have a room to myself last night, so I had a very good night’s sleep for once.

It was a cold start, and the sunrise when it came was a full fifteen minutes later than it was last Thursday – a sign that the year is already beginning to turn. Wandering alone gave me plenty of time to stop and enjoy the stillness, though, with the result that this morning was possibly one of the most magical I’ve had on the Camino so far.

I waited for dawn at the top of a small rise just beyond a tree-lined arroyo, where a flock of noisy bee-eaters were calling unseen somewhere downriver. The sunflowers in the fields were already facing east, and I let a number of pilgrims pass me by as I stood and waited. I counted four or five buzzards and kites heading out on a morning hunt and listened out for the distant sound of a quail, a less frequent accompaniment to the Camino as I leave the central plains of the meseta behind.

Finally, the warm glow beyond the horizon erupted into sunlight, saturating the sunflowers behind me with reddish light. I’ve got more photos of sunflowers now than I know what to do with, but it was totally worth it. Sometimes you have to stop on the Camino and wait for moments like these. You can tune out the two-tone crunch of gravel under your feet pretty easily, but you mustn’t tune out the rest of the world you walk through. It’s a soul-seeking pilgrimage, not a hike!

Passing through the mud-brick houses and hobbit holes of Moratinos, you leave the plains of Castilla behind and enter país leonés. And I say país (country) because of the fierce nationalism of the Leonese, whose old and bitter rivalry with their Castilian neighbours is more than obvious if you look below the self-help scrawls and incessant Welsh nationalism on the Camino waymarkers (we get it already!):

It was a similar story across the border in Burgos…

Castilla y León were merged in 1983, with the three Leonese provinces of Salamanca, Zamora and León joining the six territories of Castilla La Vieja (Old Castile) – excluding Santander and Logroño which elected to become autonomous regions of their own (Cantabria and La Rioja respectively). The Leonese have a strong regional identity and there are many who still believe the merge was a mistake, and that the Leonese territories should constitute their own autonomous community. An article in El País from earlier this year claims there are political differences at the heart of it, too. I’ve yet to pose that question to a local, but now that I’m in Leonese country – and they certainly have stronger feelings on the subject than the Castilians – I’ll see if I can’t do a little digging.

It’s little things like that which make for great inspiration. A lion sprayed in purple on a wall in Salamanca with the slogan ‘país leonés’ back in 2015 was what gave me the idea to make León, not Castile, the dominant power in my Spanish saga. If I don’t find a similar icon graffitied somewhere else over the next week or so, I’ll be surprised.

After a brief tortilla y zumo stop in Sahagún, the first Leonese town across the border with fellow pilgrim Bridgette, I made the decision to take the alternative route to the north via the Via Traiana, the old Roman road to the gold mines in Astorga. It meant a later arrival at my destination – and a considerable shade deficit – but I’m never one to turn down a challenge, and after a very sociable day on the Camino yesterday, paradoxically, I wanted a quiet one to myself. The heart wants what it wants, I guess!

The rest of the trek to Calzadilla de los Hermanillos has to be made beneath a blazing midday sun. I had plenty of suncream for the journey, but I left my sunglasses in Carrión a few days back and for once I found myself in need of them (they mostly sat unused on my head for the greater part of last week). I met only one other traveller on the road, a timid Irishman shielded from the glare by long sleeves and a sun hat who asked for the distance to Calzadilla in broken Spanish. Fighting through the last eight kilometres of scrubland, I kept my spirits up with a number of African walking songs my old drumming master taught me in my university days: Siyahamba, Uchikala, ba Tata. I might not be able to share them with the kids at school anymore, but there’s nothing to stop me enjoying them out on a march here in the open country.

It was uplifting singing my heart out in the woods, and I hardly noticed the blazing sun or the distance shrinking away at my feet. The kites and stonechats that accompanied me from forest’s edge must have thought me quite the unusual pilgrim – Spanish afternoons are decidedly not a time for jubilation. Perhaps that’s an old superstition about Pan, the Greek god of the wilderness, who legend has it would be angered by noise at midday. Or perhaps it’s just common sense!

Anyway, I’m here in Calzadilla de los Hermanillos. It’s a tiny frontier town, reminiscent of a Wild West set-up, with most of the townhouses clustered along both sides of the old Roman road. I’ve had a shower, washed my clothes, stocked up on supplies for tomorrow and packed accordingly. Now that the other French pilgrims staying here have quietened down, I’ll put my phone to charge and do a little reading before bed. Tomorrow is another day, and it would be good to meet up with the other pilgrims again. I’m somewhat doing my own thing this time, but a balance would be no bad thing. BB x

Camino XI: Sunflower State

/ Benjamin Barnabas / Leave a comment

It’s taken four days, but I’ve finally caught up with a “scene” – fellow pilgrims I can vibe with, that is. One of the strange constants of the Camino is the difference a single day can make. For three days I’ve stayed in hostels that were almost empty. After doing two days’ walking in one, for the last two nights I’ve been all but rubbing shoulders. I guess that mad 45km trek to Carrión yesterday paid off. Falling in and out of sync on the Camino can completely alter your experience.

Yesterday was a long day. After starting at 5.50am and reaching Carrión by 3.30pm, I had barely finished my blog for the day when I was swept along to Vespers, then a musical meet-and-greet, then Mass, before tracking down dinner in a nearby hostal. I was bloody efficient, even if my feet were killing me!

In summary, Carrión de los Condes is a must, and the Albergue Parroquial de Santa María totally lived up to its expectations as a highlight of the Camino. The nuns who serve at the albergue were not just the friendliest community I’ve met so far, they also got the guitars out and led all the pilgrims and the visiting Christian youth mission group, Jatari, in a singalong welcome event. A really unique Camino night and definitely one you should try not to miss!

If yesterday morning’s early start was a shock to the system after a few sluggish days, this morning was a full gear up. I was up at five when people started moving around, but within five minutes they’d all packed up and gone, stripping the beds and everything. I was still thinking of taking a rest day in Carrión at this point, but seeing the conviction of the other pilgrims gave me a boost and so I strapped on my sandals, pre-applied some blister plasters (prevention is better than cure) and set out.

Only this time, for once, not alone! My first companion on the road today was Carlos, a translator from Baja California, who walked with me until at least as far as the legendary food van (which I completely overlooked – one for next time). I defaulted to Spanish and we talked about the importance of sign language for a bit.

Along the way we fell into step with an American mother and daughter from Virginia, Elaine and Catherine, one powering on ahead, one following at a distance behind. I was asked why I’m on the Camino, which requires the full ten minute story about my grandfather José, but I’m getting pretty good at telling that story by now. At my merciless pace I ended up in step with Elaine and we came to a stop a couple of hours in to allow Catherine to catch up.

While waiting I met Alan, a Dreamer from Britanny, who had received enlightenment on the Camino in the form of a dream to set up his own donativo (donation-based hostel) back home in France. We swapped in and out of French and English where necessary, until bumping into another American, Chris from Wisconsin, and switching back to full English just before Calzadilla, where I was able to use a little Portuguese to order my first tortilla breakfast of the Camino from the Brazilian owners of the Camino Real bar.

