So now for a little bit more detail:
My brother and I left home late Thursday (march 29) night to catch a bus that left Madrid for Santiago at 12:30 that night. I spent the first two hours of the bus ride pissing off the other passengers by talking with a kid from Portland, Oregon who is living in Cadiz and whom I was sitting next to. And then I spent the next 7 hours or so performing my traditional long-bus-ride ritual: I sit with my eyes closed, listen to my ipod, and wish that I wasn't on a stinking bus. You see, over the past year or so, I have developed the inability to sleep while sitting up. I have no problem sleeping on the bus while lying down, but as the bus was full, that was not an option. So I did not sleep at all. Actually, that is a lie; I slept for 20 minutes after the bus half-emptied out after stopping in A Coruña. Anyway, to continue, we got to Santiago at about 9:30 in the morning. Our bus to Sarria didn't leave until 6ish, so we walked from the bus station to the center of Santiago. After about a 15 minute walk, we reached the main touristy part of Santiago. We then found a tourist office, and after a few minutes there we headed to a nearby cafe to eat breakfast. After breakfast, we went to a nearby plaza to wait for a girl that was flying in from Belgium. The plaza we picked as a meeting place was full of people on strike, and was just busy in general, so, for the half hour we were there, I took random pictures of people on the street, which was quite fun. So fun, in fact, that I am thinking of going down to Madrid one day solely in order to take photos of the people there. Anyway, moving on; we then walked for awhile around Santiago until we reached the Cathedral. There, we split into two groups: one of those who needed to buy stuff (such as sleeping bags) and one of the rest of us who didn't want to go with the first group. We, meaning the second group, went to a huge park that was nearby. I managed to escape the rest of the group, find myself a bench which was in the shade and blocked away from the main walkway of the park by a row of bushes, and then sleep a nice little "siesta". Unfortunately, it was only about 30 or 40 minutes until two AFS girls came running and skipping up saying "we found you". Probably the most disappointed I have been all of 2012. Anyway, after playing cards for another 45 minutes or so, we went to eat in a small restaurant we saw while walking to the park. And that is when I fell in love with a dish that is one of their specialties up in Galicia. It is called pulpo, and is basically sliced up octopus tentacles that are cooked in some way and then covered in a tasty spice. Sorry, that wasn't a very good description, but it is the best I can do at the moment. Anyway, it is easily on of my favorite and most memorable foods that I have ever had. After lunch, we returned to the plaza where we had first waited in order to wait for another volunteer. This time, I spent the half hour taking pictures of a dog. We then split up into two groups another time. One went to buy food for dinner that night, and my group headed directly to the bus station in order to "get the bus tickets in advance". I put that in quotations because we actually got there, sat down, and started playing cards again. Anyway, after about an hour and a half of playing cards and relaxing in the bus station, we got a bus that was headed out to Sarria. This bus ride was a bit more fun than the first one, but, as it was a bus ride that lasted more than an hour and a half, was still not all that fun. Once we got to the Albergue we were staying at, the group who had done the buying went to the kitchen to attempt to make mac & cheese for dinner. After about 45 minutes of pestering them, I got them to allow me to help them (they were very stubborn and didn't want anyone else to come in to help because the kitchen was quite small and there were already 5 people there, but I was more stubborn, so I won and got to help). It didn't really turn out like mac & cheese because they had failed to buy enough cheese, but it still was somewhat tasty, and the international folks didn't really know the difference. After dinner, we went straight to bed because the goal was to be ready to go by 7:30 the next morning. And so started our trip.
We were all out waiting in front of the albergue by 7:30ish, which actually kind of impressed me. Once everyone was out the door, we walked up a small hill for about 15 seconds until we got to a little open area in front of a church. Once everyone had taken off the packs they had just spent five minutes putting on and adjusting until they were comfortable, we got into a circle to stretch and so that the volunteers could explain a little bit about the Camino, and so that they could tell us our one mandatory stop of the day. After we finished all that, we were finally on our way. For the first kilometer or so, we were all fairly close together, but once we hit the first hill, which was about a kilometer and a half into that days walk, the kid from Portland, whose name was Solomon, and I kind of broke away from the rest of the group. And so we got to the top of that first hill alone, and found ourselves in a huge field with fog hanging low over it. And it was incredibly beautiful. And we kept walking, and walking, and walking. After about two kilometers alone, my brother got close enough that we waited for him to catch up, and about a kilometer and a half after that the three of us stopped to take off our sweatshirts. During that short stop, the group that was following us caught up, but we ended up jumping out in front of them again, but this time with Jon, the other kid from Soto, as well. Anyway, we ended up staying out front until the mandatory stopping point. After waiting there for nearly an hour and a half, we, meaning about 15 or so of us, set off again. By the way, since I don't think I've mentioned this yet, there were 29 of us, including 4 volunteers. Anyway, we ended up walking together as a big group for the next 5 or 6 kilometers, until me and this girl from Maryland ended up out front. So, we walked and talked, and ended up getting to the albergue where we were sleeping before anyone else. So far in front of anyone else that I was getting out of the shower as the group behind her and I were getting in. So, after Jon, Solomon, and Dani had showered, we walked up to a park that overlooked the river that was ran below the town. And, because we had about two and a half hours of free time while waiting for the last group on the road to get in, I had a beautiful little nap up there in the park. And then I got bored and took some pictures of sheep and a tractor. Anyway, at 5:30, we had to walk back down the hill to the albergue in order to meet with everyone. We then proceeded to walk back up the hill to the park as a whole group. Once we were there, we split up into groups of 5 in order to do an activity that the volunteers had planned for us. So, we were given various questions and tasks to answer and complete and the next two hours to finish. So we went at a nice and relaxed pace, which was great. And the activity was somewhat fun as we got to walk around and see the town. Anyway, after we finished the activity, we ate, watched the Real Madrid game (Dani and I were the only Madrid fans, which was a bummer, but also quite fun when Madrid won both the games they played while we were on the trip), and then went to bed around 11.
