Not so bad. The Charlemagne slope, while sloppy, made our shoes muddy but not our spirits. “I might have broken a little sweat,” said a triumphant Gina at the summit. Above the forest with the smile of the sun upon us, our nearly four hours of steep up-and-up gave us the idea the Camino, all told, was basically a cakewalk. The internet had told us that on this legendary trek to Santiago de Compostela,
People often experience a deep sense of personal transformation, forging strong connections with fellow pilgrims, confronting their inner selves, and finding a renewed appreciation for simplicity and nature, often leading to a feeling of personal growth and a deeper understanding of who they are, all while engaging in a physically challenging journey through beautiful landscapes; for many, it’s a spiritual pilgrimage no matter their religion.
After we sashayed downhill-ish to our next hotel in Roncesvalles – a restored Medieval hospital next to the tiny town’s monastery dating from 1230 – I pondered whether my own “deep sense of personal transformation” was imminent.
“Wow, really happy we didn’t book any stays in an alber-goo,” said Gina. Since neither of us knew Spanish, the word albergue we kept seeing seemed to imply the group-snore scene we’d rather have avoided, and here, in Roncesvalles, the group-snore set were, after scoping out their cubbies-with-cots, competing for lunch. Two tiny alber-goo cafes were offering the famished hikers two options: a ham-and-baguette sandwich with, of course, ham, and a ham-without-baguette plate with, yes, ham. “Would you happen to have a vegetarian option?” I politely asked the alber-goo guy, in English. “Only ham, ma’am,” is what I thought he said, apropos of the exact character shortcoming I would confront in myself along the Camino. No wonder I never personally transformed, I realized, with nothing to enjoy for lunch but Spanish potato chips and the ham plate’s pickle. People who confront their inner selves are probably okay with ham when they’re hungry. Alas, I never would be.
“How is your ‘deeper understanding of who are’ coming along?” I asked Gina the next morning after our happy hotel night in ultra-comfort, each with a bed of her own, a spa shower, and as much coffee as we could glug. Before setting off in thick Spanish fog to our next stop – Zubiri – we marveled at Roncesvalle’s charms: the beautiful Romanesque church built in the 12thcentury; the colorful (ancient!) Basque history that includes the Battle of Roncevaux Pass and death in 778 of Roland; the town’s status as the first unofficial “rest” spot for pilgrims who make it up and over the French Pyrenees. “Well, to be honest, now I get it was a major mistake to bring that big-ass suitcase on this trip,” she replied. Though a van was transporting our bags from hotel to hotel, it was indeed a foolish faux pas to pack 16 pairs of hiking shorts, four “party” skorts, hair dryer and hot rollers (Gina), and six weeks’ worth of walking costumes (me), when so far, all these did, these just in case outfit changes, was create heavy, unpleasant drama. “No kidding. Did we really think the Camino would be about bellmen and rolling carts?” Lugging, lifting, heaving, dragging; stairs, cobblestones, up-ramps, puddles: “Maybe the backpack people have the better idea.”
And now there they go, the alber-goo pilgrims burdened with backpacks. Soon after sunrise clumps of two or three ditch behind the odd fence post to pee, or stop for a café con leche in one of the country towns along today’s 22-km/14-mile route to Zubiri. When we follow, pass, or lead, we hear a variety of languages and see eagerness for the day. After all, the promise is of beauty: beech forests, Basque villages, peaceful sheep in their green fields; supposedly there are streams to ford, ancient stone bridges to cross, and even bright-red geranium pots in the windows of locals’ homes. There is a hill to climb in this section, we hear, though the Pyrenees have passed, and the word is that “amazing” tapas and “glorious” fruit smoothies are found in the delightful village of Espinal.
“Oh, man, can we just stop, please, for a minute?” We were however many miles along – the sun high and a handful of hills behind us – when Gina took issue with the unfairness of things. “Those guys…”
“Do you mean the bachelor party of 10 from New South Wales who took all the pizza?” The Camino was to be the groom’s last hurrah with his mates, and we happened to arrive just behind them at the one café in whatever Basque village it was – the one sans tapas and smoothies – only to be told, Lo siento, all the pizza is gone.
“Yes. Did they have to order two larges each, and leave us to the wolves?” It was long past lunchtime. We were hot; we were hungry. And it wasn’t wolves we were left to, but rather…ham: ham baked into a pancake called a tortilla, ham in cold soup known as salmorejo.
“What, you weren’t happy with our lunch of potato chips and chocolate-chip cookie?”
It wasn’t so much that. It was that our beautiful auberge for the night, we understood, was past Zubiri, where the well-fed mates were staying, and, we learned, it was beyond not just the infamous “downhill to Zubiri,” but also beyond the gravel works on the way out of town, the hills rising from the gravel works, the gravel works’ truck road (of dirt), and the gravel works’ workers’ entrance and exit.
So, after more miles we paused on the precipice of the down-trail renowned for the foreboding adjectives that enlivened online forums, where chatty Camino graduates issued warnings: “Treacherous!” “Hazardous!” “For God’s sake, man, don’t fall!!” Would this be worse than the gravel works? Steep and eroded and rocky, was this narrow slope to be what sends us home, arm in a sling, some front teeth missing?
“Come on,” urged Gina. We already had walked what felt like forever, were chilled, and a hot bath was all we could obsess over. “Do you think they’ll have one of those old, deep Spanish tubs, you know, where you can really stretch out?” We started down and down, stepping as if through a minefield – the sharp, jagged shale, tilted rocks, and deep, dirt divets presenting quite the balance challenge. “You know, something made of beautiful tile, where the water comes up to your chin?” Slipping on gravel and tripping on roots, we picked our way down with our walking sticks and couldn’t remember: what did the guidebooks say about snakes? There were oh-so-many suspicious holes on the trail.
“Don’t poke there!” I alerted Gina, as we rounded a bend and one such hole loomed. Just what we’d need, a venomous asp-viper strike – surely worse than a toothless smile! I wasn’t sure if asp vipers actually spent their days lounging in holes, or what, but given the number of lizards darting hither and thither, I guessed they absolutely could be tempted to pop up any second and get us instead. “At least there aren’t bears on the Camino, right?” Just then: as Gina beautifully executed a large swoop-step around the asp-hole, she uttered a little cry of surprise and fell. Face down on the rocks, her knee bonked, her shin bruised, her shorts torn, her something (to be determined) bloody, she nonetheless exuded Camino spirit. “I’m FINE,” she claimed, as I freaked. How would an ambulance even get here?? Blisters, chafing, sprains; plantar fasciitis, tendonitis, leg pain, knee pain, fatigue: these – not bear attacks or viper bites – are the pilgrim’s most common indignities. So, while Gina insisted really, it’s nothing – she was within the realm of what’s to be expected – up she bounced to lead us on, through Zubiri, through the gravel works, through the tremendous, endless, relentless specter found around every bend: hills.
“What the holy, friggin’ hell? I thought we were past the Pyrenees!” We had just been fumigated by a blast of dust kicked-up by a gravel-works truck that with grinding gears passed us on an Everest of one ascent, when Gina again checked the name of the nowhere town where supposedly our hotel was waiting to welcome us. “It’s here. Like, just over there.” She pointed her pole to a vaguely defined clump of shrubs or shacks or sheep sheds in the middle distance. Therelooked like it certainly wouldn’t feature a deep, tiled tub and the wine-with-dinner arrangement that Jorge promised, but what else could we do but walk on….and on….bone-weary and wrecked.
“Another fucking hill,” said Gina with woe, as we started yet another climb to meet our miracle. “Come on; let’s get this over with.
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