Big Hot Sun

John and me have to leave the albergue quite early. After the instructions of the irish albergue father we would not like to bother him any more, it looks he is doing his job quite serious. So we gonna make it to the Cap Finisterre, to the ancient end of the world. As we got closer and recognized the lighthouse, a van came towards us. It was Richard with his wife Barbera, he already arrived here yesterday and so they met. They wanted to buy some things for the ceremonial food tonight, but then we turned and went together to the cliff in the open ocean.

As we came closer to the beach, we start to recognize that this is the real real end of our trip, we cannot make it further, not even a step. For me it started a weird feeling of being forced to stop. There is definitely a harder border compared to the arriving in Compostela. But spirituelly this is more a beginning then an end, because for the most people the “new way” gonna start from this moment. They will come hme and apply the things they learned during the way, they gonna see things from a different angle. For few of them this gonna be breaking new changes in their live.

Later on we collect some wood for the fire tonight. We see a lot of fire places, but as we need some more place we find a good spot to set our bon fire. Then we started to burn the things we brought with us. I give 2 t-shirts to the flame which have had a special meaning for me. It feels like a snake which hives its own skin off. Thats the ceremony i was looking forward 7 weeks long, i just carried the shirts with me for this moment and with the help of the fire my brain starts to realize that the next days will be completely different then the last ones. I wil stop walking. After the fire died out we are looking to the horizont and follow the sun is going down slowly and is swallowed by the ocean, sentimitality is in the air – the farewell of us is close

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I feel quite well after the small suggar shock yesterday night. The third day of fasting is reached – no complainings, no nothing. So we packed our tents to set off Santiago. As we reached the last cafe before the holy city, we get 2 stamps and have a short glimpse to the boundaries of the coming. People say that you have to collect 2 stamps a day to get the Compostela, i was not doing and to be honest i do not mind not to recieve that piece of paper, its just important to know that i did the way on myself, without any cheating and completely come to terms with myself. Even though it is not important to reach this city, more important is to get the experience, the encounters with other people and to reflex all of this to ones own concerns and problems. “The journey is the reward” like mostly in lifetime. For my own this way got me a lot and im grateful for the people i met and the experience and ideas i got. I highly can recommend everybody to walk this way once in lifetime, especially when there is a big change in life appearing or an important decision to make.

As we arrive in Santiago, we make a small stop at a grocery, Richard is about to get some food, where im waiting in the meanwhile in front of the market. I started crack my walnuts and sort the shells from the seed as a woman comes and wants to give me 50 cents as she thought i gonna need them more then her. My beard and my bags must have awaken some mother feelings in her. I just smile to her and her child and deny her offer, but a nice try anyway – ill keep that in mind for later

On our walk further we meet known faces, here everybody comes together again. SOme of them are here since few days, other are just arriving like us. At 10am there is a mess at the cathedral, we are not about to miss it so we go. There we meet some baggers n front of the entries, which also can be angry when youre not giving them anything. As we enter we see a lot of tourists, making tons of pictures and with a behavior we do not like. We feel to be the onliest real pilgrims walking more than 800km to reach this place. Everything feels so surreal, that we cannot stand to be here for longer. It seems that everybody is holy now after touching the shoulder of the holy Jacoby. There is no sign of spirituality or deep reflexions over here and when it is floatet by the presence of tourists, so we decide to leave this place. At the pilgrim office it looks like an agency of work, the people stand in a queue to get her Compostela. The only thing which seperates them to normal people is the walking stick and the trecking clothes. After i got mine i wrote into the guestbook “My sins have been assigned. Time to sin again! Cleaning by walking in 2010 again” The catholic church knew how to get the people over here, i have to smile.

Some minutes later we meet an old woman which offers us to stay at her place for a moderate price of 10 Euros. We first thought to o on and leave that place, because we would not like to stand the albergue, but then we accepted and followed her to her place. Quite tiny for us, we had to stoop down to not crash against the ceiling, but so we could enjoy the freedom of coming home when we like, we had own keys and so we finally could go into the temptation of Santiagos holy nights.

As we entered the historic center again we meet John and his friend, the Santiago Night Amigo Group was found and so we enjoyed some concerts in the streets and continued greeting the neverending stream of known faces. I found some locals which could recommend us a great bocadillo place to eat and there i found the greatest bocadillo i ate on the whole trip. Coupled with some beer and a switched off brain we hang up a while, but finally got tired. I generelly say, when you do not feel like party, you should not exxagerate it and so RIchard and me decided to go home. Tomorrow we wanna set off to Finisterre and we would not like to stay even a place more here, there was no reason for that.

