Zoe and I were sharing a room for the last week. Monica and I took it a week about to have each of the kids in our room. We could not get '4 bed' rooms so we always went with two twins.
Zoe is a notoriously bad getter-upperer. She loves to sleep in and after a long walk and a late Spanish night the mornings are tough for her.
Nevertheless we knew that today was a big one, about 24 km or more to our hotel at Amenal on the outskirts of Santiago. We were up and getting ourselves ready when Monica poked her head in the door to make sure we were on our way. A late morning means a late arvo, and after lunch the temperature soars.
Of course we were up so we opened the door to a shocked looking mum.
'I found out what all the sirens were last night', Monica said, 'Apparently there was a big train crash in Santiago, about 80 people killed.'
Aye Corumba.
I turned on the telly, generally a waste of time because most of it is in Spanish, and of course those now famous images were all over the screen. I jumped on the internet, it was the top news story internationally as well. Huge.
It is hard to explain just how profound an impact this story had on us that day for number of reasons.
A. We were right there, even though we were two days walk out of Santiago it was only 38km, about 20 minutes in a car. I was like being in Hervey Bay and the crash happening in Maryborough.
B. It was on the eve of the Feast Day of St James, a Spanish national holiday a bit like Australia Day at home.
C. It was in Santiago, the centre of the celebrations and the focal point of the whole shebang.
D. We were about to board those trains in two days to get out of Santiago.
Man oh man, being here, so focused on reaching Santiago, so near to our destination and knowing that many of the pilgrims we had walked with were already ahead of us and there was chilling.
At that point in the morning we had no news about the whole thing really, no one knew if it was a terror attack, a mechanical failure, human error, how many had actually died, if the trains would run again and so on. Just that it was now St James Day and all bets were off.
They cancelled the celebrations, declared 3 days of mourning and knuckled down to sort out the mess.
We were flabbergasted but on our way.
Just out of town we saw this shrine. It is in recognition of a lady who was in her 50s who had walked the Camino twice and who died in her sleep in Santiago the day after completing here second trip. You see lots of these along the way, little plaques and places where particular people are remembered. It was particularly poignant that day.
And it rained for the first time that day as well. We had walked almost 300km in dry dusty conditions and on the second last day it rained. It was just a sprinkle, enough to get your coats out, but it rained. I loved it, I am not convinced that Zoe did looking at this picture but she was happy enough in the moment. You know even in July it is unusual for the hot weather to go on for so long without rain in Galicia, we have been quite blessed.
Even the deer were allegedly jumping for joy although we never saw any.
I thought I better snap one of these before we got out of Galicia. A coke machine with the Way across the front. Note the shell symbol in the background, the towns of the Camino from left to right. Fantastic. I am sure you don't find them in other parts of Spain or Europe.
The walk into Amenal was long, the last 4 or 5kms took forever, the day got hot when the rain cleared but finally we came into a shaded forest, cool and green. Note the moss on the trees below as well as the gum leaves on the ground. The bush around Santiago has a distinctly Australian smell with many eucalypts among the oaks. It had a familiar feel. The forest led us to our final night on the Camino, a little joint just on the very fringe of Santiago, Amenal.
We settled for the last time into our hotel, had our dinner and made ready for the final day, a trifling 16km into town. I expected to feel more ... well more something than I did. Being on the very cusp of reaching a significant milestone had left me a bit numb to be honest. I had been thinking about this for years, planning it for a year and looking forward to it for months. I had been walking it for 3 weeks and yet here I lay, in bed just tired and ready to have it over and done with.
Maybe that's the way of it with pilgrimages. Maybe the pilgrim just wants it out of the way so they can get on with life afterwards. Maybe upon completion there is no great change, just knowledge, knowledge that it is done. Maybe the thoughts of the suffering of the Spanish people on this special day had dampened my elation, softened my edge. Dunno. Maybe just walking 300 kilometres is tough, I know my body hurt more this week than previously, the old grey mare ain't what she used to be and she was never that good in the first place. I was always and ever an old grey donkey at best.
Anyway, one day more, one breath before the final plunge.
Buen Camino Peregrinos.
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