September 20

Villafranca de Montes near Burgos

San Marin

September 18th

Now it is the 18th - time and kilometers have flown by!

I'm sitting in the courtyard of an alberque in Redecilla de Camino, just over the border into Castilla y Leon, well west of the Basque Country I loved, but still a lovely landscape.  The fields here are much bigger, potatoes, wheat, hay and sunflowers.  Stilly he people live in the village sand go out daily to their fields, in contrast to the US where everyone seems to want to live in a separate house in the middle of their own lands.  (Once again, the American devotion to ownership and its consequent "pursuit of loneliness).

Last night I was in a small private alberque run by a serious, experimental painter, a large, little bit intersection man named Petrus.  His great love is Mexico, hence the name of the place, de lavirgen de Guadalupe.  Good food, a simple dinner and petite breakfast.

Monday and Tuesday I treated myself to a hotel with bathtub!  In a beautiful mountain valley, and the hotel actually in one wing of a 10th century on big monastery.  Photo to follow (I hope).

The town and both monasteries there are named after San Millan (accent on the second syllable). He was a shepherdwho left his flock sometime in the sixth c. To live in a cave high on the mountain as a hermit.  He was a healer, though, so soon more men than the caves could accommodate joined him, so the first monastery was built - with many Mozarabic elements since this was during the  Moorish occupation of Spain.  

Millan died at age 101.  Three centuries later a Bishop wanted to move his remains to a nearby larger town, Najera.  But when the oxen pulling the wagon with the casket refused to leave the valley, everyone understood they were expressing the will of the saint.  So on the site of their refusal to budge was built the larger monastery.

It was here that some anonymous wrote the first ever recorded the first words of Castillian which became the Spanish language -all writing before this time was in either Latin or Greek.

Anyway, San Millan is one oft favorite laces on earth now,  well worth the two extra days of walking.

My spirits are good, but my body is protesting even more.  Now wearing a bandage on my right foot and as of today, another supporting one on my left knee.  The pharmacist said that often when there is a favoring of one side, this stresses the other side.  

Hope all are well.  Much love,  mary

September 12

I stayed  in my first donativo alberque - free, but with a donation left in the morning.  This one was staffed by two after middle age men, one Italian, one German, both of whom were volunteer hospitaleros, speaking the rudiments of many languages.   I felt in them such love for humanity and for God.

More than the beauty of the countryside and villages, more than the so many interesting people of all ages whom I've met, I'm coming to love most the culture of the Camino - friendliness, generosity and mutual respect.  Someone passes you - many in my case as I am slow - they always look you in the eye, sometimes just greeting you, often inquiring where you are from and if you are doing well, and always wishing you,  "buen Camino!"

Is it because we are all walking the same road, making the same effort, carrying few possessions?

Some of the many people I've met:

A young, beautiful high school graduate, dressed like a Gypsy, with colorful harem pants brilliant scarves, who speaks 7 languages - German, Czech, Slovak, Bulgarian, very good English and very good Spanish. Next month she begins  Medical studies on scholarship at the University in Tubingen.  She walks the Camino to ask God for a blessing for her new life away from her family.

A late twenties S. Korean man, who has worked 6 years on "equity research" after getting his degree in Actuarial Science from the University of IL.  He quit his job last fall, because he believes capitalism is destroying the planet.  His family is strongly Christian, but he has many doubts and walks as a spiritual searching.

A class on the Camino from Franklin Pearce College.  The kids get college credit for Spanish, for PE, for history, culture and religion.  They spend 8 or 9 weeks walking, sleeping in the same place but exploring the experience on their own during the day so they can each write a reflective paper at the end of the quarter.  One of them, Hannah ( whose mother is Mary) is majoring in Graphic Communication, carries her heavy camera and will do a book with commentary as her project.

So many more, but my eyes are tired.  And the rest of me, too.  The place I'm staying tonight, a converted monastery, has bunk beds three levels!  Luckily, I'm in the middle not the very top!

Love to all,br

September 11

September 9th

Well, of course I have forgotten how to upload new photographs to this blog! So sorry. Perhaps some young person will help me along the way.

I am having a wonderful up time - the people (there are very, very many peregrines - I am never more than 10 minutes out of sight of another one or a group walking together) are nearly all very friendly and helpful; the country side so beautiful with rolling hills, fields now of grain freshly harvested, each village with a natural stone church and best of all, hundreds of beautiful  ego logics or wind generators on nearly every ridge top.

I spent Friday night on the flop of a former gym because I arrived in Zubiri too late to find a bed.  It was PL because I found a discarded pad and also some cardboard to put under it.  Nevertheless, sleeping in a space with thirty or so other Peale with rain pounding on the metal roof made rising very early easy to do.

I was in the Camino before dawn with my flashlight.  Unfortunately for me there was  very nice Belgian man in need of light, and he set a pace that was too fast for me on an alternately muddy and rocky track.  By the time he charged ahead in the daylight, I had apparently injured my right foot.  My fault, I know, I didn't have to keep up with him, but  anyway by the time I reached Pamplona, I was quite sore.  Stopped and bought some anti-inflammatory cream, and had a luscious day and a half of rest with my Basque friend Nerea.

She works in ecological cooperative, an organic food store in which no money is used.  It is a membership organization and when your tab is totted up and you sign the ticket that amount is debited from your bank account.

She and her very kind partner, angel live in the ground floor of a nicely refurbished old house.  It has big south-facing windows and a deck.  All the country houses have three floors, ground floor for animals, middle for people and top for hay.  So practical; warmth and dryness for everyone.

Nerea and her sister gave me a massage yesterday.  I had decided on a relaxed day instead of walking around Pamplona - I had met her in the old city, so had already seen how quaint and beautiful it is.

Today walked over thE Alto de Perdon, famous peak with rusted steel  sculptures of medieval peregrines.  

Ted for dinner!

Love to all, 

MBR

September 4

On the train, the Renfre fast train between Madrid and Pamplona.  Very tired - jetlag plus a lovely dinner at the home of Antonia and Antonio Sagredo, she an old friend of Katherine Gould-Martin.  They kindly walked me home at 11:30 p.m.   The train left Madrid at 7:35 this morning.  

I loved Madrid - for a city.  Hostal Dulcinea on a quiet narrow street very near the Prado, which is overwhelmingly large, but well-organized.  I have studied many of the paintings there but also found some unfamiliar artists like Joaquin Sorolla,a social realist from turn-of-the-19th to 20th centuries.  One of his works is "And They Still Say Fish Is Too Expensive!"  It depicts a young fisherman dying after an accident on the deck of a boat, attended by two older men whose faces are resigned and compassionate.

I keep seeing it even now in my mind's eye.

My fiend Nerea is meeting this train.  It will be good to see her, and she will help me get to St. Jean.  I should be on the Camino by tomorrow!  Love, mary burton