~ wander.essence ~

{camino day 17} villafranca montes de oca to atapuerca

wanderessence1025 May 19, 2019

Because I was racing to beat other pilgrims to one of the two albergues in Atapuerca, neither of which took reservations, I left my hotel at 6:20. I walked endlessly upward under an ink-black sky sprinkled with constellations, guided only by the beam from my headlamp. The uphill was relentless, but finally, after 3.6km, I reached the Monumento de los Caídos, which marks the shallow graves of people executed during Spain’s Civil War. It sits atop Alto de la Pedraja, at 1,250 meters above sea level.

Villafranca de Montes de Oca (pop 200) to Monumento de los Caídos (3.6 km)

Monumento de los Caídos

Then it was down and over a footbridge crossing the arroyo Peroja and steeply up again until the trail widened out under oak and pine forests, dotted sporadically with ash and juniper, for another 8.6km. It was one of the most boring and ugly stretches I’d encountered so far. The track was wide and rocky and there was nothing to break the monotony. The only thing that caught my interest were patches of heather and ferns and some small pine trees laced with spider webs.

Monumento de los Caídos to San Juan de Ortega (8.6 km)

Monumento de los Caídos to San Juan de Ortega

flowers on the way

Monumento de los Caídos to San Juan de Ortega

the wide flat path

We came upon a kind of rest area (no snacks) with different types of totem poles. I took a break to walk around looking at them.

Totem rest area

Leaving the totem area, I bid adieu to the pilgrim sculpture at the far end.

pilgrim sculpture

Monumento de los Caídos to San Juan de Ortega

Along the track, Anne from Paris caught up with me and walked with me for a bit. She said she slept last night near a shelter we’d passed partway up the mountain. She said people were out hiking this morning at 5:00 a.m., shining their headlamps into her eyes. She planned to walk all the way to Burgos today.

Anne’s brief presence alongside me today was a blessing. She said she wasn’t afraid of sleeping outside; she was more afraid of men approaching her in Paris. Once a friend gave her a can of pepper spray; she always kept it handy.

Anne who slept outdoors

At the tiny hamlet of San Juan de Ortega (pop. 20), I shared a ham and cheese croissant with Anne.

San Juan, a disciple of Santo Domingo, was known for his great works to serve pilgrims along the Camino. He built bridges, hospitals, churches and hostels throughout the region. In this town full of dangers and difficulties for medieval pilgrims, he built an Augustinian monastery in 1150. The chapel is dedicated to San Nicolás de Bari, who supposedly saved San Juan from drowning on his way back from pilgrimage to the Holy Land.

It was too bad I wasn’t here two days later, on September 22 (the autumn equinox) to see the “miracle of light.” On that day, as well as on the spring equinox of March 21, a ray of light enters the building and illuminates the image of the Annunciation, with the Archangel Gabriel and the Virgin Mary. I didn’t stop here for long, just long enough to admire the mausoleum of Saint John with the canopy that surrounds it.

Monastery at San Juan de Ortega

San Juan de Ortega to Agés (3.6 km)

I left Anne behind in San Juan de Ortega because she reconnected with some young friends she’d met earlier in her walk. I walked endlessly alone through more forest, not knowing for a long time if I might be lost. The forest was lovely, with spaces between the trees filled in with heather and grass.

San Juan de Ortega to Agés

San Juan de Ortega to Agés

San Juan de Ortega to Agés

San Juan de Ortega to Agés

When I finally emerged from the forest, I could see farmland and the two towns I was expecting: Agés and Atapuerca. I can’t tell you how exciting it is when you finally see your destination glowing in the sunlight before you.

San Juan de Ortega to Agés

San Juan de Ortega to Agés

approaching Agés

I walked through Agés, a pretty little town. Its old quarter has houses in a traditional architectural style, with wood and adobe (sun-dried clay and straw bricks) as the building materials. Stone is also evident in construction.

Agés

Agés to Atapuerca (2.5 km)

After leaving Agés, I kept on, at first slightly downhill, crossing the simple medieval stone bridge, Puente Canto, built by San Juan de Ortega over the río Vena (a tributary of the río Arlanzón). It seemed like a long slog on a paved road to Atapuerca.

Agés to Atapuerca

Atapuerca has become famous for its paleontological sites, chief of which is the Sima de los Huesos (the pit of bones), where some of the earliest human remains have been found. Ongoing excavations and analysis at this UNESCO World Heritage site point to human activity going back at least 1.2 million years. Sadly this site was 3km off the Way, so I didn’t spend the half-day it would take to get there and back, plus to explore the site.

World Heritage site at Atapuerca

Agés to Atapuerca

When I arrived at 11:30 a.m., at Albergue El Perigrino, I put my backpack in line for a room. They didn’t open until 1:00, so I just sat around chatting with people. Here, I met Simon and Karen from Britain, who I’d meet many more times along the Camino; Ray and Tony, the friendly Aussies; and my Quebec friends, Paul and Richard.

Atapuerca

It was hot, so once we were assigned our rooms, I headed for the narrow unisex shower room. I was one of the first in. When I came out, fully dressed in my clean clothes but still damp, Tony and Ray, bulky guys both wearing only their underwear, were on either side of me. I laughed and said I felt like I was between a rock and a hard spot. People were packed into the shower room.

Ray and Tony then asked if I’d like to share a washing machine with them in a combined load of laundry. I threw my stuff in with theirs. Later, after I returned from lunch, I found Tony happily hanging up my underwear on the line outdoors. “Nice things,” he said with a grin. 🙂

I went to the bar in town for a lunch of potato tortilla and limon y cerveza and toothpicks with blocks of cheese, prosciutto and olives smothered in olive oil. I sat with my two French Canadian friends, Paul and Richard. We shared a deep conversation over a few beers. After Burgos, their Camino would be over. Paul had done it before with his partner of 28 years, and this time was doing it with Richard, his friend of 40 years. I told them about my seven year separation, and they were curious about how that worked out. Richard had been married before and had kids from his marriage, but had been with his current girlfriend for three years.

Paul and Richard from Quebec

Atapuerca

After lunch, I wandered up the hill to the 15th century parish church of San Martin, visible on a steep hill from the town below. A cool breeze soothed my heart. I said prayers inside. Paul had said during lunch that in the churches he felt a vortex of prayers ascending to heaven from pilgrims doing the Camino for the last 1,000+ years. He felt it was his job to be grateful and to listen.