Seriously, a humongous thank you to all the language teachers I’ve had over the years. Days like today make me remember how much I owe the lot of you!

The late breakfast stop was a real culture shift from the last three days of bombing it without stopping to the next albergue. I must have spent an hour shooting the breeze with some of my companions from the morning’s walk!

From Calzadilla, the remaining nine kilometres of the road marches past more sunflowers than I’ve ever seen in my life. With the sun at my back, as it almost always is on the Camino (if you’re walking in the morning, which is when you should get most of it done), the sunflowers were practically beaming at us the whole way, like fans cheering on a racer. None of them reached the height of my mother’s steroid sunflower (fed on a bizarre animal feed), but there was enough variety to resemble a crowd.

Basic high-school metaphors aside, they were a welcome sight after three days of wheat fields. 53% of the photos I took today are of sunflowers, which definitely makes sense.

One of the pilgrims today said walking the Camino was like following the seasons, which each stage a different time of year. I guess the meseta is the height of summer. One thing is certain: as the Camino pushes always westwards, you do always have the sun at your back. If you should get lost, it’s a safe bet that as long you position yourself with the sun behind you, you’ll find your way back to the road eventually. Perhaps that puts all of in a sort of sunflower state, looking for the sun every morning and keeping it at our backs. It would certainly be pretty merciless to do the reverse and walk into it for six hours a day!

Shortly before Lédigos I caught up with my final companion for the day, Bridgette from Brisbane. By this point it was nearly twelve and the sun was beginning to work on us like an anvil, so when she suggested stopping for a drink before the last three kilometres I was more than game. A quick pit stop turned into a three hour rest over iced tinto de verano, and I was in no hurry to move, even when the clock threatened half past three and Bridgette considered a fifth glass of wine. But eventually we got a move on and cleared the last three kilometres to Terradillos in less than twenty minutes, to find the albergue less than half full, meaning we could snag an empty room. It just goes to show that arriving early isn’t always necessary! Though I expect it will become more of a thing as we get closer to Galicia…

It’s good to have company at last. It will make for less reflective and more anecdotal blogging, but that’s probably good for me and for you too, dear readers! After all, there’s only so many times I can spin a yarn about Montagu’s harriers and vast skies… BB x

Camino X: Carry On, Carrión

/ Benjamin Barnabas / Leave a comment

I’m here in Carrión de los Condes, a full day ahead of schedule. So much for not rushing this time. It was definitely not my intention to walk nearly fifty kilometres today, but here we are. At the very least, I think it’s safe to say I have put one of the more tedious stretches of the meseta behind me. My feet might be killing me, but silver linings and all that.

I got my comeuppance for being an early riser in Burgos this morning. By five o’clock half the dorm was already up and about, so at 5.15am I gave up trying to doze away the hour and got my things together. I’d had the foresight to buy breakfast the day prior, before a wander up to Castrojeríz’s ruined castle (as if I hadn’t walked enough already), so I chowed down on a Bolycao (childhood classic) and set off into the darkness.

One definite plus to setting out before dawn was the climb up the side of Mostelares, a steep banked plateau guarding the road to Itero. In the late morning sun I’m sure it would have been a sweaty, unforgiving affair, but with the sun still below the horizon (and the help of my trusty stick) it was relatively easy. I overtook the only other pilgrims on the road, bade farewell to the army of wind turbines blinking like distant artillery fire in the distance, and put Castrojeríz behind me.

A large riverside grove before Itero de la Vega broke the monotony of the wheat-fields for a bit (Theresa May could get seriously naughty in this part of the world), and I caught a glimpse of a deer between the Lorien-esque rows of birch trees. A talkative group of five Spanish women were on my tail by this point, so I let them overtake and take the clickity-clack of their guiri sticks with them. I’m not sure what their real name is in English, but my kids in Extremadura used to call them palos guiri and the name has stuck.

After Itero, the usual stop is Boadilla del Camino, but it was not even 10am so I decided to press on (this is becoming a running theme). The Camino follows the Canal de Castilla until Frómista, which was a welcome change of scenery, if a little bizarre in the middle of the meseta. I’m not sure the local wildlife knows quite what to make of it: I heard the odd reed warbler and saw a flock of lapwings land in a nearby field, but other than that it was an eerily quiet waterway, as man-made imitations of natural things often are. God is not mocked.

Frómista was… a strange place. It felt decidedly more like an urbanización than a town per se. I arrived around 11.15, two hours too early for most of the albergues which habitually re-open around 13.00-14.00 after a lightning quick clean. A couple of merry storks did their beak-clicking ceremony as I reached the town centre, but I got a strange vibe from the place and decided not to linger. Perhaps it was the fact that all the albergues would be shut for another two hours, or maybe it was the fact that the one recommended by all the guidebooks had so many vitriolic one-star reviews on Google complaining about the rudeness of the hostalero.

Whatever it was, a madness took me, and I decided to try my luck in the next town along.

Big mistake. Población de Campos is only a few kilometres on from Frómista, but by now it was noon and the midday sun was up. After an uninspiring slog along the side of a main road – the first of many – I dropped in on the first option, Albergue La Finca.

Well, there wasn’t any dust on the tables, and there were some papers on the front desk that looked recent, but that was about it. The garden looked as though it had seen better days, the gate was slightly ajar and there were no cars in the drive – or peregrinos, for that matter. I rang the doorbell a few times, waited, and then moved on to try my luck with the albergue municipal.

I didn’t fare much better there. The sign was missing, and after a brief search I found it stashed behind a bush. I decided to ask at the nearby hotel, where the kindly dueña informed me that, sadly, both albergues were closed for renovations. I could try at Villamentero, another 5km up the road. Her own Hotel would have set me back 40€, which isn’t ludicrously steep, but on the Camino that sum equates to five nights in an albergue, so I had to pass it up politely.

At this point, I got it into my head to push on all the way to Carrión. A stupid idea, but with prospects along the road ahead looking bleak, and zero desire on my part to backtrack to Frómista, the idea slowly began to seem more and more logical. and, I’ll admit, the whimsical desire to say I’d carried on to Carrión ultimately tipped the scales.

Cue the most tedious stretch of the Camino so far. Fifteen kilometres and three hours of featureless roadside walking. I guess this is what everyone was referring to when they said the meseta could drive a man mad. I clocked a couple of occelated lizards somewhere near Villalcázar – the enormous green buggers are unmistakeable – and claimed a bustard feather, but beyond that, and the chafing pain of my seriously overworked feet, I was genuinely counting the mileage signs all the way to Carrión.

When it finally appeared on the horizon, with the mountains of León in the background, I could have done a somersault out of relief – only, I don’t think I’ve ever been athletic enough for such a feat, and it would have been the death of my feet anyway. So I contented myself with a hallelujah and used the last of my reserves to power on past the silos and into the promised land.

Somebody up there was looking out for me today. A merciful blanket of cloud covered me all the way from Población de Campos, and when I reached Carrión, the Albergue Santa María still had beds going spare. The shower that followed was never more welcome, nor felt so good.

