More to This than This

Camino. Chapter 23

Camino de Santiago - Day 22: Leon to Vallar de Mazarief

This is my serialized story of walking the Camino de Santiago across Northern Spain with my sister-in-law. If you’d like to start at the beginning, click here.

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Tuesday. Week Three. A day of transition. Leaving the city of Leon for the western Meseta countryside. Within a day-and-a-half we’ll start climbing into the Cantabrian Mountains. This is significant occurrence and something, after more than a week on the Meseta, about which we are very excited.

We depart our luxury hotel in the darkness of early morning and are soon lost trying to find the Camino markers out of the city. This has happened to us on numerous occasions as the hostels (and hotels) are typically not on the Camino itself but more often than not a block or two away. Even in finding the Camino arrows or clamshells, it is not always immediately clear which way to go. One of the downsides of starting our daily hikes in the dark. Still, we press to being ahead of the other pilgrims who are walking a similar daily goal to reach Santiago.

Confused about where we are, we decide to walk back to the Cathedral. We have learned by this point that the Camino passes all the historic Catholic churches and cathedrals. This the one thing we are pretty much assured, the camino will take us past each and every the historic church or cathedral along the way. Most of the time, this is welcomed as the facilities are typically open and beautiful and the artwork on the walls in the small alcoves are exquisite.

We turn a corner heading back to the central cathedral and immediately bump into Leah who we met with her husband on the first day of our adventure. We laugh bumping into Leah once again. Way back at the beginning of our pilgrimage, Marlene and I took the wrong road out of St. Jean Pied de Port in France when we were meant to be climbing into the Pyrenees. Instead, we walked nearly 10 kilometers to the town of Valcarlos before we realized our mistake. After studying our guidebooks, we determined there was no other way but walk back to St. Jean and start over.

On our return hike we bumped into Leah and Jim who were just starting out themselves and had made the exact same mistake. Engaging with them made the journey back a pleasant walk. Later, then, we met up with Leah and Jim in the city of Pamplona and joined them for a wonderful meal that evening along with another couple, Karen and Richard, who we met in St. Jean. It was a great evening, but in continuing our adventure the next morning, we didn’t see either couple again.

Bumping into Leah, who was not at all lost, was a godsend. A Camino app on her cell phone led us to the right street and subsequently we walked together out of the city.

Leaving Leon and its long exit out of the suburbs for the nearly deserted villages and ghost towns of the Camino is always an abrupt transition, but given the week we had already spent on the Meseta, not surprising.

Mid-morning we stopped for a brief breakfast together before going our separate ways—Leah on the main route and Marlene and I, once again, taking the alternative route, which would leave the highway and meandered along on smaller roads in the country-side.

Marlene and I had agreed from the beginning to always take the alternative routes as we couldn’t help but believe they were actually part of the original camino path. The newer routes, often along the highways, we couldn’t help but feel were intended to move the bulk of pilgrims faster along to their next destination.

Inwardly too, this transition back into the Meseta weighed on my mind: why was I so adamant about going on this four-week hike across Spain?

From the moment I saw the map of the “Way” in my sister-in-law’s kitchen during the annual family picnic at her house in Pennsylvania, I wanted to join her. What was calling me to leave my wife and daughter—our house, pets, and vacation plans—to strike out on this adventure? Marlene, as a hiking companion, was wonderful and her daily leadership in organizing this enterprise made oue lives easier, to which I was most grateful, but, if truth be known, I wasn’t attracted to this “walk” because of her presence alone. Then, where did the urge come from? This restlessness?

Now starting our third week of the hike, I feel like this Camino should be more than a trial to test ourselves physically, it should be more than a feat of endurance—though it has been that surely. Everyone says—and it is written in numerous texts—the Camino is meant to be a spiritual experience. Why, then, was this need for a spiritual awakening calling on me, a 69 year-old man on his way to turning 70? Hadn’t I been sufficiently content in my life already? My word for the hike was “serenity,” at this point why wasn’t I serene?

After breakfast we say goodbye to Leah and, once again, set off on the more scenic route, leaving behind the main trek of pilgrims along the highway. Once again, we walk on rough roads along agricultural fields and, once more, stay in a small hostel full of pilgrims, surrounded by empty buildings in a dying village. Once more we would meet up with the main route the next day. This time, though, I couldn’t help but feel there had to be more to this than this.