Parish church of San Martin

cemetery in Parish church of San Martin

interior of Parish church of San Martin

I enjoyed beautiful views of Atapuerca and the surrounding countryside from the hilltop grounds of the church.

view from interior of Parish church of San Martin

Atapuerca

a discarded bull

I returned to my room at the Albergue El Perigrino to lie down and suddenly I got a text message from my loved one: “I don’t know what to do dad won’t talk to me and I’m going crazy over here the tiniest little things happen and I f** rage nobody will talk to me I’m completely alone.” I tried to call him and my husband but couldn’t get through to either of them. I called his brother who lives in Colorado and suggested our loved one should check himself into a hospital; he said our loved one would never do that and he wouldn’t either. He said they were both in a bad place right now. Our loved one had a big fight with his brother’s roommate Nick, who told him to get out, that he could no longer stay with them. He admitted Nick was a nightmare, an alcoholic who, after being sober for 6 years, was actively drinking again. He also said he was homesick and dreamed of coming home and he had been talking to his ex-girlfriend who was helping him; she had broken up with her boyfriend months ago. He didn’t know what he would do back home and he still liked his job. But he wanted to look after his brother and possibly live with him.

Albergue El Perigrino

Then my loved one called and said he was upset that he couldn’t talk to anyone and wanted to share his ideas with his family . He believed that he couldn’t trust anyone because the things he’d been told all his life were not true, one thing being that the earth is round. He believed the edge of the earth is Antarctica and there is an international force there with guns keeping people on earth. He said we need to change what we do; we should stop paying taxes to the U.S. government because they’re supporting the killing of children in Gaza and if the government comes to collect taxes, we should stand up to them. I said I didn’t believe any of that, and even if were true, it doesn’t affect how I live my life. I also said I wasn’t going to stop paying taxes and go to jail for the rest of my life; there are other ways to help children in Gaza, by giving to charities, etc. I said I was trying to find joy in my one and only life.

He asked what if he could prove the earth was flat and I said it would depend on the source and he said it was NASA dot gov. I said, “How is this information useful in your life?” At this he hung up on me. I didn’t call him back but got on the phone with my husband for an hour; he wondered if he should fly to Denver and notify the police of our loved one’s location because he spent 1 1/2 hours on the phone with him and believed he was at the end of his rope. He also said our loved one was so agitated that he couldn’t go to his job at Chipotle, which meant he would likely lose another job.

Later, our loved one sent a text to both of us saying, “I challenge you guys to simply consider the question: ‘What if he’s telling the truth?”

I wrote back a long, well-thought-out (in my opinion) text, which he never answered: “Let me ask you: Is all this research and are all these thoughts serving you well in your life? You can find information out there to support any idea you want to believe. Even if you are telling the truth, it doesn’t affect my life. I want to find joy in this life as much as possible and to connect with people. I have met so many people on the Camino struggling with many issues, yet they manage to find joy in the midst. Dad told me you were so agitated today you didn’t go to work, which may cause you to lose your job. Does making everyone upset and angry connect you or separate you from others? The big question is, are these beliefs serving you well and enabling you to feel fulfilled in your life? If they’re making you miserable, maybe it’s time to reevaluate. I love you and sadly I feel helpless to do anything to help you. I love you every second of my life with all my heart but I feel heartbroken that you seem to want to be at odds with the world. The world is not going to change to suit you, so why don’t you work to be the change you want to see in the world? I honestly don’t care if the world is flat or in the shape of a triangle; my desire is to find fulfillment and joy in the one life I have. You have so much to offer the world but if you continue as you are, I just don’t see how you will find your way. I love you but please don’t waste your time trying to convince me of your beliefs because they won’t change the way I life my life.”

My husband thought my message sounded good. Later, our loved one sent a text to my husband saying: “Just went and talked to a priest. He said he’s glad to see young people like me asking questions like this. He said he’s sorry my own family won’t listen to me. I’m going to work today but for one reason…SOMEBODY listened to me.”

I was terribly upset. I felt keenly the futility of trying to talk logically to someone who is illogical. Also, I knew I needed to step back. In the end, people are going to believe what they are going to believe. I can’t change anyone’s mind about anything. I felt my loved one needed psychological help, but there was no legal way I could force him to get help. Unless he attempted suicide or hurt someone, I was powerless. He was determined that he would not seek psychological help. He always has been firm on that point. My heart ached for him and his struggles; I wanted so much to help him but he has to want to seek help.

I must have looked devastated as I walked back to the albergue (I had been walking through the streets of the town as I talked to my husband on the phone, crying sporadically), because I met up with Karen and Simon and they listened lovingly to my predicament. Simon said gently that young people these days can find any information online to support any belief. They shared that someone in their family went through a series of breakdowns and it turned out she had been struggling with her sexuality. I loved how they shared their vulnerability, and were understanding and not judgmental, and they didn’t offer advice. They helped soothe my angst considerably.

I went to eat at the bar – pizza and red wine – and the bartender, who had been gruff earlier, must have sensed I was stricken because he was very gentle with me.

On the way back, I sat with Paul and Richard and told them what happened and let them read my text to my loved one. They thought it was a good text. Paul said I should just set him aside from my mind because I couldn’t do anything to help him unless he decided to help himself. Richard disagreed and said it was impossible because I am his mother.

I could hardly sleep all night because I was so agitated and anxious about my loved one’s mental health and well-being. I felt utterly helpless. I also felt disappointed that all my prayers, offered daily in my long solo walks and in churches along the Way, seemed to be going unanswered. What little faith I had been building seemed in danger of being snuffed out.

Atapuerca is one place I will never forget. The kind friends I met, the funny experience of the shower and laundry, and this traumatic experience all mingled together to etch the time and place vividly into my memory. I can still see it clearly today, and I still feel my heart race when I think about it.

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*Day 17: Thursday, September 20, 2018*

*230,502 steps, or 12.93 miles: Villafranca Montes de Oca to Atapuerca (18.8 km)*

You can find everything I’ve written so far on the Camino de Santiago here:

Camino de Santiago 2018

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On Sundays, I post about hikes or walks that I have taken in my travels; I may also post on other unrelated subjects. I will use these posts to participate in Jo’s Monday Walks or any other challenges that catch my fancy.

This post is in response to Jo’s Monday Walk: Back Lane Beauty.

cincinnati street art

wanderessence1025 May 16, 2019

A city that enlivens itself by investing in street art is one that uplifts and transforms: the city, its people, the entire atmosphere. ArtWorks Cincinnati is a program that, according to its website: “believes in human potential and fights for the betterment of our local communities through the power of the arts.”

Below is a sample of street murals in Cincinnati, Ohio we discovered during our three day visit in early March of this year.

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

ArtWorks Cincinnati

We found this three paneled mural in Oakley, a neighborhood in Cincinnati.

