Oh, wow! Your SIL is even older than I am. I didn't know that was even possible.

Good luck to them.

Peggy

Here is the latest entry:




5/30/08 Belorado
(Santo Domingo to Castildelgado to Belorado to Villafranca Montes de Oca to Atapuerca)

We´ve been thinking about what has changed since medieval pilgrims first walked this way. That question came to mind when we came to the town of Ciruena and the road crossed a golf course. Little golf heads in plaid caps and soft (clean) cardigans turned to watch us pass. I have seldom felt so grungy and wrinkled.

In the middle ages, pilgrims used those built-to-last Roman stone roads and parts of these remain to be admired. We also crossed a roman bridge (gingerly - Caesar does not seem to have been enforcing maintenance rules of late) and we poked our heads into a roman fountain. There are modern fountains with drinkable water in almost every little town we pass through. They are usually shaped suspiciously like a pig trough with a metal faucet or spigot. I don´t believe that medieval pilgrims drank much water, if they wanted to live to complete the trip. (Those who made the wrong decision on these points were buried along the way. A few modern pilgrims still die enroute each year. Their graves are marked with maudlin tributes, plastic flowers and ghastly poems.) There were fountains 1000 years ago that served for washing. They are often a few steps down into a cool dark pool. Perhaps they are like a Jewish ritual bath, a mikvah, not that I have been to a mikvah. And then there is the famous fountain in Irache from which wine pours instead of water. Every pilgrim knows it. They may be ignorant of how old a town is but they know enough to fill up in Irache.

The middle ages had a diverse population - Jews, Muslims, Franks, Celts, Christians. But that would change. Today Spain is more homogenous having spent a goodly amount of time driving out or cruelly murdering anyone who was different. I did see a Muslim store in Santo Domingo. Among today´s pilgrims, there are still the usual blend of French and Germans and Italians. What to make of the make of the many South Koreans we have met or even the New Yorkers. When the pilgrims ask where we come from and we reply, the United States, they always say "Oh, so far away." I didn´t walk to the starting point but lately I have told them that I walked across the Atlantic, like Jesus. They roll around in their bunks laughing, except for those who continue snoring.


And there was a older world here even when the first pilgrims began their treks. There were rounded stone remains of ancient Celtic villages. Yesterday, we came out of the wet woods and below us lay the lovely towns of Ages and Atapuerca, lit by moving sun light. In the 2nd half of the last century, prehistoric remains dating back some 800,000 years were discovered in Atapuerca. Scientists love this place. They can spend their entire careers here examining minuscule dabs of pollen or tiny fragments of bone or stone chips. And they have found that these groups of people were cannibalizing one another. Shades of the 21st century.

Thanks for posting - I'm still reading!

gruezi

annhig - I haven't read Tim Moore's book but will check with my library. I have read a wonderful account serialized in the UK Telegraph about a man doing the Camino at 68 years old and also read "Off the Road" by Jack Hitt. I have Pilgrim Stories that I'm saving to read when I'm closer to being ready for the Camino. I will be taking inspiration from this account which is wonderful!

Thank you. I have passed on your generous comments to my wife and SIL.

So excited to read this! I walked 150kms of the 'Camino Light' (with a tour group that tranported luggage and arranged places to sleep) and that upon itself was an amazing experience.

Some outstanding ladies!

My wife and her sister are both a shade over 5 foot and each is carrying a 20 pound backpack. She practiced for months and her knee ached just two months before she left.

Our GP told her not go but he sent to her to a knee specialist. He sent her to therapy and gave her a cortisone shot a week before she left.

So far, she is doing spectacularly well. They are in Burgos now and plan to visit friends we mrt during our first visit in 1972.

Latest entry:

