Solitary Walking

 arrow someone has made in stone at a crossroads in routes

heading for Astorga on the beautiful, less-peopled 'countryside' option from Hospital de Orbigo

"How many of us are completely at ease with our own thoughts, 
comfortably at home in our own minds and bodies?
I know I'm not always in this ideal state. 
Far from it. 
So solitary walking gives me the chance to explore a little 
the murky depths of my own mind, 
to clear some weeds from the muddy pool of my unconscious, 
to sort out my ideas and beliefs, 
to shine a little light into my soul, 
to reflect on God and the nature of life, death and the universe. 
And, with luck, to meet up with some interesting people, 
and enjoy a few beers with them along the Way..."

~Robert

on his Solitary Walker blog

Robert has many reflections on walking you might want to check out,

as well as accounts of the varied walking journeys he has made.

Flowers of the Camino

 

Flowers seen beside the path nearing San Martin del Camino, 

after a long hot day's walk, mostly near highway, out of Leon.

“There are always flowers for those who want to see them.”

 

—Henri Matisse

 Quote found on 'Picturing God' website

On my last night in Santiago I had a very special conversation 

with a Frenchman I had met a few times along the Camino.

He had always struck me as a prayerful, reflective man, full of wisdom,

who thought a lot about others. 

(I was surprised though to find him on the altar of the Cathedral in Santiago as a deacon!)

In our last conversation

he told me that I was 'une fleur du camino'

-a flower of the Camino. 

But he also gently said that a flower sometimes has to die to make a seed.

His words and his love have always remained within me.

A Long Walk

 Countryside near Saugues on the Le Puy route

"What on earth has happened to me 
in these 5 years since my first Camino? 

Then I simply decided to go for a long walk 

but of course I discovered as we all do 
that as well as the physical act of walking 

which is deeply meditative, 

the simplicity of the way of life, 

the friendship of strangers 

and the beauty of the countryside 

are actually a powerful spiritual brew."

~Johnnie Walker

Pilgrimage and Church

 Church in the village of Gaillac, as seen soon after leaving Cajarc

"Above all I suppose the experience opens my mind to God 

in ways which Church never does. 

Increasingly I’ve become bothered again by aspects of Church: 

by the lack of caring, the focus on power, 

the marginalisation of women inevitable in a male dominated organisation 

and the pompous self regard of many leaders. 

Now I find these feelings fading and taking on a new perspective. 

When I rage about it I want to take them all, Pope included, on pilgrimage. 

I realise I can only take myself."

~Johnnie Walker

Feeling with the Heart

On the plateau above Le Puy on the first morning's walk

“The best and most beautiful things in the world
cannot be seen, nor touched, 

but are felt in the heart.”

~Helen Keller

Mist in the hills surrounding O'Cebreiro

Mist seen in valleys below on the descent from O'Cebreiro

"What’s it like to be back? We can’t seem to stop walking, and on one of our impromptu hikes, Lisa observed: “I thought it would be somehow more . . . spiritual.”

I thought it would be more spiritual, too. Originally, we’d planned to walk the questions posed in John’s gospel, pondering one question each day. There are some great ones, worthy of weighty consideration: “What are you looking for?” “Do you want to be made well?” “Do you also want to go away?” And Pilate’s hauntingly cynical: “What is truth?”

On the Camino, however, the questions that consumed us were quite different: “Was that the alarm?” “Should I be paying attention to this pain?” “Can we stop for a café con leche?” “Are we there yet?”

So much for John’s questions.

But I could tell you the phases of the moon along the trek, when the first light comes, how the sun glints off the lantern of the cathedral of Santiago. I could describe magical forests in Galicia and how the morning mists create islands of the hills surrounding O’Cebreiro"....

"This is not the spirituality we anticipated; it’s the spirituality we got."

~ Martha E. Stortz

from "Pilgrimage"

an article in Santa Clara Magazine

Summer 2010 

Let your God look upon you

 Between Pech Ibert and Cajarc

"Be silent.

Be still.

Wait before your God.

Say nothing.

Ask nothing.

Be still.

Let your God look upon you.

That is all."

~Edwina Gateley

H/T Concord Pastor

"Thursday's child has far to go!"

 Distance to Santiago on sign on outskirts of Le-Puy-en-Velay

 "Only those who will risk going too far 

can possibly find out how far they can go."

-- T.S. Eliot

Incidentally, there was another sign 

not too many metres away from this one 

that gave another, even longer, distance estimate. 

It is probably as well I never noticed it at the time!!

And yes, I am a 'Thursday's child'
-prophetic that saying!

Rain on a spiderweb

seen soon after leaving Domaine des Mathieux, the day after heavy rain had fallen

 

"I am sure it is a great mistake always to know

enough to go in when it rains.  

One may keep snug and dry by such knowledge, 

but one misses a world of loveliness."

~Adeline Knapp 

Whisperings of grasses

 Rural countryside, en route for Lauzerte

"What I know in my bones 

is that I forgot to take time to remember what I know.  