Oakley street mural

This post is part of the Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #45: Street Art.

*March 2-4, 2019*

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“PHOTOGRAPHY” INVITATION: I invite you to create a photography intention and then create a blog post for a place you have visited. Alternately, you can post a thematic post about a place, photos of whatever you discovered that set your heart afire. You can also do a thematic post of something you have found throughout all your travels: churches, doors, people reading, people hiking, mountains, patterns, all black & white, whatever!

You probably have your own ideas about this, but in case you’d like some ideas, you can visit my page: photography inspiration.

I challenge you to post no more than 20-25 photos and to write less than 1,500 words about any travel-related photography intention you set for yourself. Include the link in the comments below by Wednesday, May 29 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Thursday, May 30, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation, every first and third (& 5th, if there is one) Thursday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

the ~ wander.essence ~ community

I invite you all to settle in and read a few posts from our wandering community. I promise, you’ll be inspired!

Ulli, of Suburban Tracks, wrote a post about an archeological site in Germany with some special energies and dynamics.
- OBSCURE MENHIR EVENT

Thanks to all of you who shared posts on the “photography” invitation. 🙂

on journey: indiana to illinois

wanderessence1025 May 15, 2019

It was deserted at the Baymont Wyndham Hotel in Lincoln City, Indiana. I had breakfast all by myself: a fried egg, two chicken sausages, a banana, orange juice and coffee. When I left the hotel at 9:07, it was 28º F, but at least skies were blue.

Outside of Dale, Indiana, my stomach turned at the sight of a billboard that said: “Make America Great Again,” with a photo of Trump and an unfurling flag. I stomped my foot to the accelerator to bypass that abomination and headed toward Santa Claus and Gentryville, IN under a flock of birds skittering across the sky.

I drove past Hoosierland Pizza & Wings and columns of grasping trees to the Lincoln Boyhood Home National Memorial, where I watched a film telling the story of Abraham Lincoln’s boyhood and family life.

Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial

relief carving on the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial

In a nutshell, Thomas Lincoln, Abraham’s father, encountered problems with Kentucky’s land laws, so he bought 160 acres of land on Pigeon Creek north of the Ohio River in Indiana. In December of 1816, the family arrived. Abraham, age 7, was big and strong and helped his father clear the land; from the cut trees, they built a cabin and furniture. He learned carpentry from his father. The family worked together planting and harvesting crops such as corn; they also tended livestock: cows, chickens, pigs and sheep, the wool from which they made into clothing.

walking the trail to the Lincoln Boyhood Home

the remains of Lincoln’s Boyhood home

Some cabins, sheds and barns at the site are used for prairie life reenactments, but these are not the original buildings from Lincoln’s boyhood.

log cabin used for prairie life reenactments

barn used for prairie life reenactments

Abraham was proficient with an axe, and people often remarked about his ability to fell trees and split them into rails for fences. In 1860, when he ran for President, Lincoln would be called “The Rail-splitter” candidate.

Lincoln the “Rail-splitter”

trees on the family property

Lincoln said of work: “My father taught me how to work but not to love it… I’d rather read, tell stories, crack jokes, talk, laugh – anything but work.”

Thomas was a storyteller with morals and a sense of humor. Nancy, Abe’s mother, taught Abe to read and write and encouraged him to acquire knowledge.

Sadly, in 1818, two years after they arrived in Indiana, Nancy Hanks Lincoln died of milk sickness, caused by drinking milk from a cow that ate white snakeroot, a shade-loving poisonous plant found throughout the Ohio River Valley. Cows can transfer the disease to humans through their milk. Abe’s sister Sarah, who was two years older than him, had to do all the cooking, sewing and mending.

diorama of Nancy Hanks Lincoln’s burial

knoll leading to Nancy Hanks Lincoln’s grave

memorial to Nancy Hanks Lincoln

In 1819, Thomas went back to Kentucky to look for a new wife, leaving the two children to fend for themselves. He brought back Sarah (Sally) Bush Johnston, who had three children of her own. She united the two families and brought three books with her.

Some of Abraham’s favorite books were Aesop’s Fables, Pilgrim’s Progress and Ivanhoe. In the evenings, the family read aloud from the Bible, and Abe considered it the “best gift God has given to man.” He read Indiana law books and court proceedings and was fascinated by the lives of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin. Besides his love of books, he had a gift for public speaking.

In his late teens, Abraham began to earn his own way. In 1826, he and his cousin and a neighbor made money by cutting cordwood for steamboats on the Ohio River. He also operated a ferry across the Anderson River, earning about $6 a month. To make extra money, Abraham built a small rowboat to take travelers from the riverbank to steamboats waiting in the middle of the Ohio. He was accused of operating an illegal ferry and had to appear in court. His defense was that he was only ferrying passengers to the middle of the river, not all the way across. The judge ruled in his favor, and the charge was dismissed. Later, he took up law and learned about the legal system.

In 1828, his sister Sarah died giving birth to her first child and the infant died too.

Abe took a flatboat trip with a friend down the Mississippi River to New Orleans and came face to face with slavery at a New Orleans slave auction. He was angered to see families separated and sold. In 1830, when Abe was 21, he left for Illinois and to escape another epidemic of milk disease.

I took a walk through Lincoln’s boyhood trails, now marked with stones from important places in his life.

Boyhood trails on the property

Stone from Lincoln’s birthplace in Hodgenville, KY where he was born on Feb. 12, 1809

Stone that was part of the White House in Washington, D.C., where President and Mrs. Lincoln lived from 1861 to his assassination on April 15, 1865

Stone from the Anderson Cottage in Washington where Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation in 1862

The rock where President Lincoln stood when he delivered the Gettysburg Address, November 19, 1863

In his 14 years at his boyhood home in Indiana, Lincoln learned honesty, knowledge, compassion for man, and his moral convictions of right and wrong. Here he developed leadership skills that would serve him well during one of the most traumatic times in our nation’s history.

I left the Lincoln Boyhood Home around 11:00, when the temperature had finally risen to 39º F. I passed big farm spreads with complicated silos and grain elevators, a pale green weathered barn, a church steeple on a hill, and Dave’s Gunshop. I fell in love with a farmhouse surrounded by a stand of trees. An Amish Buffet called my name, but it was too early for lunch.

southern Indiana silos

farm operation in southern Indiana

Flocks of birds rose and fell, splitting and dancing, swept into cross-currents, parting and sweeping the sky. I saw signs for the Wabash and Erie Canal, Carts Gone Wild, Grace’s Toys and Dolls, and a plethora of personal injury billboards. Smokestacks marred the horizon to the northwest. Three giant white coned cylinders had the Superior Ag stamp on them. Other blocks of silver cylinders also had cone tops. I was confused about whether these were silos or grain elevators.