It seems very busy all of a sudden up here. I guess I was one day behind the crowd. Perhaps I’ll meet some of the younger peregrinos tonight. It would make a change from three days of walking the Camino alone. But let’s just see how things pan out! BB x

Camino IX: Sticks and Stones

/ Benjamin Barnabas / Leave a comment

I spoke too soon last night. Around five o’clock, not too long before Lourdes, the hostalera, set off for home for the night, a bearded Frenchman arrived de la nada and set down his kit for the night. Antoine, from the town of Évian-les-Bains (of bottled fame), had walked a hell of a way to get to San Bol: not only had he walked a whopping 45km from Atapuerca that morning (bypassing the city of Burgos entirely), but he had started his Camino from his front door, making this his eighth week on the road. I’ve only ever met one other pilgrim on such a trek, a real rag-and-bones German who had gone for a walk with his dog and kept on going. Antoine, however, looked as though he had only set out yesterday. It was as good an excuse as any to practise my French, which isn’t nearly as rusty as I thought (though I did have to think how to say the number seventy-five), and it was good to hear a fresh perspective on what’s going on in France right now from a Frenchman.

I watched the sunset over the meseta from the porch and ended up having a very engaging chat with a local man from Iglesias with the most original name of Porfirio Celestino. He had come up on his bike to see if the new trees had grown in this spot, but also to check on his beehive, which he had been told to rejig by an expert. We had a laugh about our shared experiences as teachers and tried to outdo each other’s collection of oldy-worldy names like Araceli, Guadalupe and Diosgracias (the latter being my great-great grandfather’s Christian name). I think I won with the latter, he laughed so heartily. Wouldn’t you, if your parents named you Thanks-Be-To-God?

I allowed myself a later start this morning. Later being 7.45am, which is a perfectly respectable time to set out. The sunrise was nothing short of magical, and it was all I could do not to linger longer. I can’t recommend the Albergue de San Bol more highly. It was a perfect introduction to the Meseta and blissfully immersive. A partridge climbed up onto one of the many piles of rocks to serenade the valley as I set out, the twin flags of Spain and Iglesias fluttering in the cool morning breeze. There are lots of piles of rocks like that around. I guess they’re removed periodically from the fields to make plowing considerably easier.

Hontanas was deceptively distant. I would have found it quite a slog under the midday sun had I attempted it yesterday, but in the morning light it was a very pleasant walk. Wild flowers line the luminous Camino right the way across the Meseta, adding dashes of crimson, cornflower blue and violet to the shimmering seas of gold.

At one point, high on the plateau above Hontanas, I seemed to be absolutely surrounded by quails. I couldn’t see a single one – they’re tiny, incredibly well-camouflaged and very rarely flush when cornered – but I could hear them all around. Their three-stop whistle can carry for as far as a mile, but if you can hear their childlike ‘—aauWAH’ it’s a good sign that they’re nearby. Quails and turtle doves are fast becoming the soundtrack to the meseta, and that puts a serious spring in my step.

I’ve passed a couple of roadside graves today (not pictured for obvious reasons). They were quite a common sight on the first couple of days of the Camino, where the mountain pass can be dangerous under the wrong conditions, and tended to be Asian or Latin American in origin. Out here in the middle of the Camino, however, the meseta proves a challenge that isn’t always insurmountable, claiming Spaniards and even the hardy Dutch. I try to say a small prayer at each one I pass. By the looks of the painted stones at their feet, I’m not the only one.

Hontanas seems to be a magnet for pilgrims. A sizeable number had stopped for breakfast at the first café, leaving the road ahead clear. I had only a few cents left in my wallet, but I still spent a good ten minutes there, though that was because I caught sight of a little owl perched on the wire opposite the café. I deliberately didn’t bring my camera as it would have been one belonging too many on the road, but I regretted that decision more than once today – my phone camera simply doesn’t do justice to the beautiful little thing!

After Hontanas the Camino crosses and then follows a wooded stream for a couple of miles. Here, once again, I came across one of my favourite sights of the route: the silver, scythe-like wings of a harrier. It caught me completely by surprise as I came up a low hill, and I could see the yellow rings of its eyes before it jinked and soared away down the valley.

I thought I’d lost him, loitering for a few minutes to see if I could spot where he went, but not five minutes later I saw him up ahead, quartering the valley floor. Kites are graceful, but harriers – especially the silver-grey males – are in a whole other league, drifting over the fields like black-fingered phantoms. He disappeared behind the trees as I drew near, and then re-appeared clutching a fair length of straw in his talons, to take back to his nest in the wheat-fields, no doubt.

Some things, I guess, are worth going solo for. Seriously, I could get used to encounters such as these.

At the end of the valley, the road cuts right through the imposing ruins of the Monasterio de San Antón. So cleanly, in fact, that the main road runs beneath two of its great stone arches. There’s a tiny albergue here and a chance for a bonus stamp (at last!), but I was quite content to just explore for a bit, not being in any particular hurry.

There are plenty of old churches along the Camino, but this ruined monastery is rather special – not least of all because of the way its hollow windows open out onto the endless blue of the Castilian skies beyond. I’m going to run out of adjectives for the sky long before I’m clear of the meseta, because it’s my constant traveling companion, but I’ll do my best to keep it original!

Best of all, they had a box outside the albergue for unwanted objects to take away. I’ll have a few of my own to offer before long, but my eyes lit upon a beautiful Aragonese walking stick from Ordesa National Park. I’ve blown the dust off it and put it to good use. With any luck – if it isn’t pinched along the way – it will take me to Santiago, and perhaps beyond.

From the monastery, the hilltop castle of Castrojeríz comes immediately into view. It’s still a good hour’s walk until you reach the town proper, but it has to be one of the most scenic approaches of the Camino so far. I offered to take a photo for three Japanese pilgrims and they repaid the favour, meaning I will have at least one photo to show I walked the Camino this summer!

Well now, I’m here in Castrojeríz, and the kindly hospitalera has just returned from the hospital in Burgos. Her husband, with whom she runs the albergue, is currently walking the Camino himself. After a very light dinner last night I treated myself to a menu del día at a local mesón-restaurante. The barman must have clocked my La Mancha shirt because he brought out a lovely red wine from Tomelloso, just down the road from my family’s home. They didn’t have any sopa castellana – apparently it’s too hot for that – but the salmorejo he recommended was fantastic. So don’t worry, Mum, I’m eating very well out here!

I’ve showered, made the bed and claimed another stamp, so now that I’ve finished writing I’ll have a short siesta before buying supplies and exploring the hilltop castle this evening. What a perfect routine! BB x

Camino VIII: Lonely Oasis

/ Benjamin Barnabas / Leave a comment

I’ve heard various accounts of the pilgrim road across the Meseta. It is so often described as the most arduous stretch of the Camino, skipped by those pilgrims who find its endless expanses of featureless wheat fields uninspiring and/or dull. A dear friend and former companion on the road wrote to me yesterday, calling it “demotivating and mentally draining”. So I haven’t come out here under any illusions.