The world is holy.  We are holy.  
  All life is holy.  

Daily prayers are delivered on the lips of breaking waves,
the whisperings of grasses, 

the shimmering of leaves,"

~   Terry Tempest Williams

Landscape

 Landscape after Estella

"It is a pity indeed to travel and not get this essential sense of landscape values. 

You do not need a sixth sense for it. 

It is there if you just close your eyes and breathe softly through your nose; 

you will hear the whispered message, for all landscapes ask the same question in the same whisper. 

'I am watching you -- are you watching yourself in me?' 

Most travelers hurry too much...

the great thing is to try and travel with the eyes of the spirit wide open, 

and not too much factual information. 

To tune in, without reverence, idly -- 

but with real inward attention. 

It is to be had for the feeling...

you can extract the essence of a place once you know how. 

If you just get as still as a needle, you'll be there."

~Lawrence Durrell (Spirit of Place: Letters and Essays on Travel)

The dreamers

 Two Italian women having dinner in Triacastela

-two of the many wonderful dreamers I met along the way...

"Every great dream begins with a dreamer. 

Always remember, you have within you 

the strength, the patience, and the passion 

to reach for the stars to change the world."

~Harriet Tubman

The direction of your dreams

 "Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. 

Live the life you have imagined."

~Henry David Thoreau

Cruz de Ferro

Cruz de Ferro in the mist, on the mountains above Foncebadon

"The mountain remains unmoved 

at seeming defeat by the mist."

- Rabindranath Tagore

Some people prepare very well for their encounter with the Cruz de Ferro

carrying stones all along the way that they will place there

in atonement for their sins or for the intentions of others.

And for some, this is a significant place where they leave behind past guilts,

and drop their burdens on the stone pile below the cross.

But I wasn't among them.

Religiously, I was quite unmoved.

It was the mist that moved me

to both delight and annoyance

-it was so gloriously thick but there was no view!

Early Morning

In the countryside after Astorga- walking early- 
with the remnants of a thunderstorm still in the air

"I'll tell you how the sun rose a ribbon at a time."

~Emily Dickinson 

On warmer days in France and Spain 

I always preferred to start walking in the morning cool.

To walk as the world awoke to a new day 

was always a time of real joy for me

deep quiet joy.

And this particular morning I walked with my Quebec friends.

It had been an unbearably hot night,

until in the early hours, a loud thunderstorm began. 

We were glad to escape early, 

though nervous lest the storm return while we were in the open.

We were all excited, after so many days of 'flat' walking

to be heading for the mountains again, 

towards Rabanal del Camino... Foncebadon..... Cruz de Ferro...

places of mysterious names, 

all in the higher land that we couldn't wait to climb.

Changing Seasons

Leaving Montbonnet on Day 2 of the Chemin, with mid-April snow on the ground

"Each moment of the year has its own beauty

....a picture which was never before

and shall never be seen again."

~Emerson

Another h/t to George for the quote.

One of the greatest joys I found in the whole walk from Le Puy to Santiago

was the way I passed through the changing seasons as I walked. 

These first few days out of Le-Puy-en-Velay, mid-April

were bitterly cold at times

and twice, there was even snow- a novelty for a Kiwi lowland North Islander!

green tree and blue sky

 

En route for La Romieu 

"I thank you God for this most amazing day,

for the leaping greenly spirits of the trees,

and for the blue dream of sky

and for everything which is natural,

which is infinite, which is yes."

~e.e. cummings 

H/T to George for quote

"Real Maturity" and Cats

Real Cat seen in Auvillar

"Sometimes when I get up in the morning, I feel very peculiar. 

I feel like I've just got to bite a cat! 

I feel like if I don't bite a cat before sundown, I'll go crazy! 

But then I just take a deep breath and forget about it. 

That's what is known as real maturity."

~Charles Schultz on prudence and temperance (as Snoopy in Peanuts)

H/T to Ironic Catholic for this quote 

I think that walking the Camino brings out some 'real maturity'

- when the going gets tough sometimes, you just gotta keep going-

Plus the Camino often has you rolling in laughter uncontrollably

with your Camino mates

-in a way that's not easily understood by anyone who hasn't walked the Camino-

So this humour from Snoopy belongs here rather well....
 

One of the sculptured cats of La Romieu - a town well worth the detour- don't miss it folks!

A doorway

 

A door in a ruined wall- in the Auvergne- on the first day out of Le-Puy-en-Velay

  "God enters by a private door into every individual."

 

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

an archway- a beginning

 The archway that looks down on the beginning of the Chemin-

the path away from the Cathedral in Le-Puy-en-Velay

 

"It is for us to pray

not for tasks equal to our powers,

but for powers equal to our tasks,

to go forward with a great desire

forever beating at the door of our hearts

as we travel toward our distant goal."

  

~Helen Keller 

 

"Everyone" who leaves from Le Puy takes a photo of this archway

-you see almost identical photos in everyone's collections!

It marks a significant point- the start-

an exhilarating place, 

where so much is hoped for

and so much lies unknown in the future.