I drove past a sign for the Red Skelton Museum of American Comedy in Vincennes, Indiana. Huge flocks of birds descended and landed on a waterlogged field. The flat expanse of land was dotted with farm operations. Multi-arched sprinklers on wheels hovered over fields and silver silos glowed in the sunlight. I passed the Windy Knoll Winery, Casey’s General Store and a Good Will Center, a Dollar General, Save A Lot, and Old Post Liquor. A huge cemetery splayed out from both sides of the road and the Good Samaritan Hospital offered healing for the sick.

Before long, I was at the George Rogers Clark National Historic Park in Vincennes, Indiana. I had no idea who George Rogers Clark was, nor did I know anything about this military campaign or its significance. What they don’t teach you in school!

George Rogers Clark Memorial

At the Visitor’s Center, I watched a film about the “Long Knives,” Kentucky fighters that were on a top secret mission. The upshot was this: After the French and Indian War (1754–1763) and during the early years of the Revolutionary War (1775-1783), British soldiers under Lt. Governor Henry Hamilton were still controlling territories west of the Appalachian Mountains. The British were recruiting Indians to attack and kill settlers to these areas, including settlers in Kentucky. George Rogers Clark, born in 1752 as one of ten children of a wealthy Virginia planter and older brother to William Clark, of the famous Lewis & Clark, wanted to break the Brits’ Fort Detroit stronghold: Cahokia and Kaskaskia on the Mississippi River and Vincennes on the Wabash River. In utmost secrecy, Clark attracted 150 men (of the 400 he hoped for) and trained them on Corn Island on the Ohio River. He managed to get 26 more for a total force of 176. They were a disciplined little army under Clark’s intense training. Their goal: to attack the British post at Kaskaskia – Fort Massac – in the heat of the summer, on level country populated by buffalo, in a surprise night attack on July 4, 1778. Persuading the French settlers under Father Pierre Gibault there to cooperate based on a document of alliance between the U.S.A. and France, Clark left them in peace and then proceeded to Cahokia and then to Vincennes. By the autumn of 1778, Clark controlled all three towns. He told Indians attacking settlers that they were being used by the British.

characters in the drama: George Rogers Clark, Father Piere Gibault, an Indian, and Henry Hamilton

Henry Hamilton in Fort Detroit, 800 miles away, didn’t know the towns had been taken. When he found out, he mounted an expedition to take back Vincennes; he succeeded, rebuilt Fort Sackville and hunkered down there with 35 British regulars and 45 French.

model of Fort Sackville, which no longer survives

Winter came on and prairies turned to bogs. Clark planned to strike when Hamilton was weakest. The riverboat, The Willing, failed to bring needed supplies, but Clark had to either attack Hamilton or quit the country. On February 5, 1779, he led his men on a 200 mile march to Vincennes. Their biggest enemy was nature. In nine days of marching, the weather was unseasonably warm, but rain and the nights were frigid. The men were hungry and the land was underwater. The Wabash River had turned into a lake four miles across. They had to march through deep channels of freezing water for three days on empty stomachs because The Willing never came with provisions. Doom gripped them as they waded through ankle deep mud. Surprisingly, all 180 men survived and reached land, pushing to higher ground.

The Wabash River today

The accurate Kentucky sharpshooters badly wounded a number of British troops in Fort Sackville. By February 24, 1779, the Americans were in control and ate their first full meal in a week. Clark ordered Hamilton to surrender and a cease fire was agreed, but Hamilton still held out. To force the issue, Clark executed Indians by tomahawk in front of the fort. Shaken by that display, Hamilton surrendered on February 25, 1779.

As a result of Clark’s brilliant military activities, the British ceded to the United States a vast area of land west of the Appalachian Mountains. That territory now includes the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin and the eastern portion of Minnesota.

In 1818, plagued by debts and ill health, George Rogers Clark died at the age of 65, seemingly forgotten. It wasn’t until many years later that he was recognized by Franklin D. Roosevelt for his acts of courage and leadership. The George Rogers Clark Memorial was built between 1931 and 1933.

George Rogers Clark Memorial

inside the George Rogers Clark Memorial

It was odd that I happened to arrive here on February 25, exactly 240 years after Henry Hamilton surrendered to George Rogers Clark; the National Park Service had just finished wrapping up a celebration to memorialize this oft-forgotten battle in our country’s history.

murals in the George Rogers Clark Memorial

A detailed history of the campaign is on the National Park website: History & Culture.

At 2:33, “Welcome to Illinois” greeted me after I crossed the Wabash River. The land was flat and boggy, watersoaked through and through, and I couldn’t help imagining George Rogers Clark and his band of soldiers wading through the bogs. I crossed the Embarras River and a water tower that spelled out “Olney.” Mobile home parks lined the road and a big Walmart distribution center sat among stubbled flat fields dotted with copses of trees. It seemed there was a Walmart in every town. I crossed Big Muddy Creek, Little Muddy Creek, and the Little Wabash River on modern bridges, but three rusty metal bridges sat shuttered parallel to the main road. I wasn’t tempted to stay in the Floral Hotel near Raccoon Creek, nor was I tempted by Missy Ann’s Bed and Bath. Ornamental grasses glowed along the road and stubbled fields glinted with sunlight. In Xenia, a derelict barn sat abandoned in boggy land. If I’d had a pet, I might have stopped at Paws Here Veterinary Service. I saw Iuka had a population of 600, while Salem, with its neat streets of craft bungalows, had 8,000 residents.

In the town of Salem, I was in search of Richard Pollard’s Yard Art. Sadly, it was closed off with a rusty chain and a “No Trespassing” sign. I was only able to take one picture of the funky junkyard, a Volkswagen emblazoned with “Pollard Motors” perched precariously on a post.

Richard Pollard’s Yard Art in Salem, Illinois

Leaving Salem behind, I headed south on Rt. 57, passing a billboard for The National Quilt Museum in Paducah, Kentucky. It was tempting but out of my way. I stopped briefly at Rend Lake, a 13-mile-long, 3 mile-wide reservoir created when the Army Corps of Engineers dammed the Big Muddy River.

Rend Lake, Illinois

I drove through a series of small towns: Ina, with its Pleasant Hollow Winery, and Zeiglar, from which convoluted roads finally led me to my sister’s house in Murphysboro around 6:00.

darkening sky near Carbondale, IL

My sister’s new house is very cool, a mid-century modern house with numerous wings. I loved her office, her decks, her many windows, her artwork and old classic books.