I’m only one day in, so I haven’t yet got the full flavour of the Meseta. But I’ll tell you what it has in abundance: silence. Spain isn’t a country that is known for peace and quiet – quite the opposite, in fact, being a regular contender for Europe’s loudest country – but if there is a corner of the kingdom where silence is as golden as the fields over which it presides, this is

It should be said, setting off a full hour before daybreak probably didn’t help (yes, I am definitely that pilgrim). The others in the hostel in Burgos must have found my coming-and-going at a quarter past five in the morning frustrating, though I did what I could to soften my steps. I would have thought I had learned my lesson last time, but for whatever reason I’m still working on the assumption that most places fill up quickly around midday.

Burgos was softly lit by a clouded moon as I took my leave of the Cid’s city. Beside the storks, those speechless sentinels of Spanish skies, I only saw two other living things on my way out: a street-sweeper hosing down the steps above the cathedral, and a solitary Japanese peregrino who took a wrong turn. Everyone else with half a brain – the city’s entire population and the rest of the pilgrims on the trail, for that matter – was still in bed, enjoying a few hours’ more sleep.

The sun was up by the time I reached the outskirts of Villalba de Burgos, the first stop on the road. Still no pilgrims, but the Guardian Civil made a couple of appearances as they patrolled the road in their car. Here I took my leave of the Arlanzón river, stopping only to refill my water bottle at a park fountain and to listen to the flute-song of a golden oriole concealed somewhere within the poplar trees.

The Meseta begins to unravel in earnest after the sleepy town of Tardajos, which I imagine presents a good introduction of what is to come. Half the town seems deserted, and this time that has little to nothing to do with the time of day. Squat, single-storey townhouses rub shoulders with taller, more modern homes, though in some cases it is just as much the latter that have their windows boarded up as the former.

I stopped at Rabé de las Calzadas to see if the local church were open. No luck. It looks as though the parish priest serves multiple towns, celebrating Mass first at one church and then another. You can sometimes get stamps in these spots, but it’s really candles I’m looking for – when I can, I like to say a prayer for my grandfather and great-grandparents, for whom I walk this road. They say the reason is that pilgrims would probably try to sleep in them for free and might not be as respectful of their lodging if they did. Which is understandable. So far this year, I’ve only found one I could enter. I’ll keep looking, though.

It’s a steep climb after Rabé up into the Meseta proper. The last green hills of Burgos give way to a sea of gold, unbroken at eye level but towered over by a host of wind turbines that make the place a dry parody of the North Sea: similarly featureless, though a great deal warmer.

I’m getting the feeling this is all coming across as rather maudlin. For a nature lover like me, however, this is bliss. If you can put a name to the sights and sounds around you, you’re never truly alone.

Since leaving Burgos, I’ve been accompanied most of the way by the friendly two-tone song of the stonechat. Families of three – a parent and two fledgelings – seem to pop up everywhere, unbothered by my passing in their tireless search for food. Warblers of every kind – willow, Sardinian, fan-tailed and Cetti’s – sing from the hedgerows, signalling the presence of a river long before it comes into view. Corn buntings, wagtails and jolly wheatears pop in and out of sight between the wheatsheafs. Swifts, swallows and martins fill the empty villages with sound, and hoopoes add a flash of brilliant black-and-white when disturbed in the parks and gardens along the way. In the vast Castilian skies, storks, kites, ravens and solitary griffons are a constant presence, and in the fields below, quail and turtle dove sing unseen, their purrs and whistles keeping the silence at bay. And butterflies of every colour and size are so abundant there’s a very real danger of stepping on them.

On the plateau above Hornillos, I even caught a glimpse of one of my favourite creatures of all: the slender, ghostly shape of a male Montagu’s harrier, quartering the fields like a runaway birdscarer. I haven’t seen one of those since my time in Extremadura, where they find the vast emptiness much to their liking.

I’ve come to a halt in arguably the strangest stop of the Camino so far. Falling prey to my own hubris, as I am often wont to do, I left Hornillos behind and pressed on to what several guidebooks call a “Camino favourite”, the remote Albergue de San Bol. Tucked away in a river valley just five kilometres shy of Hontanas, it is easily missed, and with so many pilgrims keen to race through the Meseta, that’s understandable. I got here at half twelve and found the place deserted, with a sign on the door saying it would be opened at two. I stuck around, taking the opportunity to wash my feet and sandals in the small pool and do some reading while I waited.

Five or six curious pilgrims came by to investigate. None of them have stayed. The first one, a German by the sound of him, asked about a place to fill up his bottle, shrugged and moved on. Another two came by, but went on their way not five minutes afterwards. A Dutchman made noises about staying on but disappeared without a trace while I was washing my clothes. Two Italians rocked up an hour later, who could easily have been my age… only, they were fresh out of school and keen to press on to Hontanas. By this point I’d already made the decision to stay, so I bid them addió and nailed my colours to the mast when at last the local hostalera showed up.

From her I learned the truth – the Camino has been quiet for a few days, but April and May were absolutely heaving this year. That’s probably due to the backlog of pilgrims like myself who haven’t been able to take the road for two years due to COVID. At this time of year, few pilgrims stop at this stage, unless they’re traveling in a group. Would I be alright if I were the only guest tonight, she asked?

Well, so much for my first “communal feel” albergue. On the plus side, it allows me one more day to really be my own boss. It isn’t often on the Camino that you get an entire dormitory to yourself, or the chance to watch the sunset in a place so idyllic as this. I’ve already paid for my bed for the night with the last of the coins I had on me (I really should have taken cash out in Burgos, as banks and ATMs are few and far between out here) so I’m going to kick back and really enjoy having this slice of paradise to myself for once.

There will be plenty of time to socialise on the Camino. But I’m in no hurry – if anything I’d like to avoid the crush in Santiago on Saint James’ day three weeks from now – so I will take my time and allow myself a few later starts from now on. And who knows? If I tarry a while, I might just find more stories in these slumbering villages than I would in the pilgrims tearing through this lonely stage.

Peace out. I’m getting some serious peace in tonight. BB x

Camino VII: Heart of Granite

/ Benjamin Barnabas / 1 Comment

I’m back! The cloud kingdom of the Basques is as impressive as ever, and since the earliest bus I could catch was the three-hour pueblo bus, I’m being treated to a great deal more of it than I ever imagined. It’s been a good three months since I was last here, but it looks and feels as though it were just the other day – like the Camino has just been waiting for me to return all this time. It’s a passing fancy, nothing more, but if I were to say I didn’t feel this country calling to me, I’d be lying.

It was a fairly busy flight out here, but if I thought I might encounter a handful of fellow pilgrims, I had another thing coming. From snatches of conversation (and a distinct lack of pilgrim paraphernalia) I’ve learned of the Bilbao BBK music festival that kicks off tomorrow. Apparently it’s one of Europe’s most popular? Shows how much I know!

Leaving a trio of Australian festival-goers and their awful mullets and porno moustaches behind (some girls on dating sites go mad for them, apparently, though God knows why), I bought myself an onward ticket to Burgos through the ALSA machine as there was nobody manning the three booths (“ni un Cristo en la taquilla”, in the words of the lady behind me). Two teenage girls in denim shorts propped their phone up against a pillar and did a TikTok dance, watched cautiously by a sub-Saharan umbrella salesmen on his way up the stairs. I treated myself to my first tortilla y tomate sandwich of the trip and made my way into the maw of the terminus in search of Lane 22.