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In the meantime i learned to distuingish between the different nationalities. On the way i recognize some english people. Their are quite white, only their carves are sun-burned degree 2. Quite enthusiastic they are jumping down the descent. “They just must have been started now” i think. Later on i get in touch with them and i was completely right. I think when they will learn something, then it is the way their body will react in such a case. Im sure, when they will continue like that they soon will meet Mr. knee, feet and blisture in one of the next albergues.

When the camino teached me just one thing, it is about to listen to my body and my instinct. As soon as if i feel pain i will stop and not try to make the next 10km, even when im in a group, always to take care about the signals you get from your system and not to take any painkillers to gild my pain with ignorance. I have seen dozen of people who even after 3 weeks complain about feet problems and walk with taped feet.

Arriving in Palas de Rei i recognize a quite attractive girl. My mood let me start to whistle Lambada, few minutes later we get in touch. She does not know anything about the pilgrimage, so i tell her about the origin and my experience. As we get closer to the city i offer to sit somewhere, as she suggests to go to the close cafe. Suddenly my alarm starts to tell me NO NO NO, i always avoided such places as they are mostly for consumption and do not expose any serious or spiritual talks. Im fed up with all that superficial talkings which are mostly coming up at this places, but finally i agree and we take a seat over there. Few minutes later we meet Antonio and his filmteam, they sit down at table. It gets quite funny and we enjoy the mood by drinking some sidre. Soonish some known faces drop by and ask me where i stay, because they recognize my rucksack next to the table and its already after 5pm, the albergue is about to be full. But i just smile to them, cuz today the weather is so great, that i find myself a place in the open. Today i will avoid a noisy sleep with other pilgrims and better enjoy the morning singing of dozens of birds instead of the snarching of dozens of pilgrims. Furthermore the galician meadows formally scream to sleep on them.

After the second sidre i have a glance at the city court as i recognize a pilgrim with a quite big rucksack arriving at the place. He just watches few seconds around the plaza and continues walking further. “Im quite sure he sleeps outside” i think on myself and i cannot get myself silent anymore to miss the chance to get in touch with him. Minutes later and with the help of the Sidre i tell the people at the table to take care about my rucksack, i will run after him and see if he likes accompany. My spontanity is at a quite high level and so i catch him at the end of the city taking a small break. He offers me a beer and so i found my new travelmade: Richard from Germany, well done – the Camino made me move and act again. After im running back to get my stuff and buy some bread for my last meal before Santiago. Its time for my new experiment to hunger 3 days before reaching the place. I read that the senses can get quite sharp if we hunger a while or at least do not eat that much like normally. I gonna try it and so i enjoy my dry bread before putting my tent in the green wide open of a galician sheep field

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Because i will not be stressed out by other pilgrims in the morning, ill stand up lately. Nearly everybody has left and so i start preparing my breakfast. The hospitalieros already started cleaning, so i promise to help them in a minute, so i also get in touch with them in a better way. As i recognize lots of the hospitalieros do their work voluntarily, some of them even are pilgrims as well. They had to stop, because of blisture problems or have been asked by the albergue admins for helping them a while and so they do. What me worries a bit is that most of the pilgrims who arrive here everyday do not appreciate it, they more enjoy the service they get from the people and nearly nobody asks them how they feel and why they do it. Sometimes they feel like being in a hotel, they get served at the counter, recieve their beds and (sometimes) get served with dinner and food, nobody knows or get to known that they get served by people who took their entire holidays for being hospitaliero, even do not recieve any cent for it and work the entire day. For people interisted in beeing host they are associations like the Amigos of the Camino where you can register, they allocate you to the places for an approximiate time of around 2 weeks. But there are also a lot of private places, where you can call and ask for. During the winter lots of albergues are closed, but some of them are really looking forward for recieving hosts to work for the pilgrims. In my head i play with the idea to do it during the winter time, i collected some great adresses and emails of albergues id like to stay for a while serving and cooking for the pilgrims around the globe.

