"On the Jakobsweg"

During our absence, the hard copy of my latest book arrived from the publishers, Blurb. It's more ambitious than others I have done on similar lines: it purports to be a lightweight guide to the pilgrimage route I walked in April - approximately 500 kms. from Nürnberg to Einsiedeln. I have included maps and a page of resource information, as well as a brief diary - and of course some of my photographs.

The book's aim is to encourage others to think of trying this Camino, one that is little-walked by the English (from what I gather), but particularly rich in Christian associations. Quite apart from these, it passes through some majestic scenery, and the natives are extremely friendly! You can see the whole book via its free online preview.

My photograph shows the front cover: the photograph was taken approaching Steinhausen, known as the most beautiful village church in the world.

"No Impact Man"

I don't photograph rubbish much, but this is a detail of a scene I took in April, when making a detour off my Camino to visit the Abbey of Oseira. The human-induced chaos of this far-away farmyard seemed strikingly at odds with the unspoilt beauty of the Galician countryside surrounding it.

"No Impact Man" is the title of a documentary made four years ago about a family who determined to see by how much they could reduce the impact they made on their New York environment over a period of 12 months. I asked Leo if he could get it for us to watch through "Love Film", and he came up with it on DVD this evening.

I can see that many would find the journey it describes tiresome, and perhaps trite, but it's lightly done, and raises some good questions en route to its conclusion - that whatever you do is best done as part of the community, rather than in an isolated fashion.

A couple of criticisms: the issue of needing to live without loo paper seemed to loom as large if not larger than restricting (or not) the size of the human family; and having a largish dog in the flat seemed to be a given, with never a mention of the ecological issues to which family pets should surely give rise.

Ponte Ulla

Today I was meaning to go a bit nearer to my goal than in fact I managed. It´s an easy walk until the last bit, but that involves climbing 200m within 4 kms. As a gang of other walkers were sitting in the sunshine lunching late at the bottom of the hill, I joined them: the lunch was a good one, especially the fish - you can tell we are getting nearer the sea. Generous quantities of wine were thrown in, and that made it an easy decision to stay the night in a room above the restaurant. I´m not the only one to change their plans, and reserve the steep bit for the fresh air of the morning: we should still be in Santiago by early afternoon.

Ponte Ulla is a small town on the North side of quite a sizeable river. I´m sitting not far away from the end of the (local) road bridge, and can see the motorway bridge high above, further upstream. Downstream, the view is dominated by two even more enormous viaducts, one for the original railway (still very much running) and the other for the rare AVE trains that thunder by occasionally between Santiago and Ourense (rarae aves indeed - I haven´t heard one all day).

There´s been plenty of real birdlife on this Camino, especially since entering Galicia. As usual I find I don´t know many of the names, but more often than not I´m woken at cock-crow. The cuckoo is omnipresent. I´ve seen hawks and heard woodpeckers at work, and then of course there are the cranes. So, what with that and all the varieties of animals, trees and flowers, I have enjoyed these three weeks plus as much for being in the natural world as for anything else the pilgrimage has brought me.

Silleda

Less than 50kms. from here to Santiago! I should be there on Monday therefore, and am very glad not to have given in to the temptation to catch that train last Saturday.

I was staying next to another station last night. What a difference a week of good weather makes! My raincoat has remained unused apart from when every item of clothing was needed in the unheated albergue of the Monastery of Oseira the other day. What an amazing place that is, the Escorial of the North! It makes Ampleforth Abbey´s plant look puny. Five of us visitors were shown round by a diminutive Cistercian artist, Fray Luis. One of a community of only 14 - several of whom are elderly or infirm - he is in the process of illustrating the Bible, book by book. (I must look up the weblinks when I get back.)

Oseira was a detour from the direct Camino, but worth every extra km., not only for Vespers in the Abbey, but also for the wild and remote feel of its neighbourhood. The name comes from the bears (ursa) which the early monks, or their predecessors more likely, frightened off when the valley was first settled.

Today, the route has boxed and coxed with the dual carriageway, but on the whole, there has been little tarmac to tire the feet: more often, there is a sandy (or muddy) track in the woods above or below, and away from, the main road, which you don´t even hear. A track that was in existence long before the 21st Century! A few kms. before here, it led me across a 10th Century bridge, slung high over the Rio Deza, with its original paving stones, an extraordinarily tranquil place.