6/2/08 Burgos - 303 miles to go
(Atapuerca to Burgos)
Sunday in Burgos was devoted to visiting Spanish friends (Modesta and Santi) who I first met more than 35 years ago. If you have not visited a Spanish family or friends, you may not realize what a wonderful but exhausting experience it can be. From the moment they see your face, they envelope you and carry you off into their lives. Do not resist. You now belong to them. Expect a long day. An early start; a late finish. It´s best to plan your getaway in advance. You should have a good excuse - something along the lines of "I have to walk several hundred miles tomorrow morning."
I was fearful of having to speak Spanish all day. This level of talking is not to be confused with speaking in a restaurant or in a store or on the street. After all, you can walk away from a restaurant or store or on the street if you are flubbing the language preposterously. (Refer to paragraph one - no walking away.) But, not to worry, my friends did all of the talking. I only had to smile and say, "si, si" occasionally. It was like turning on a Spanish radio station and listening to the murmur of voices. "Si, si."
I have corresponded with these people over these many years but only met them once in the interval. And on that in-between visit, Modesta had just been in a car accident and was hospitalized. Incredibly, this time she has broken her toe and would spend the day with us limping about. Her husband, Santi, dragged us around the city. He had quite definite opinions about what one had to see and he intended that we would not miss any of it - the magnificent cathedral, a Sorolla exhibit, a Chagall exhibit. This would be his modus operandi all day. In the meantime, Modesta kept up a running commentary like a veritable Greek chorus, on life, on friends, on Santi.
After several hours, she said we are hungry and should eat. Santi suggests that we go home, to their little village, where there is plenty of good food. Noooo, she says, we´re going to eat in town in such and such a restaurant. He concedes, a little disgruntled. After lunch, she asks, what about coffee? Santi replies that we could go home, where there is plenty of good coffee. Noooo, she says, I mean really good coffee. Again disgruntled, we go to a 4-star hotel. It´s a castle. Not Disneyland, shaped like a castle, but a real castle. It is quite busy and there is no parking available but we do it the Spanish way. No parking, no problem. Just pull over into the gas station next door, park your car in the middle of the other cars filling up and get out. We have quite good coffee in a high-priced bar. There are lots of elite, upper class types eating and drinking up in addition to our wrinkled selves, of course, wearing our cleanest but wrinkled outfits. I forget that this is a real castle, slam my finger in the moat and bleed all over for awhile. Santi will fix me up later by pouring a frightening and stinging solution all over my finger and all over his desk. Now all of my toes and one finger are swaddled. I am working my way across my entire body.
Home for Modesta and Santi is a little village almost an hour south of Burgos. 50% of the residents are Modesta´s cousins. The house is relatively new but completely filled, end to end, with Santi´s paintings. There are over 2000 of them - I know because I saw his handwritten inventory. (ARTISTS in the family, take heed. Watch those prices. Sell now or retire with 2000 paintings.)
Does it sound like it´s getting late? It is. It´s about 4 pm and we are far from Burgos. Santi suggests that we take a walk, a paseo, to see the village and we go out. Our paseo involves visiting each house where a person is at home. To check if they are in, stand at the fence and yell for a bit. Go in, admire a table or new twin boys. Check a bag of mushrooms freshly dug up in the woods. Meet the mayor, a woman (but is the fix in on the cows?). Discuss water problems. Walk through the social center although a meeting is taking place. Kiss everyone.
Santi decides we should see the church bell tower. Because the town and the church are carved into the stone mountain, the tower is unusual. You can climb to the craggy peak and be level with the top of the bell tower and walk right into it. And so we clamber up a stony ravine filled with running water and cow Xit: a retired artist wearing a jacket and tie and fine leather shoes, his hobbling wife with a broken toe and two ragged pilgrims who don´t want to climb anywhere anymore. But at the top, the view is splendid and we take goofy pictures with our heads stuck in the iron bell. Then, we slip slide back down and Carmen is rewarded with a view from above into the nest of a giant black and white stork. Oh, birder´s heaven.
Our hosts ask reticently if we are hungry. I immediately answer yes, starved. If I had said anything else, they would have dropped the subject and not brought up food for hours. Dinner might then have become one or those elegant Spanish affairs that begin at midnight. Carmen and I would have ended up sleeping at the table. I am determined to avoid this fate by impolitely responding that, yes, I need to eat and soon. So the food is prepared and we eat and drink and talk and talk and talk. Finally Santi and Modesta drive us back to the city. Night is falling and it will be quite late before they arrive back home. Nevertheless, Santi thinks of a dinosaur museum that we´ll pass on the way home. He knows about our interest in all things old (very old) and pulls in. It is fortunately closed, although we take the time to discuss dinosaurs from outside.
At the hotel, we all pile out of the car. Modesta and I embrace and cry. Not just cry, we weep. Saying goodbye is not a reserved thing here. No firm handshakes and pats on the shoulder for us. No, we splatter our tears all over the sidewalk. After all, who knows, we may not meet again. And, after all, that may be true.

My daughter began the Camino on May 17 in Canfranc, since she missed the train to Pamplona.

I wonder if your wife and sister in law have crossed paths with her. Her name is Samantha and she is traveling with fellow seminary student Jess. Her blog is samanthaspages.blogspot.com. You are right about little internet. She has only posted to her blog 3 times since she left.

Thank goodness that texting works sometimes.

Hope your family is home safe.

We meet her in Athens in 20 days.

I will ask her.

Angie, thanks for sharing Samantha's blog.

Aduchamp, any additional news from your ladies?

Aduchamp, I just found your Camino Entries Part II. Thanks.

Hi Aduchamp1,
I am a 71-year-old Canadian who walked the camino last April and May from Pamplona to Santiago. It started with some difficulty, since my backpack never arrived and, after waiting 5 days in Pamplona, had to re-equip as well as I could and get on with it. I kept a journal, much as you are doing and I recommend that you investigate making it into a book. I love what you are writing. My journal turned into a book, which has recently been published as "A Journey of Days", available on-line at www.gsph.com, www.chapters.ca and at www.Amazon.com. Just search at any of those sites for my name. I have just returned from a book launch in Oslo, Norway. Keep up the journal and the fascinating writing.
Buen camino, Guy

The Camino Entries, Part 2 is at:
http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35135621

I am really enjoying these accounts, Aduchamp1. My husband and I are thinking of doing the Camino in some fashion in 2010. I have a very bad foot, so we are contemplating bicycles (or surgery).

I plan to walk the Camino some day. Kudos to your wife and her sister!

Yes, we are talking about a book with their illustrations inlcuded.

Thank you.

I read in the lounge that your wife had written a trip report. I am planning to set off on a hike of el Camino Frances in about a year and a half. Do you have a link to her report? I am enjoying this thread and have bookmarked it for review.

noe847.. careful which part of the camino you choose if you are biking.. wow.. that is really hard. My son saw a few bikers who were ready to toss their wheels in a few places.

Robin

My wife did not do a traditional tip report this and Camino II which is now listed again are her reports. There are several books which give the information you seek including those by john Brierly and Don Nardo.

We are busily editing her entries daily. An incredibly kind writer has offered to contact his publisher in hopes of having it published.

OK thanks. I'll be in line to buy it when and if she has it published.