Today my way is not that long, i heard about a temples albergue at the mountain, it is maintained by Tomas, a “weird” person which counts his own to the templar knights, an albergue with no fluent water and an toilette in the open. I gonna check this out and hope to meet some interesting persons like in San Bol once. As i arrive in Manjarin i recognize an self-made house of stones and a wooden roof. In front of it stays a van with a guy sitting inside, who is quite concentrated in reading his book. I knock on his door as he opens and we get into a conversation unfortunately just in spanish, but here we go. Later on he shows me his house and im quite impressed, he did everything by his ow. Although it looks like a simple shelter, but inside he even has an own stove which can be switched in an open one to make a small bon fire. He said that this land is not owned by anybody and the people here respects that. He build everything from stuff around. The fundamental already exsisted, he used the ruine next to him for getting the stones and binded them with mud. The roof is done with wooden trees and pine brances. The only thing which worries me is that inside its quite dark, because he just has 2 small windows and in the winter it rais a lot, you cannot do anything as reading books and hang out in the nature. A good spot for leaving ivilisation for a while, but for a long time it could be quite depressive in my point of view. After speaking with him a while he tells me his name Jesus, i thought he is Tomas and was about to ask him if he minds when i stay here for a night. After he tells me about the albergue and i carry on to meet the legandary Tomas. 50m later i come to a kind of hut where i meet the people from the albergue. All up there are 5 people living here.
First i do not like the albergue that much, they sell a lot of tourist stuff and bell if tourists pass by, but as i decided i gonna stay here. The conversations with the people is quite reduced, everybody is doing his things: playing with the dog, speaking with pilgrims, getting wood for the fire. As i meet Tomas he is not speaking any word with me, so today i decided to be just an invisible guest, after some trials of conversation i stopped forcing things, quite weird – with Fernando and Maria i can exchange few words, but as they are used to lots of pilgrims they are not asking me any questions, i regret but can understand that. Later on Tomas serves a great soup for the whole village, it is very delicious and im quite grateful for that. After the people leave to their bed chambers and i go up the roof flor and enjoy the silence and the heat exposed by the stove beneath me.

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The day starts like all the other. I got up as one of the latest and prepare my special mixture for the breakfast: small noodles with chopped fruits and butter. As the pilgrims leave i go to the shoe shelve where i left my toe shoes yesterday. But when i looked at it i cannot find them anymore, they are gone. Looks like somebody made me a bad joke, so i start looking for them, but even when i asked the hopitalieros they dont know anything about them. STOLEN, but who is doing that and why? Just taking them as souvenir home seems to be one of the reasons. But OK, its not a moment to leae tears for it, it may is a sign for really starting it in barefoot, so i go and leave. After a while i recognice that i just need to much time and it hurts a lot without any protection even after 4 weeks having a qiete i good and thick skin for it. Destinys make me to get to known Antonius, he endows me his flip flops, so i can make it to Leon with them. Arriving there i have to get new ones, because they are not made for walking big distances. The shoes i see mostly are not that good and quite expensive, even i cannot find suitable sandales. The alternative i find are the legandary crocks, or at least a remake of them, i got them for 8 bugs, that was in my budget. Now i just have to find out if they will carry me until the end of the track, 350km more to go. I hope so

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Im in day 3 of my experiment not to speak with anyone for a while. It was a nice quite drive along these days, so i learned to deal with gestures, mimiks and handwriting – makes a lot of fun, when you see how people react and deal with you. Day three and i meet John – its not good for the verves, because he brakes my silence even with his presence. Well done mate! To sum up i have to say i missed the communication with other people, i may not be suitable for silcence a long way and will not waste my tie with it here, maybe at another moment after the Camino again.
Todays route is quite brilliant, it seems i walk through the african steppe. I see dry trees and listen to the sounds of dozens of frogs at a swamp very close coupled with the sound of small crickets hidden in the dried grass. The track is quite long, no water spring is close the next 17km. At this part of route im sure lots of pilgrims learned to respect the water, so did i. As it gets dark i arrive my destination, the small village Calzadilla at the end of nearly 20km dried desert sand. I hope to get in, it is quite late already and i could need a shower after this hot day.
As i enter John smiles at me, im happy to see him again after 1 day of desert. He advises me not to sleep in the beds, as he could detect dozenz of bed bugs in it. Im curious and we check together. “They all gonna be die tonite. I will take the table to sleep on”. I completely agree, its not to make fun with those bugs. John first ran into them in San Bol, where they have been gassed very efficiently by our great great idol Wainer S Doble. As the hospitalera comes in he shows her the problem and she is quite embarrased, for me it looksthat she was never faced to a problem like that. She is the desperation in person and stands like a frozen snow man inside the room, her face is pale and you can just read “I dont know how to deal with it” in her facial expressions. A shock later she calls some other guys from the city, together with them we inspect the beds and they are very grateful towards us that we localized that problem. The gratulate John as he would be the almighty for himself. We need to find a solution and so she offers us both to move n the chambers upstairs, we just should not say anything to the other pilgrims. They are still in town and dont know anything of the desaster. As we moved i recognize Gertrud coming in, we have to tell her and make her move upstairs also. She is so happy to see me again, that she even is not asking why, so we move. What worries me is not to say anything to the others, its not a good way to do so, but there is not enough place for them and even when we would take them up, they gonna infect us with their bugs, their sleeping bags were exposed to long time to the infected beds, a great risk for us. “They all gonna be eaten” is the comment i will always remember from John. No chance, they have to sacrifice. We just can wait and drink a cup of tea
The next morning when we wake up nothing happens, all are already left, no complainings, the effect of the bugs maybe is postponed, they gonna be zombies of these parasites in a short while. We have to take care. John, Gertrud and me survived that night, thanks god!

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