Ourense

Caroline and I stayed a night here five years ago, when we were Interrailing - a great city, with boiling water spilling out from hot springs and a long Roman bridge, which I shall walk over tomorrow. Rather different from our hotel room in 2008, I am sleeping tonight in one of the 18-bed dormitories converted out of part of the old St Francis Convent, high above the Cathedral. And it´s a lot fuller than previous albergues, as quite a number of people start their Camino here: you can qualify for a Compostela (certificate) in Santiago so long as you walk at least 100 kms., and there´s just over that to walk from Ourense.

I remember many phrases often repeated by my late headmaster Fr. William Price when he taught us European history, one being that the climate in North Spain was nine months Winter and three months Hell. We seem to have just crossed the threshold here in Galicia: last Friday was so wet and cold that I was thinking seriously of giving it all up - a thought encouraged by the fact that the albergue in A Gudiña (where I spent that night) was right next to the railway station. But since then the weather has changed completely, the landscape is transformed (you can take in your stride even those bits where you still need to paddle), and today as I walked through the outskirts of the City, I would have done anything for an ice cream.

On the Via de la Plata

70 kms. walked so far - more than 400 to go to Santiago still. I´m in Zamora´s amazing public library at the end of a rest day - no progress along the Camino. But I seem to have walked as far as on previous days, getting happily lost in this old city. It has 23 Romanesque churches, including the Cathedral, and several worthwhile museums: the one I liked least was the Semana Santa Museum, full of all the tableaux which were being carried round the city last week - seeing them in a Museum is altogether less moving than seeing them move slowly through the crowds with that plangent music and the smell of incense. Salamanca isn´t as celebrated for its processions as Seville, but you can´t miss them, nor should you try to.

I´m now nicely baffled about what I have and haven´t seen, and about to retire to the Albergue for supper and I hope an early night. (I hoped that last night, but - as one does in Spain - got caught up in the football.)

As with most days since I started from Salamanca on Saturday, it´s been showery, and none too warm. The rain in Spain seems to fall mainly on the Camino, which is waterlogged - to a far greater extent than in April 2010, when we walked from Seville to Salamanca. I gather I´m lucky not having had to take my boots off yet, and wade across an overflowing stream or two. The Duero here in Zamora has spilled right over its banks, right up to the road, a brown spate rushing between the arches of the Roman bridge.

Perhaps it´s the weather, or maybe the state of the world, but there are fewer pilgrims than three years ago, but I´ve shared accomodation with some interesting people already including a Japanese jazz drummer and a song writer from Berlin - not on the same night. We all agree it´s very hard to see how Spain is ever going to recover from its economic crisis: in spite of massive public expenditure (no doubt authorised from Brussels) on infrastructure such as this library, nothing much seems to be happening anywhere, and there´s nobody around in the villages or countryside.

Walking is a great way to see a country, even if like me you struggle with the language. The birds don´t require translation, nor the flowers which are beginning to peep through. And it´s majestic scenery for the most part as I wend my way North.

"Once a pilgrim..."

To Bristol today for the second time this week: more particularly, to Bristol's oldest building, St James' Priory, used for worship for approaching 900 years. After lunch, 30 or so of us met in what remains of a very large church, not so much for worship as for reflection upon the graces of the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela: most of us had walked (or cycled) the Camino - or were intending to do so. My photograph shows Gerry Slamond leading us in a pilgrim song, one of several he wrote when walking through Spain: he even performed one during the pilgrims' mass in Santiago Cathedral.

So, what lessons did my fellow ex-pilgrims share with us? "It taught me to get rid of everything in life except the essentials," one said. "But I'm still working on it." Why do we keep doing it? was another question. (I couldn't help thinking of Eliza's words in My Fair Lady: "Go to St James so often I will call it St Jim.") "It's the existence of a goal," said one. "No," said another, "it's the journey." "No, it's the people," said a third.

One of those present who'd done a fortnight as a hospitalero in the CSJ's Refugio Gaucelmo at Rabanal del Camino spoke of the language difficulties which arose from time to time. A South Korean, whom he had gone out of his way to accompany to the edge of town, fearing he would not find the start of his next stage, bowed deeply to him, saying, "I will never remember you."