Whoever designed the seating plan on this bus is even worse at maths than I am. There doesn’t seem to be any logic to it whatsoever. Seats 39-40 are followed by 45-46. The opposite seats are in the twenties. Four rows back, the sticker for seats 43-44 has been ripped off, but since they’re the only unnumbered seats on the bus, I can only assume I’m in one of the right seats. If this were a German bus, somebody would be having a fit (I’ve had altercations on German buses before over incorrect seat numbering). Fortunately, this is Spain, and nobody seems to care overmuch.

The bus is winding its way through the northern marches of Spain’s largest county, Castilla y León. A meandering river follows the road, and sleepy establishments dot the landscape: a host of cattle farms, ruined quarries, an ancient church or two, and an out-of-town brothel called ‘Las Vegas’ bearing a crude illustration of fishnet tights on the wall. For the last half hour we’ve been traveling in the shadow of the high cliffs of Lerdano, and beyond that… beyond that is the legendary Meseta. I’ve heard so much about it, I can hardly wait!

I’ve been trying to navigate the telescreen on the back of the seat in front of me. That nobody else except the noisy Moroccan family in front of me is doing the same should have been a clue. The tech is dated and hard to use. I was able to spin fifteen minutes of YouTube out of it after a few failed sign-in attempts (as it won’t let you scroll down to accept cookies), which meant I could enjoy the awesome soundtrack to The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom for a bit. It’s been a bloody good palliative for a breakup, and while it’s unlikely to knock Ocarina of Time from the top spot (so much love for that classic) it’s easily become my second favourite game in the Zelda series. Plus the layering in the soundtrack is so bloody clever. I’m hooked.

At Balmaseda, near the end of the Lerdano massif, I see my first vulture soaring overhead. It takes me a couple of seconds to see the rest of them: perhaps forty in all, racing toward a destination unseen behind me. I’m almost tempted to jump out the bus to investigate, if it weren’t for the very real possibility of ending up stuck in this backwater until the next pueblo bus, which could be a full twenty-four hours away. It’s a good thing I didn’t bring my camera, though, or I might just have chanced it.

The Moroccan family in the seats in front are making quite a scene. Or rather, their progeny are. The father appears to have given up on parenting his two year old, who has been screaming at the telescreen for the entire journey in a mixture of Spanish, Arabic and that nonsense parrot-speak that babies use. Dad is feigning sleep when he can. Half the remaining passengers appear to have found earplugs and put them to good use. Mine, unfortunately, are in the hold with my rucksack, so this is just something I’ve got to grin and bear. To add to the din, the veiled mother practically shouts down the phone to three friends in quick succession in a voice lucid enough for me to pick up what she’s on about, even with my rusty (and admittedly elementary) Arabic. Fourth time not so lucky: after a break she hears her phone ringing, picks it up, sees who is calling and promptly puts it back down. Seconds pass and it rings again. She lets it ring. Her husband casts a questioning side-eye her way, but their exchange is lost as the bus grinds around a corner. On the fourth attempt she rejects the call outright. The kid continues to wail at the telescreen, unable to understand the interface (which is all in English) or comprehend why hammering his tiny fists on the touchscreen keeps removing the game his father has long since given up reloading for him. So much for catching some Z’s on this bus.

We’ve stopped at a concrete-and-glass café near Villarcayo. It must be a nexus of some kind, because half the bus got off, to be replaced by just a handful of handsome locals. Not fifteen minutes later, we crossed the Ebro river, flanked on both sides by an even more handsome Sierra, its jaw-like granite crags sundered by the mighty river. There are few things more likely to make my jaw drop than a decent granite cliff. Maybe I’m just easily pleased, or maybe my heart is made of granite.

It doesn’t say in the Bible when God made Spain, but I figure it was somewhere towards the end of the week, because wherever I look I see such incomparable beauty. Which makes me just one more hopeless Romantic adventurer to this country before me. There’s quite the list…

Bloody hell, but it’s good to be traveling solo again. I know it’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but it is definitely santo de mi devoción. I’m not ashamed to admit I’m addicted to the unfettered freedom of it. I’m booked ahead for the night due to my late arrival in Burgos, but beyond that, the future is an open book. And that’s just the way I like it.

Roll on three weeks of uncertainty! At the very least, it makes for fantastic writing material. BB x

Here We Go Again!

/ Benjamin Barnabas / Leave a comment

Tuesday 4th July, 12:55pm.
The Rutherford Office.

Another school year comes to an end – this time a full week later than the last, owing to a start-of-the-holidays school trip to Austria. It’s been quite a year. I knew this was going to be an emotional year, watching the graduation of the cohort that joined when I did, now five years ago. All the same, I did not expect it to be quite as golden as it was. I’m still riding the high of victory in house music, and that was back in October, and my teeth are still chattering from the nerves of debating in public for the first time against our indomitable student all-stars in May. Couple that with a run of surprise parties and heartfelt parting gifts, this is the year when I have felt happiest as a teacher. And quite right, too – it’s been the perfect panacea after last year’s nightmarish run of bad luck.

Not that it hasn’t been without its trials. I had a particularly memorable birthday, which saw my partner and I part ways for good, and in case that wasn’t enough of a gut-punch, I spent the rest of the night mopping up vomit and bile with my own hands as a wave of violent sickness swept the school. Somebody up there must have taken pity, because I never came down with the bug myself, despite being right at its heart for the best part of a week.

I have had moments this year that have brought me crashing down. But I remain unflinchingly true to my principle of hope. Wishy-washy as it sounds, I am convinced that a fervent belief in the light we carry inside of us will always carry us through, no matter how dark the world beyond. The torch I carry is the same one my ancestors bore before me, and that’s a massive help. So while this year I have sometimes felt more akin to Eccleston’s Ninth Doctor (“coward, any day”) rather than Tennant’s Tenth – upon whom I now realised I have modeled so much of my day-to-day teaching persona – I have held on to the belief that somehow, whatever happens, all will be well. Call it God’s plan or whatever you will. I call it hope. And in a world where people fill that uncertain void with TikTok, Netflix, and mindless gym routines, hope is a bloody good thing to have in your pocket.

August is looming, and August means the long-delayed intensive driving course (which I have wisely stopped calling a crash course, for all the obvious reasons). Previous plans would have left July wide open, but as I’m not really the planning kind, I tossed a coin a week ago and made the decision to press on with the Camino – perhaps all the way to the end, this time. I certainly have the time, for once. And after a bumpy end to a golden year, I can think of no better way to seek healing.

I haven’t packed quite yet. I still need to book a taxi to Gatwick for tomorrow morning, and I haven’t got around to reserving a hotel yet. And I haven’t even looked at what the flight home might look like, as I’m keeping my options open on that front. But that’s OK. This is me as I am, without any pretenses to normalcy. I was originally due to fly yesterday, but given that it would have left me with all of twelve hours to recover from the music tour to Austria, I got sensible and booked a different flight. It’s all the same in the end, but my head (and my feet) will appreciate the respite.