After getting the tour of her house, we went to neighboring Carbondale, a larger university town, home to Southern Illinois University. We went to Fujiyama Japanese Steakhouse where we toasted each other with Sapporo beer and warm sake in the cavernous restaurant. It wasn’t quite the cozy Japanese sushi bar we’d loved in L.A. We had edamame, gyoza and sushi: I ordered the special “Forever Love”: shrimp tempura, spicy crab, cream cheese, pink soy paper, and sweet wasabi sauce. Then, because I hadn’t brought a hair dryer and she didn’t have one (I should have checked before I left home!), we stopped at Walmart so I could buy one, and at Kroger for some groceries.

“Forever Love” at Fujiyama Japanese Steakhouse in Carbondale, IL

Forever Love

edamame & gyoza

My Indiana & Illinois route for today is outlined in purple below.

My Illinois route: Salem to Carbondale to Murphysboro

My Indiana route (day 2) is outlined in purple: Dale to Lincoln City to Vincennes

I did a couple of pathetic sketches today, and collected cancellation stickers and stamps for my visits to the two National Park sites.

my sketch for the day

my cancellation stamps

*Monday, February 25, 2019*

Steps: 10,737; 4.55 miles

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“ON JOURNEY” INVITATION: I invite you to write a post on your own blog about the journey itself for a recently visited specific destination. You could write about the journey you hope to take in the year ahead. If you don’t have a blog, I invite you to write in the comments.

My intentions on this trip included picking a random theme for each day of my trip. I had written in my journal, before leaving home, a theme for each day that would focus my attention. This day’s theme was “Leadership & Quirky Things.” Another of my intentions was to draw a sketch in my journal. I used a pen (a mistake!), but I tried my best to draw some of the things I noticed along the way. My drawings are still so elementary!

Include the link in the comments below by Tuesday, June 18 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Wednesday, June 19, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation, once on the third Wednesday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

amarante, portugal: the village of love

wanderessence1025 May 14, 2019

After a lazy morning in our Airbnb apartment, we escaped Porto’s rainy day forecast by driving to the sleepy village of Amarante through mist-enshrouded, vineyard-covered hills and valleys. Though it remained gloomy through the day, the rain ended upon our arrival, giving us a chance to wander the town’s zigzagging lanes and to sample its iconic São Gonçalo cakes.

Amarante is a destination for lonely heart pilgrims hoping to sniff out true love. It sits on a bend in the Rio Tâmega, which levels a winding watery path through an otherwise hilly landscape. The willow-lined riverbanks are dominated by a striking church and monastery sitting dramatically at the end of the medieval Ponte de São Gonçalo.

We strolled through this charming hometown of São Gonçalo, a 13th century hermit considered to be Portugal’s St. Valentine, amidst grizzled local men smoking cigarettes outside balconied houses. We dipped into a bakery for a treat of the phallus-shaped traditional São Gonçalo cakes. Legend has it that older unmarried women offered these cakes to the man they desired in hopes of finding reciprocal love.

Of course we had to sample these provocative cakes in an effort to blend in with the locals and pilgrims. 🙂

We crossed the Rio Tâmega on the granite Ponte de São Gonçalo, a bridge completed in 1790 to replace the original 13th century bridge, which collapsed in a flood in 1763. We found letters spelling A M A R A N T E decorated in child-like drawings . Switchback lanes carried us, with breathtaking effort, from the narrow valley floor to a sweeping view over the hills and the arcaded gallery of kings at Igreja de São Gonçalo.

Inside the lofty interior of the Igreja de São Gonçalo, we admired the gilded baroque altar, pulpits, and Gonçalo’s tomb. Here, the dead saint lends hope to pilgrims who are looking for a mate; it is said that if they touch the limestone statue above his tomb, their wish will be granted within a year.

After ambling around the austere cloisters of the church, we made our way down to the cobbled path along the south bank of the Rio Tâmega, admiring the watery reflections of homes and businesses, willow trees, the triple-spanned bridge, and the Casa da Calçada.

By the end of our visit, we grew hungry for lunch. We stopped in at Bar dos Pauzinhos where I had a wonderful Francesinha, a Portuguese sandwich-bread with wet cured ham, linguiça, and fresh sausage-like chipolata, covered with melted cheese and hot thick tomato and beer sauce. Every bite was heavenly. 🙂

After lunch, we hopped into our Clubman MINI Cooper and made our way back to Porto as the sun peeked out in the late afternoon.

Amarante

pastel de nata in Amarante

St. Gonçalo cakes

me eating a St. Gonçalo cake

Amarante

Casa da Calçada is a 16th century palace rising above the Ponte de São Gonçalo that is now a boutique hotel.

entrance to Casa da Calçada

Casa da Calçada

Amarante

across the Ponte de São Gonçalo to Igreja de São Gonçalo

the Rio Tâmega

AMARANTE

reflections along the Rio Tâmega

Ponte de São Gonçalo

Casa da Calçada & reflection

Interior and cloister of Igreja de São Gonçalo

Inside Igreja de São Gonçalo

cloister at Igreja de São Gonçalo

inside Igreja de São Gonçalo

Amarante south of the Rio Tâmega has winding narrow switchback lanes from which we found marvelous views. Above the Igreja de São Gonçalo’s Italian Renaissance side portal is an arcaded gallery with 17th-century statues of Dom João and other kings who ruled while the monastery was under construction: Sebastião, Henrique and Felipe I.

arcaded gallery of kings at Igreja de São Gonçalo

The bell tower was added in the 18th century.

bell tower of Igreja de São Gonçalo

balcony extraordinaire

Amarante south of the Rio Tâmega

Amarante south of the Rio Tâmega

Amarante south of the Rio Tâmega

arcaded gallery of kings at Igreja de São Gonçalo

Picking up our car and heading back to Porto

*Tuesday, October 30, 2018*

Steps: 14,940 (6.33 miles)

**********************

“PROSE” INVITATION: I invite you to write up to a post on your own blog about a recently visited particular destination (not journeys in general). Concentrate on any intention you set for your prose. In this case, one of my intentions for my trip to Portugal was to pick five random verbs each day and use them in my travel essay: 1) ~~sniff~~, 2) ~~level~~, 3) ~~smoke~~, 4) ~~loan~~, 5) ~~end~~. √

It doesn’t matter whether you write fiction or non-fiction for this invitation. You can either set your own writing intentions, or use one of the prompts I’ve listed on this page: writing prompts: prose. (This page is a work in process.) You can also include photos, of course.