La Fête du Muguet

It was hot, and Caroline in particular was exhausted by all the walking, biking (Vélib's) and crowds, especially round Notre Dame, so this afternoon we sat with our backs to the Seine embankment on the Quai d' Orléans and watched the world go by, in varying states of undress. We had travelled anti-clockwise: first, passing through the market in Boulevard de Reuilly, dodging the bunches of lily of the valley thrust at us at every turn. Then up onto La Coulée Verte - dodging the joggers this time. That brought us nearly to the Bastille, where we braved the bike hire system for the first time, wobbling via the Place des Vosges to the Centre Pompidou. By then lunch seemed a good idea: from our table on the pavement of Rue des Lombards, we could almost see the Tour St Jacques. Most appropriate, in view of my impending departure for Le Puy-en-Velay tomorrow morning, to walk along his way.

Water +

"We've had the driest 12 months on record," said Jim Naughtie on the Today programme this morning. This chimes in with something even more disturbing that Nick Reeves, Executive Director of The Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management, wrote recently. (It came to mind following yesterday's visit to Leicester.)

“While we have been making headway in cleaning up our rivers and beaches, the air we breathe and the water we drink . . . we have created trashy inner city settlements where the poor, the vulnerable, the hopeless and the unhinged have been kettled into urban breezeblock ghettoes that have become a breeding ground for disaffection, anger and feral behaviour . . . These rotten environments turn on its head the notion of sustainable development. Sustainability is about much more than water and energy efficiency, insulation and recycling. The human dimension somehow got forgotten. The environment is about the condition in which we all live together, not just the well-connected, the empowered middle class and those with sharp elbows and loud voices.”

I took this photograph of the sluice on the 37-hectare Retenue de Brousseau in Les Landes when walking on the Voie du Puy in April 2009.

"With an eye on the Via de la Plata"

Happy St James' Day! It also happens to be the day when I've put the finishing touches to my new book about our month on The Way of St James in April - from Seville to Salamanca.

As reported here at the time, Caroline and I went by train from Cheltenham to Seville, arriving on Maundy Thursday, and walked the first half of the Camino de Santiago which starts there, the Via de la Plata - I with my camera. The resulting photobook with the above title can now be seen here: click and you'll see that its 90 pages (with my 325 photographs and 11,000 words of commentary) are all available to view free online - if your eyes are good enough!

The book is also available for sale - print on demand; but as it's in the style of a coffee table book, it is, I fear, rather expensive: for further details see here.

All feedback extremely welcome!

To be, a pilgrim

We have walked on the pilgrim way in France, and a little in Northern Spain, but the idea of walking the Via de la Plata is what has attracted me recently. And so, in this Holy Week, and in a Holy Year, Caroline and I make our way (via five trains) to Seville on Wednesday, before embarking on Saturday upon our four-week walk to Salamanca: it's a convenient half-way point on the Silver Route - next year (God willing) we shall walk from Salamanca to Compostela.

One of the strangest of Luis Buñuel's strange corpus of films is "La Voie lactée", featuring two people tramping towards Santiago, and meeting a mysterious man in a Spanish cloak, a heretic from the past perhaps. The latest Confraternity of St James Bulletin arrived the other day, always worth a read. It makes mention of that, and also of a more recent film, "Al final del camino". This 2009 road movie/romcom, set on the pilgrimage route, clearly provides a different form of enjoyment from that sought by the reviewer: at the end of what might be called a "mixed" notice, the Bulletin's Editor adds: "[The reviewer] is a retired Methodist minister who can sometimes be old fashioned, especially on the camino."

Walking has never quite gone out of fashion, and today we have double-lined socks, Lekis and mobile phones to aid our passage. I might even get to blog a bit. People temporarily turn themselves into pilgrims for many different reasons, some only finding out on the camino itself: I hope to be one of them!

Spain: Ourense

However hard you study the Cook's timetable, there are some journeys you can't do in one go. That's why we found ourselves in Ourense, walking from the station across a Roman bridge: 370 metres long, it has shells embedded to indicate we were on the Camino de Santiago de Compostela - the Via de la Plata. Our train had brought us from Vigo along the Miño River valley, a journey through delightful forest scenery - a comfortable Renfe train this time. This more contemporary bridge over the Miño caught the eye; as did the elegant hot water (very hot!) baths in the centre of the old part of the city, its baroque main square and 13th Century Cathedral of Santiago. A good place for a bicycle race too, it seems: without having a clue what it was about, we joined the hundreds on the streets cheering contestants on!