I’ve only ever done week-long stints of the Camino, and if I intend to reach Santiago, I will be on the road for a little over three weeks. I will have to look after myself if I don’t want to end up like the Americans I met at Easter, sporting heels all shades of iodine. Fortunately, I’ve packed plenty of Compede blister plasters, and being a reasonably experienced peregrino, I know what not to do: that is, keep my trousers short and my breaks long. I’ll also try to hang back and not rush to make it to Santiago for the saint’s day on the 25th, which is roughly when I would arrive if I don’t stop once – as that tends to be a focal point for pilgrims on the trail. No, I think I’ll take it slow. The meseta is capricious at the best of times, and should not be trifled with. And it’s likely to be hot.

I’m feeling pretty well-traveled at the moment. This time two weeks ago I was in the gardens of Sevilla’s Real Alcazar, humoring our tour guide with a smile while my students sought refuge in the shade as the temperatures neared 40 degrees. One week ago I was unloading my violin from the coach in the valley of Huttau, staring up into the snow-bound peaks of the Berchtesgaden Alps and reminiscing on seeing that same sight through the eyes of a child, seventeen years ago. This time tomorrow I will be back in Burgos, journal in hand, on my own at last and savouring the free air and the knowledge of the open road stretching for three-hundred miles before me. I can’t wait!

As always, I will keep you posted. Until then, chavales. BB x

Cross Country

/ Benjamin Barnabas / Leave a comment

The Camino might be over for this year, but the adventure certainly isn’t. Before my flight back home tomorrow, one last challenge remained: to scale Monte Santiago and lay eyes upon Spain’s highest waterfall, the Salto del Nervión. Since I’m staying in Bilbao, which straddles the Nervión on its journey to the sea, it seemed only natural to go in search of its source. The fact that it springs from a mountain bearing the same name as the patron saint of the Camino clinched it. So, just after eight o’clock this morning, I grabbed my rucksack and poncho (just in case) and set off for the Bilbao-Arando train station.

Leaving the stained-glass masterpiece of Bilbao-Arando behind, I took the 8.25 to Orduña on the C3 line. It’s the furthest stop on the Cercanías line and the trains were running very consistently even through the holiday season, so I was pretty confident about getting there and back OK.

Orduña itself was just waking up when the train pulled in. I made a quick detour via an AlCampo mini-market to grab a picnic lunch: the usual fare of semicurado cheese, chorizo slices and a fresh loaf of bread, with a punnet of grapes to boot. I then doubled back, crossed the bridge over the railway and started to climb up into the hills.

Fortunately for me, somebody had the peace of mind to leave a clearly-labelled map outside the train station. I’d found a few maps online, but I was relieved to find a more reliable one at the start of the trail, so I snapped a photo and used it as my map for the day. I can’t find it online, so here’s a copy if you’re interested:

First things first: the climb was bloody steep. Easy to follow, but steep. And before long, I’d climbed up beyond the cloud level and was weaving in and out of the mist. Sometimes I couldn’t see more than ten metres or so ahead, and sometimes the road seemed to stretch on forever up the mountainside. A jay screeched at me from the base to the summit, and while it may well have been a number of them, I had the strange feeling it was the same bird watching my slow progress. And yet, whenever I tried to lock eyes upon it, I only ever caught a disappearing shadow between the trees.

In the deep woods of the Basque Country, when the clouds are at ground level, it’s easy to see how myths of the Basajaun – wild men of the woods – persisted for so long. God only knows what was watching me unseen in the mist.

I only met two other souls on the road coming down: a local man with a hiking pole in hand about halfway up and a jogger leaving the forest, which would imply he’d just run down the mountain. There’s a reason the Basques have a formidable reputation.

Near the summit, a spring of crystal clear water was a welcome find. I couldn’t help remembering a childhood memory of vomiting for days after drinking from a village spring in the Alpujarras, but the water looked so clean I couldn’t help myself. It was easily the most delicious water I’ve had out here – mountain water always is, if you can get it – though I was sane enough not to use the metal cup chained to the rock, which looked in dire need of a good clean. In a nearby tank, filled to the brim with the spotless spring water, a few tiny newt efts were swimming about.

After what felt like an age (but in reality only took ten minutes over an hour) the track suddenly came to a narrow crevasse which cut a path through the karst to the clifftop. With one last screech from the jay echoing after me, I put the cloud forest behind me, pushed the metal gate open and stepped out of the Basque Country and back into Castilla.

At first, the rolling clouds shrouded all but the peak upon which I was standing from view. I could just about make out the bizarre sculpture to an apparition of the Virgin Mary in the form of a colossal concrete block supported by a stylised tree looming out of the mist, but it looked like it had been fenced off and graffitied for good measure long ago.

More impressive by far was what I could see when I turned around. The Castilian sun began to beat down through the clouds, and suddenly the sheer majesty of the Sierra Sálvada began to unroll before me like a painting. I was lost for words. Pictures don’t do it justice, but they might bring you closer to that wonder I witnessed.

The breathtaking crags of the Sierra Sálvada give an indication of what to expect from the Salto del Nervión long before you reach it. It’s a drop of more than 200m to the bottom in places, and even the thought of kicking a pebble over the edge is enough to tie your stomach in several uncomfortable knots.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m absolutely mad about mountains. But there’s nothing funny about a drop of that height, particularly when it isn’t broken by any tree or slope on the way down.

Ironically, perhaps, some of Spain’s biggest creatures are perfectly at home here. The hulking shape of the griffon vulture was rarely out of sight during my wanderings along the clifftop, but nowhere more so than about the stark stack known as the Fraileburu – the Friar’s Head – an utterly unassailable column where many of the Sierra’s griffons had chosen to roost, haughtily observing the valley below. I haven’t needed my camera once on this holiday – my phone has done a more than satisfactory job – but I was missing it then more than ever. A decent telephoto could have worked wonders on the griffons riding the thermals below, as well as pulling the acrobatic choughs and the few pairs of Egyptian vultures into focus for good measure. Instead you’ll just have to see how many you can spot clinging to the cliff face below.

From the summit of Monte Santiago, it’s a fair trek to the Salto del Nervión. I didn’t stop often and I keep a pretty merciless pace, but it still took me the better part of two hours to reach the waterfall. Fortunately, the path cuts through tree cover for a large stretch, and the views are incredible – especially so as the sun had burned off most of the mist by this point, offering spectacular views down to Orduña, now some way in the distance.

The Mirador at the Salto was quite busy by the time I arrived (around one o’clock) but one look was enough. The river was bone dry: I might have guessed from the absence of any sound of crashing water. So much for the highest waterfall in Spain! It seems it’s only really in action after heavy rain, otherwise the Nervión is supplied by a network of underground rivers that ensure it flows year-round, while its primary spring in neighbouring Castilla has a tendency of drying up in all but the wettest seasons.

Still – box ticked, I suppose.

Perhaps more interesting than a dry waterfall is the nearby lobera, an ancient wolf trap built possibly over two thousand years ago by the ancient Basques to hunt wolves and other large game on the clifftop. In a fashion akin to the Native American buffalo jumps, the wolf would be chased into a funnel, with men beating drums on one side and the cliff on the other, driving the poor beast into a deep pit at the end of the funnel as its only escape.

I didn’t see any wolves during the hike, though they have been seen recently in the area after a long absence. Instead I disturbed an amorous couple who had straddled the large wolf statue and were enjoying each other’s company, though they had picked an exceedingly odd place: I can think of better spots for a tryst than the site of a Neolithic abattoir.