Include the link in the comments below by Monday, May 27 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this invitation on Tuesday, May 28, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

the ~ wander.essence ~ community

I invite you all to settle in and read a few posts from our wandering community. I promise, you’ll be inspired. 🙂

Maximcartography of cartographysis wrote a marvelous post intermingling his reading of José Saramago’s Blindness and the cod specialty bacalhau with a visit to Lisbon.
- Blindness and Bacalhau in Lisbon

Thanks to all of you who wrote prosaic posts following intentions you set for yourself. 🙂

{camino day 16} villamayor del río to villafranca montes de oca

wanderessence1025 May 12, 2019

I started my day at 6:30 a.m. by accidentally missing a 4.9 km stretch of the Camino. I stayed in a hotel last night, La Encantada in Quintanilla del Monte, that was 1 km off the Camino from the town of Villamayor del Río. Another pilgrim staying there, Vicky, had a service to take her into town. Assuming she meant Villamayor del Río, I asked if I could share her ride into town. Suddenly, we were speeding through the town and left it before I knew what was happening. “Which town are you going to?” I asked, feeling a bit of panic. She said, “Belorado.” It all happened in about 5 minutes. I felt disappointed as I meant to walk the whole Camino, but I had no desire to backtrack at that hour of the morning in the dark. So I found the Hotel Jacobeo in Belorado, ate a chocolate croissant, a hard boiled egg, café con leche and orange juice. Then I replenished my cash, and was on my way in the dark. My right hip and the muscle along the inside of my knee were hurting, so I stopped to stretch a number of times.

Villamayor del Río to Belorado (4.9 km)

Belorado

The historic town of Belorado, built in the steep valley of the río Verdeancho, has a population of about 2,100. The town has castle ruins of Roman origins that point to the town’s defensive past straddling the old border of Castile. As it was dark when I arrived, I didn’t see the castle ruins, the ancient cave dwellings that were once home to hermits, or the 14th century Church of Santa María.

The landscape was enshrouded in fog for almost the entire walk, so I attended to the haystacks, the wildflowers, and violet berries along the path.

Belorado to Tosantos (4.8 km)

Belorado to Tosantos

I went through Tosantos (nothing there but its 60 residents), where I saw the chapel of the Virgen de la Peña (Our Lady of the Rock) clinging to a wall of rock.

Tosantos to Villambistia (2.0 km)

sunflowers

café inTosantos

Casa de los Deseos

Peregrino Medieval

After a steep climb, I stopped in Villambistia (Pop. 50) at Casa de los Deseos for a mango juice, café con leche, and a bathroom break. I wasn’t really hungry as I’d had that big breakfast in Belorado, but the fog had gotten so thick, I felt like I was soaked. I wanted to dry off. I saw the adorable Québécois couple, Daniel and Rosalina. She said she’d been miserable with indigestion but was feeling better now. There I met Stella from London who told me of an app called The Camino Companion, which I could never find. I met Brian the Irishman who gave me grief for using the men’s room.

There was a pretty church, Iglesia San Roque, in Villambistia, but it was closed.

Iglesia San Roque in Villambistia

I continued on a broad, smooth, rural track through fields of sunflowers, wildflowers and violet berries.

Villambistia to Espinosa del Camino (1.6 km)

sunflowers

colorful violet berries

pretty greens

droopy sunflowers

sunflowers

tiny yellows

little stars

spider web

I walked through the small town of Espinosa del Camino (pop. 40) without stopping. The Albergue la Campana was a charming yellow place with a bicycle set up out front.

Espinosa del Camino

Espinosa del Camino

We climbed and climbed until we crested a hill and could see Villafranca de Montes de Oca down below. There, I met Alex and Meghan from Ontario, Oregon. Alex had hurt his knee carrying two bags (one for himself and one for Meghan who had gotten hurt going down into Zubiri).

Espinosa del Camino to Villafranca de Montes de Oca (3.6 km)

Espinosa del Camino to Villafranca de Montes de Oca

Meghan and I stopped to admire the 9th century ruins of Monasterio de San Félix de Oca, with its distinctive arch. Here, the founder of Burgos, Count Diego Porcelos, was probably interred. Meghan worried about her 21-year-old daughter, who had fallen behind to hang out with an Italian guy.

Monasterio de San Félix de Oca

The scene became more painterly as we approached the town and the sunlight melted over the hilly farmland and sunflower fields.

Espinosa del Camino to Villafranca de Montes de Oca

sunflower-lined path

Espinosa del Camino to Villafranca de Montes de Oca

sunflowers

Espinosa del Camino to Villafranca de Montes de Oca

field of dreams

me with sunflowers

Espinosa del Camino to Villafranca de Montes de Oca

river Oca

Because of skipping ahead, I was in my hotel by 11 a.m. What was supposed to be a 17.3 km walk turned into an 11.8 km walk. I got an easy day without intending to!

My hotel, La Alpargateria, was the first one on the noisy main road in Villafranca de Montes de Oca; it was run by two lively sisters, Sylvia and Kristina. Their father ran the bar next door, El Pajaro, the only place to eat in town. I had a jambon sandwich and cerveza for lunch.

Villafranca de Montes de Oca historically welcomed pilgrims as early as the 9th century. This is one of several Villafrancas along the way that became home to Franks arriving as pilgrims and returning as artisans. The village is located at the foot of the Montes de Oca, formerly a wild unpopulated area notorious for bandits that preyed on pilgrims. The bandits often prayed for protection (after all, bandits needed protection too!) from the Saint himself in the safety of the 18th-century Church of Santiago or they’d find shelter in the 14th-century Hospital de San Antonio Abad, which had recently been restored. This handsome building is often referred to as the Queen’s Hospice.

Back in my room, I edited my photos and posted on Instagram and chatted for a while with Mike on Whatsapp. Darina wrote and said she was having a fabulous time in Navarette with her friends and even went to the sea in San Sebastian. She said she might be in Burgos on Monday, but I would be gone by then. She sent photos of a beautiful waterfall she went to: Monasterio de Piedra in Aragon. She said the energy of the place, the spirituality, was better 250 km to the east of Navarette: “I’m sooo blessed and happy.” She is such a joyous person. Joy emanates from her. I would love to find that kind of joy in my life and emanate it as she does.

I also heard from Claire and Matt and she found she got the job teaching English in Korea. I felt so happy for their upcoming adventure.

As small as the town was, it had a truck stop at the entrance to town and it was a busy truck corridor. The trucks barreled through town, paying little heed to the pilgrims on the skimpy sidewalks. If I hadn’t been paying attention when I walked out the door of the supermarket, I would have been flattened! I couldn’t help but wonder how many pilgrims got killed in this town each year.

