Eternal Gratitude to my Lifetime Friend & Camino Compadre (posting late from May 30)

6/13/2019

(Stage 10). Thursday, May 30. Walking out of Santo Domingo de Calzada into Belerado. About 22.5 km/14 mile walk, but for us it was almost 18 miles because when we stopped in a cafe in one of the little villages along the way for a delectable lemonade, we absentmindedly left our walking sticks there. (stupid human/pilgrim trick of pick-up-sticks). We did not realize it until we arrived in the next village, and we walked all the way back - and forth again! We mostly laughed about it, although it would have been easy to cry. Hot day, too. It really warmed up after the early morning chill, captured in the pic of pilgrims trekking uphill to Granon a favorite cafe stop on The Way. Stayed in a lovely room in Belerado and found a delectable pilgrim’ meal of fresh fish in an open air albergue dining patio just off the central piazza. Families with toddlers, teens with Coca Cola and many abuelos gathered around the central fountain in front of the church - as in every village through which we pass. The sun shone warm and bright late into evening (always good for drying laundry on the veranda). It is my last day to share El Camino with my dear walking companera who launched me on this journey. She heads back toward USA tomorrow, May 31, as I move along the trail. I will miss her constant caring camaraderie, her buoyant humor, her insightful encouragement (and keen travel advice!) Forever friends❤️

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May-June 2019:
My Camino

In May & June 2019, I walked el Camino de Santiago across the north of Spain. I walked the Camino for more than 1,000 kilometers (about 600 miles) from the foothills of the Pyrenees in France at St. Jean Pied de Porte, into Spain, to Santiago de Compostela, and then out to Finisterre and Muxia, the most Western tips of Spain. I walked to honor the entwining of the physical and spiritual in human experience, and to commemorate the memory of a loved one. I was on the Camino for 40 days, and my blog tells the launch only from my first 10 days of that journey. Two months after returning home, in September I gave a talk, which expands on perspectives that emerged throughout the entire journey. It is available here in this video of a narrated powerpoint.