From the Salto del Nervión, I decided to fork east and descend back into the valley of Orduña that way. The trouble was, the map – which had been utterly brilliant thus far – was pretty dismal about suggesting a way back down bar turning around and heading back the way I came. One of the maps I’d found online seemed to indicate a track that led down through the forest an hour or so to the north of the Salto, but I couldn’t find anything like it. Scanning the east side of the valley during the hike didn’t show much either, beyond what might have been a dry river gulley running down the mountainside.

In the end, rather than face a possibly two or three-hour march to the north, I decided to follow the beginnings of a track that appeared as the cliff began to slope rather than drop. Whether it was made by man or beast I’m not entirely sure, only that it probably wasn’t the track suggested online and that it very quickly came to an end.

There are few things more frustrating than getting halfway down a mountain and realising you’ve lost the path. At least you can surrender going up, but on the descent, you have no choice but to find a way down somehow. So I did what I have done in the past, foolhardy though it seems, and cut across country.

This is a lot easier said than done when the cross country in question is a forest thick with underbrush that happens to be growing on the side of a mountain. The ground under my feet was not always stable, there were thorns everywhere and the animals tracks I was following – boar, I wouldn’t wonder – were not always reliable. The heat of the midday sun was similarly unwelcome, silencing the forest and making my every step sound like a cannon. The vultures circling overhead only added to the dismal state of affairs.

Twice I came upon what looked like a road, but rather than wind up on some local farmer’s turf (and potentially ending up in really cross country) I decided to stick to a personal motto (don’t ever, under any circumstances, f*ck with the Basques) and continue to forge my own path.

It took just over an hour to escape the forest. I don’t think I’ve been more relieved to see a tarmac road in years.

I made it back to Orduña’s train station with seven minutes to spare before the 16.45 train back to Bilbao. I must have looked a beardy, sweaty mess but I was past caring. Despite the mountain’s best efforts, I’d made it back in one piece.

My old English teacher once told me you can’t claim to conquer a mountain, a thing which has been standing on this earth since the world was young and will be there long after you have gone. I’m still hooked on the idea of climbing higher than the vultures – there are few things in this world more awe-inspiring than looking down on creatures that are usually specks in the great blue beyond – but I’ll hand it to him here. Mountains are ancient, treacherous things that deserve to be treated with respect.

I finished my time in Spain by summiting Santiago’s mountain, but the mountain very nearly got the better of me on the way down. A knock to my hubris – and a necessary one.

I’ll stick to regular cross country around the school grounds for now. I’ve had quite enough wayfaring for one holiday! BB x

Easter and El Cid

/ Benjamin Barnabas / Leave a comment

Ending any stage of the Camino is always a sad experience. I think I’d managed to put it out of my memory last time, but it came back to bite this morning. I guess it’s the routine sense of purpose the Camino provides so effortlessly: wake up, eat, walk to your next destination, wash your clothes, eat, sleep and repeat. You never need to worry about planning ahead, and that allows you to focus on the small pleasures: conversations on the road, birdsong in the morning, the joy of taking off your sandals at the end of the walk. Life can seem a little lacking in purpose when you step out of it.

So, unwilling to surrender entirely to sorrow, I strapped my sandals back on and set out to explore the beautiful city of Burgos, city of Spain’s greatest hero of all time: Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, El Cid.

I went to Mass in the cathedral. There were two celebrations taking place in the chapels at the front of the cathedral ahead of the misa solemne. I opted to attend one of the smaller ones. For my sins I haven’t always been to church on Easter Sunday since becoming a Catholic, so it was extra special to turn that around here in one of Spain’s most beautiful cathedrals. Even if it did mean staring up at one of the least subtle icons of Santiago Matamoros.

While soaking up the sunshine on the bank of the Arlanzón, I heard the sound of bells. A colourful procession was making its way down the Paseo Espolón, trailing a happy crowd of Sunday pedestrians. Gone were the solemn drums of the nightly pasos: the air was thick with the clean sound of hand bells and castanets. Gone too were the hoods that had so spooked the American pilgrims: these celebrants were welcoming the Easter season in with golden ribbons in their hair.

I’m a bit of a purist when it comes to Semana Santa. In the same way that I prefer enigmatic bulerías to happy-go-lucky sevillanas, I’ll always take the dark mystery of the nightly processions over the happier parades that bookend Semana Santa, Domingo de Ramos and Domingo de La Resurrección. Even so, the addition of an advance guard of local dances (in local dress) is a very nice touch: I don’t think I’ve ever been moved so by Easter Sunday’s celebrations.

Leaving the celebrants behind, I made for the Puente de San Pablo, which is, frankly, a less than impressive name for what should really be called the Puente de los Héroes. Watching the passing traffic from eyes of stone are the primary characters of the Cantar del Mio Cid, among them Alvar Fáñez, his lieutenant and nephew; Jimena Díaz, his wife; and Abén Galbón, his Muslim friend and lord. At their head on the north bank stands the Cid himself, an imposing figure astride his war-horse Bavieca with the sword Tizona in his hand. I’ve been obsessed with the legend of El Cid since I was a boy, and none of that has faded as I approach thirty. I still get a giddying kick in the guts at the sight of that statue. Whatever the real Rodrigo Díaz might have been – warlord, mercenary, king in all but name – I will always be a fan of the legend. It is, truly, one of the greatest stories to come out of Spain.

It occurred to me that I had not actually been inside the cathedral proper on my last visit ten years ago, so I decided to make good on that this time. After all, it isn’t every day you get to pay your respects at the resting place of a real-life legend – and at half the price, as a peregrino (5€ with a credential – that’s a steal!).

Now, I’ve spent my life in and out of cathedrals – I know Canterbury’s so well I could probably navigate it blindfolded – but Burgos is something else. I’ve heard people say it’s more impressive outside than in. While it’s easily one of Spain’s most breathtaking cathedrals to behold, the interior of Burgos’ cathedral is no slouch. Come for the tomb of El Cid (or what remains of his the French didn’t loot as trophies during the Peninsular War) but stay for the incredible stonework. There really is something to see at every turn, from starburst-like windows in the upper vaults to stone carvings of skulls, savage beasts and wild men.

The treasure rooms in the lower chambers also hold a number of interesting relics, including the Cid’s legendary chest of sand, the silver hand of Saint Thomas A’Beckett (of Canterbury, of all places!) and a beautiful Moorish cloak emblazoned with the motto “Glory to the Sultan”. I wasn’t expecting to see any Moorish treasures so that last was an unexpected bonus!

With my tour of the vaults complete I popped into one of the only food stores still open and had a snack dinner of mejillones en escabeche – a solo travel staple of mine – overlooking the cathedral. A pair of ravens circled the twin spires for about an hour, their usually impressive stature dwarfed by the Gothic masonry. I couldn’t get into the bottled tinto de verano I bought on a whim – foolishly, I didn’t think to check if it would need a bottle opener. It’s still sitting unopened on my beside table as I write.