La Alpargateria

Later, sitting under a shaded awning at El Pajaro, I met 27-year-old Anne from France. She was very cute, with her cropped brown hair and nose ring. She planned to camp in her sleeping bag that night because there were no rooms in town. She seemed happy to do so, and had done it before. She had been working in Paris doing animation for commercials, but she quit because she didn’t like it. She, like Darina, seemed full of joy.

El Pajaro Restaurant/Bar in Montes de Oca

Montes de Oca

Sadly, the Church of Santiago wasn’t open.

Church of Santiago

Montes de Oca

Montes de Oca

Montes de Oca

Montes de Oca

Church of Santiago

fountain of Church of Santiago

Church of Santiago

San Antón Abad

Church of Santiago

In the evening, I shared a pilgrim’s meal with the two French Canadian guys from Quebec, Richard and Paul. We had a lot of laughs. They said they’d had dinner with Vibeke, the Danish lady I’d met a couple nights earlier, in Belorado. They talked of their dismay over Trump’s appeal (they hated him), the French language vs. Québécois French, Paul’s past hikes on the Camino with his wife, and how they had a room reserved for the next day in Atapuerca. My pilgrim meal was green beans, trout with French fries, wine and pudding. It was so much fun; I drank a lot of wine, but for some reason I hardly ever felt anything from Spanish wines.

Tomorrow, I’d have to get an early start to race for a bed at the albergue at Atapuerca, where beds were known to be scarce and no reservations were taken, except for private rooms, which were all booked. The Camino was really crowded and every day people were reserving ahead to be assured of a place to sleep.

I could hear the trucks roaring past my window all night.

**********

*Day 16: Wednesday, September 19, 2018*

*20,686 steps, or 8.77 miles: (Villamayor del Río) Belorado to Villafranca Montes de Oca (supposed to be 17.3 km, actually 12.0 km)*

You can find everything I’ve written so far on the Camino de Santiago here:

Camino de Santiago 2018

**************

This post is in response to Jo’s Monday Walk: Back Lane Beauty.

on returning home from the adirondacks

wanderessence1025 May 6, 2019

It was always depressing returning home from vacation. Our family trip to the Adirondacks in New York, from August 10-18, 2001, seemed an otherworldly escape. Many afternoons, I sat in a dark green Adirondack chair on the dock at Flower Lake, writing in my journal. We hiked in the mountains, canoed on the lakes and explored charming little towns. We relaxed, played Yahtzee and Chinese Checkers. We soaked in a Jacuzzi. It was my perfect dream life and I could have continued there through fall and winter.

In the months after we returned, I worked on creating a photo album of our Adirondacks holiday. I kept a detailed journal that I hoped to eventually use as inspiration for a short story. It’s now been nearly 18 years since we went on this holiday, and I’ve never yet written a short story set in the Adirondacks. 😦

photo album from the Adirondacks

photo album from the Adirondacks

I planned to keep busy in the fall, which would be no problem when my classes started soon after our return home. If I focused only on work – writing, learning French, reading up on France and the Bahamas, planning our trip to France, and staying out of stores – I hoped I would be okay.

One night after our return from the Adirondacks, Mike and I watched Connie Chung’s interview with Congressman Gary Condit on Prime Time. At that time, I believed he was guilty of killing Chandra Levey, an intern at the Federal Bureau of Prisons who had disappeared on May 1, 2001; the married Congressman had been having an affair with her. In the interview, he gave what seemed evasive, canned answers to every question. Apparently public opinion was with me 10-2 that he killed Chanda Levey. He seemed so damned smug that a body would never be found and he would never be implicated. I hated to see people literally get away with murder – another O.J. Simpson, I was convinced. Of course, I, along with the media and everyone else, would be proven wrong in 2009, when an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, Ingmar Guandique, would be arrested for Chandra Levey’s murder in Rock Creek Park.

At the end of August, I went to my first Creative Writing class with Laura Ellen Scott at George Mason University. Though I’d been an English major at the College of William and Mary in the late 70s, I’d never taken creative writing classes; most of my classes were in literature and literary analysis.

Our first assignment in the class was to do a rewrite of the Edgar Allen Poe short story, “The Cask of Amontillado,” set in an unnamed Italian city at carnival time in an unspecified year. The Poe story was about a man taking fatal revenge on a friend who, he believed, had insulted him. Like several of Poe’s stories, and in keeping with the 19th-century fascination with the subject, the narrative revolved around a person being buried alive – in this case, by immurement, a form of imprisonment, usually for life, in which a person is placed within an enclosed space with no exits. Poe conveyed the story from the murderer’s perspective.

It was our class assignment to write a short story using Poe’s story as inspiration; mine was loosely based on the Gary Condit and Chandra Levey affair; in my story the main character was not a Congressman, but a spelunker. My rewrite was called, “Slow Dance with Stalagmites.” I finished the first draft on September 6 and then did a lot of revision. A while after we’d turned in the assignment, the teacher read my story aloud to the class as the best story she’d received.

photo album from Adirondacks

canoeing on Lake Saranac

Mike and I went to Cinema Arts to see the Italian film Bread & Tulips. It was so cute. I loved how the middle-aged woman, Rosalba (Licia Maglietta), escaped her less than devoted husband, Mimmo, and two sons and recreated herself in Venice, working in a florist shop and falling for an ex-con Icelandic waiter named Fernando who kept trying to hang himself. Of course, I myself loved to dream of escaping to Europe and living all alone, remaking myself anew. I would try to keep that dream alive when I got depressed.

Adam, me and Alex

At the pool on the Sunday after we returned, I lay in the sun reading The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver. When I got home, I called my Mom, who had been in the hospital since Wednesday because her blood oxygen level was 69 when she went in for a checkup with her doctor. When I called, she’d just been released from the hospital. She’d been having trouble breathing since the hot weather and since she put some fingernail polish on before she went to Richmond with her friend Susan. Her normal blood oxygen level with her emphysema was 90, while normal for other people was 97. The nurses in the hospital were surprised that her doctor hadn’t put her on oxygen immediately upon seeing the 69 level. They kept her in for tests. When they sent her home, she had to stay on oxygen and she would likely have to be on it indefinitely. She was hoping she’d be better in the fall and be able to get off of it. At that time, she had to be on it 24 hours a day. She was hooked up to the machine on a 40-foot cord when she was in the house, and when she went out, she had to cart around the oxygen tank on a rolling cart. That meant Dad had to go with her to the grocery store, because she couldn’t push the shopping cart and pull her oxygen cart at the same time. That didn’t sound good at all.

Mom was upset that a waitress at a restaurant was very rude, presumably because she was carrying oxygen. I told her, “It may not have had anything to do with the oxygen. She may have just been plain rude!”

I told her I was starting class the next day and she said, “In what?” I said, “In writing… You just don’t want to remember what I’m taking, do you?” I didn’t know why she seemed threatened by my writing, unless she was afraid I was going write about her. She had never in my entire life encouraged my creativity, as she had with my sister and brother. It irked me; this was one of many reasons why we had such a strained relationship.

my Adirondacks journal and photo album

I met my ex-husband Bill in Richmond to pick up our 17-year-old daughter Sarah, where in the car, I reiterated to her that it was up to her to prove to me that she was mature enough to go away to college. I said one visit to the clinic during school could cost her that privilege. She was often going to the school clinic for stomach issues related to anxiety. She needed to learn to deal with her anxieties. So, we started our visit on a sour note.

I took Sarah shopping and broke my promise to myself not to get her any new clothes, by letting her use money from her account to buy herself jeans at Gap and some sweaters at Wet Seal. I felt bad for her because Bill made her pay every cent she’d earned all summer for car repairs. It seemed to me he should have split some of those costs, since he was guilty of putting a lot of wear and tear on that car. I felt sorry for her having to provide almost totally for herself, with virtually no help from her dad and stepmother.

Several weeks later, that September of 2001, we would suffer the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon, an event that would forever change our lives. The story of Gary Condit and Chandra Levey was soon forgotten. Sarah would finish her senior year of high school and go away to college the following fall, dropping out after a year (she graduated much later, after a long slow process, at age 32). I lost my mother to emphysema several months later, in April 2002, and read the e.e. cummings poem, “if there are any heavens,” at her funeral; I’d discovered and fallen in love with this poem in the Adirondacks. I continued taking creative writing classes and started my first novel, which I finished, though never published, several years later. Finally, a chain of events occurred after the 9/11 attacks that led to a 7-year separation from my husband in 2007, in which I partially realized my dream of remaking myself in a foreign country, much like Rosalba in Bread & Tulips. My husband and I would get back together in 2014, after I’d lived and worked abroad in South Korea and Oman, and before I’d go to work in China and Japan.

Somehow this family vacation marked an end to innocence.

*************************

“ON RETURNING HOME” INVITATION: I invite you to write a post on your own blog about returning home from one particular destination or, alternately, from a long journey encompassing many stops. How do you linger over your wanderings and create something from them? How have you changed? Did the place live up to its hype, or was it disappointing? Feel free to address any aspect of your journey and how it influences you upon your return. If you don’t have a blog, I invite you to write in the comments.

For some ideas on this, you can check out the original post about this subject: on returning home.

Include the link in the comments below by Sunday, June 2 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Monday, June 3, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation on the first Monday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

the ~ wander.essence ~ community

I invite you all to settle in and read a few posts from our wandering community. I promise, you’ll be inspired. 🙂

I am traveling from April 4 to May 10. If I cannot respond to or add your links due to wi-fi problems or time constraints, please feel free to add your links in both this post and my next scheduled post. If I can’t read them when you post them, I will get to them as soon as I can. Thanks for your understanding! 🙂

Thanks to all of you who wrote returning home posts following intentions you set for yourself. 🙂

{camino day 15} santo domingo de la calzada to villamayor del río

wanderessence1025 May 5, 2019

I left at 6:45 a.m. start and talked briefly with an Irishman named Brian who had always been fascinated by the Camino. He did the last 100km in 2013, during which time he was going through marital difficulties. A Canadian woman held his hand and that was what enticed him back to complete the entire route. In the interim, he and his wife of 28 years went through a divorce; she cheated on him and refused to go to counseling, but the divorce was amicable. He said one good thing came out of his marriage: his kids.

While we were talking, we missed a fork in the path completely. A Spanish man standing in the dark along the path yelled out and pointed us in the right direction. Brian said that on the Camino angels appear out of nowhere to lead you.

There was some gossip along the Camino that Irishmen were hitting on women, spending nights with them and then disappearing; it was quite common apparently. I have no idea if that was true or not, but it was part of the Camino lore.

It was a day of black-faced sunflowers bowing their forlorn faces to the elusive sun. The path was flanked by ochre cornfields.

I had a nice chat with a man from Cologne, Germany who worked for Sprint. He said he thought Washington, D.C. was much nicer than New York; he used to live in New Jersey. Sadly, I had to excuse myself from that conversation for a nature call. 😦

I stopped at a cute cafe in Grañón for potato tortilla and café con leche and orange juice. We had to wait in line forever, but I hadn’t had breakfast so I had to wait. I liked to eat breakfast after getting a few kilometers under my belt. At the café, Shireen from Australia said the same man who directed us at that earlier fork in the path had yelled to direct her as well. We could only assume it must have been the man’s vocation to direct pilgrims at that confusing spot.

Santo Domingo de la Calzada to Grañón (6.7 km)

small ermita over the río Oja

sunrise

sunrise over Santo Domingo

Santo Domingo de la Calzada to Grañón

thistles & sunflowers

sunflowers

sunflowers

sunflowers

sunflowers

sunflowers

approaching Grañón

café in Grañón

Grañón

After breakfast in Grañón, I stopped for a brief visit to Iglesia S. Juan Bautista (Church of St. John the Baptist), and, after saying my routine prayers, sat for a while trying to figure out how to work the flash on my new Canon.

Iglesia S. Juan Bautista in Grañón (pop. 290)

Iglesia S. Juan Bautista

Grañón

I left Grañón on a hilly patchwork of farmland. It was a bit cloudy and cool, a nice relief from the heat as we left La Rioja region behind. Soon, we found a huge metal sign marking the start of the province of Burgos and therefore, of the largest autonomous region in Spain, Castilla y León. It is eleven times the size of the region of Madrid, but with a population of half that of Madrid. The ancient kingdom of Castile is named for its many castles, which sought to protect the kingdom. Fernando I established Castile in 1035, and El Cid turned the tide against the Moors from his base in Burgos in the 1090s. Castile was united with León two hundred years after it was founded under Fernando III.

This area is home to the Meseta, the flat plateau region that tests the mettle of many pilgrims. We weren’t to the Meseta yet, so we would have some time to prepare. Cereal crops abound here, mainly wheat and oats, with some sheep and goats. We saw fields of sunflowers in both areas today. We entered the town of Redecilla del Camino, where I stopped for a mango juice. Sadly the Nuestra Señora de la Calle (Our Lady of the Street) church was closed and I had to move on.

Grañón to Redecilla del Camino (3.8 km) (cross into Castilla y León)