Finally, I went out for a beer with Francisco, the Mexican from the hostel. He was keen to draw my attention to a mural near the bar, where the Cid once again leapt off the page of legend into life. I was most impressed to see one detail in particular: the moros watching from the corner were striking for how un-Moorish they looked. Why, without their turbans, they might just as easily have been as Castilian as the other citizens of Burgos.

Which is exactly the point. We can be fairly certain that, by the time of the Cid (the mid to late 11th century), many if not most of Iberia’s Muslims would have been native to the peninsula for generations, not the lean, bearded Syrian stereotype that is so often thrown about when painting this period of history. Major props to the artist – it’s a brave stroke but a necessary one.

I have now made landfall in Bilbao. I’ve scouted the bus and train stations and they seem navigable enough. Tomorrow, I strike out for the highlands that followed me all the way along the Camino. I’ve had two days to recover and my feet are feeling much better. One final challenge stands between me and my flight home. Let’s hope I’m up to it! BB x

Camino VI: Parenthesis

/ Benjamin Barnabas / Leave a comment

In Burgos, the journey comes to an end. One leaves for home, two pack for their flight tomorrow and one more digs in to stay, leaving four of the gang to push on toward Santiago tomorrow. Perhaps mine is the hardest, watching the others move on or away, knowing that if it weren’t for my flight (and my beleaguered feet) I’d have long since decided to chuck in my plans and make for Leon with them. But life is full of farewells, and I could never have gone with them all the way to Santiago in the week of holiday that remains. So here I am, at the end of this run at the Camino, putting my thoughts into words.

Today’s leg was a special one. Impatient after a crush in Bar El Alquimista over breakfast – I’m still not especially good at dealing with loud and crowded spaces – I set out ahead of the others this morning, nursing a doctored but still painful blister and conscious it would likely slow me down. It didn’t feel great leaving the group behind, but the crush in the bar threw me off a bit and I needed some time on my own on the road as a remedy.

Leaving behind the slumbering town of Agés, I followed the road westward toward Atapuerca. This is possibly one of the most mystical waypoints of the Camino de Santiago, but blink and you’ll miss it – because Atapuerca is the resting place of the oldest known hominids in Europe. Not far from where the Camino crosses the Sierra lies the Sima de los Huesos, a pit that contains the bones of ancient humans who have lain there for nearly a million years. Walk this stage of the Camino and you really do get the sense you’re following in the footsteps, not just of a thousand years of Christian pilgrims, but almost a million years of human wayfarers. One of my fellow pilgrims pointed out that there are far older pilgrim routes in India, but if you think of the first humans pushing toward the end of the known world (where Finisterre stands today) as the first Camino pilgrims, I’d like to think the Camino de Santiago is a fair contender for the top spot.

I made the climb alone, taking with me a sprig of mistletoe, a fallen olive branch and a strip of blackthorn blossom: something wicked, something old and something new. It seemed like the right thing to do. Meanwhile the birdsong up the mountain was spellbinding: hoopoes, cuckoos and woodlarks on all sides, and these last especially, becoming for me the quintessential sound of this stretch of the Camino. I’ve recorded a video so I can share some of that magic with you.

From the mystical heights of ancient Atapuerca with its lonely wooden cross and stone circle, you look down from the last high place upon the city of Burgos and the seemingly endless reach of the Meseta beyond, with the daunting white cliffs of the Picos de Europa clearly visible over 130km away.

Having waited for my companions at the cross, I joined them for the descent into Burgos, but when their stop for a mid-morning snack threatened to stretch over an hour, my itchy feet swept me back onto the road again. It would be the last time I spoke English on the Camino this year, because from there on out the only people I encountered were Spaniards on the road (they took long enough to find!).

For the final twelve kilometres into Burgos I was joined on the road by Fran, a programmer from Soria in his twenties who was an enlightening companion. From him I learned that the Spaniards, as I suspected, had indeed done the Camino for Semana Santa, but they had started at the beginning of the national holiday and were thus a few days ahead. I also learned about his home town of Soria and how the Mesta have monetised their trade, turning what was once an affordable experience following the shepherds’ route into a glamorous eco-tourism experience to the tune of 200-300€. He also gave his thoughts on the Catalan question, likening it to a dog barking furiously at a door which, when it is finally opened, suddenly goes quiet – it is easier to hate when you cannot see what it is that troubles you. Or something like that. I was just happy to be speaking Spanish – and flattered to be told that if I hadn’t revealed I was English in the first five minutes I’d have had him stumped, as he was genuinely ‘confundido’ by my Spanish.

I took my leave of Fran outside Burgos’ enormous cathedral, after a brief conversation with a local (‘De dónde sois?’ : ‘Yo de Soria,’ / ‘Y yo de Inglaterra, pero con familia en La Mancha.’ / ‘Soria e Inglaterra? Menuda familia los dos.’). Fran took off to catch his BlaBlaCar home and I set out in search of my hostel.

I didn’t get much of a siesta, because the next guest to arrive was another Francisco, this time from Puebla, México. After a brief exchange over the subtle numbering of the hostel beds we ended up talking for close on two hours about a number of topics, with him asking after my thoughts on Italy, Spain and the British Empire and me asking for his wisdom on La Malinche and nahuatl. He is on a quest much like I was years ago: on his tour of Europe he has come to far-flung Burgos to seek out the village of Grijalba, from which he believes his father’s ancestors may have hailed (through the legendary explorer Juan de Grijalva).

It is always heartwarming to meet another traveler on the road, but especially so when they are on a quest – you don’t meet many of that kind these days. Perhaps it is fate that the day started in Bar El Alquimista, named for Paolo Coelho’s famous novella.

After one more conversation in Spanish which left me feeling more confident than ever before, I led the pilgrims of our group that remained down a side street in search of dinner. It couldn’t have been a better choice: six raciones and a salad split between us made a feast such as we hadn’t had yet. Morcilla, croquetas, calamares and sepia a la plancha, torreznos and zamburiñas (what more fitting food for pilgrims than scallops?)… it was far and away the best I’ve eaten on the trail.

And I didn’t have to pay a cent, since the generous Dane in our number footed the bill before we twigged what he was up to. I’d done something similar a few days prior, so I guess he was paying me back, but that kind of generosity is what makes the Camino so special. For our last meal as a group, I could not have asked for more.

I’ve never bonded with other peregrinos quite so quickly, and I wish I could take the road with them to the end. But every road leads to a parting, and we part as friends.

It is not the end of the road for me, but rather a parenthesis. One day I will come back here, to the ancient city of Burgos, and pick up the Camino where I left it. Hopefully I’ll meet other pilgrims like them who will make the road an adventure with friends once again. Sophia’s charm and maturity. Mikkel’s wit and his generosity. Katie’s wisdom and Lachlan’s humour, courage and peace of mind.

Domenico the Carabiniere. Enrique the Arriero. Phil the Professor. I have met so many characters on the Camino this time. That has been the real blessing of the road this Easter. I’m glad I came. Truly. (And especially since it was a whim decision just over a couple of weeks ago).

It’s now half past eight in the morning. By now they will have left Burgos and will be somewhere on the road to their next destination. All I can do now is wish the four of them all the best on their road to Santiago. And someday, sooner or later, I will take up my shell once more and follow them. BB x