Again we woke somewhat early and were on the trail all stretched out and ready by 8:15 or so. Almost the whole first half of that day's walk was uphill, and the uphill started roughly a quarter of a kilometer in, so the girl from Maryland, whose name was Claire, and I again ended up out front, and we remained out in front of everybody until the rest stop we all took roughly 15 kilometers in. The second day wasn't quite as pretty as the first, but there was another crest that we reached while it was still covered in fog, so I enjoyed that a lot. While Claire and I were out front, we met, and ended up walking with, a college girl from South Korea whose is going to school in Barcelona. She and Claire ended up talking about K-Pop, which is a basically Korean pop music, for about two kilometers of walking. I found it somewhat entertaining to follow and listen to for the first kilometer or so, as they were throwing out random band and song names that I didn't recognize and then responding with phrases such as "Oh my god! I know, right. I mean, that song is so much better than their earlier stuff." or with "Yeah, they are quite weird. Have you heard "such and such". It is the only one of theirs that I like." While somewhat enjoyable for a little while, I got bored of the conversation after a little while, but luckily, by then, we had arrived at the rest stop and some other AFSers had caught up to us. After eating, I set off again, but this time with a group of six other boys (from Brazil, Japan, Thailand, Cataluña, Iceland, and Turkey) that I stayed with until the end of the day. The second half was much more fun than the first half of the day, as we spent a good while singing, running down and up hills, and just goofing off in general. The most memorable part of that day, though, was when got stuck behind a group of 6 or 7 cows and calves that were being herded to a different pasture. We had to walk a kilometer behind them, and that kilometer was made entertaining by one cow that was half-shitting the whole time. When it first cut out in front of us, it already had shit slowly dripping out of its butt, and a kilometer later, when they were finally herded off the road, it was still shitting. So we were making jokes about it the whole time, and I got my camera out, put on my big telephoto lens, and took about 30 or so photos of the cow's butt, which I will post later on. Anyway, we spent the last what-turned-out-to-be-three kilometers running and sprinting to get to the hostel. You see, the guy herding the cows told us it was a little bit over one kilometer until the town, so we decided we would do it running and in bursts of sprinting. Unfortunately, it turned out to be over three kilometers to the hostel, so we would sprint until we found a person, ask them where the hostel was, sprint there, not find the hostel, ask another person, sprint to where they told us, not find it and so on. Anyway, we were panting a bit when we finally entered the hostel, but it made the shower feel that much better, so it turned out well. After those of us who had arrived had showered and relaxed for a little while, we went out in search of food because, well, we were basically dying of hunger. Some of us, myself included, ended up sitting down for a full meal, meaning two courses followed by dessert. I had a penne pasta with a blue cheese sauce and, for the second time, pulpo. After eating, we had what turned out to be our last organized after-walk activity; we had to give each other massages. So, we were paired up and we took turns giving each other 15 minute long massages that one of the volunteers directed. They felt quite good. Anyway, after massages, we spent the next hour or two playing cards outside, which turned out to be an almost daily activity. We then ate dinner, and went to bed.
The next morning we were up and out on the trail by 8:30ish. This time, I decided it would be fun to walk with some other people, so I hung back with a slower group of girls. At least for the first 10 km until I got tired of walking so slow and took off at a slightly faster than normal pace until I got the first group, which was about a half kilometer in front of us, roughly two kilometers later, right before getting to Melide. But more on that in a minute. You see, the coolest part about the Camino is meeting all the different people, meaning meeting both other AFSers that I didn't know before, as well as random people on the trail. Anyway, the group of people I spent the first bit walking with consisted of, for the first 5 kilometers, a girl from San Francisco and a girl from the Philippines, and, for the whole 10 km, a girl from Wisconsin and a girl from Arizona. So, we walked and talked and got to know each other, and then about 6 kilometers in, we encountered an American college student who the girl from Arizona had met the day before. Well, you know that cliche "what a small world". It comes from encounters like these. Let me explain: We started talking to this woman, and it turned out she was from a small town in Wisconsin, that I cannot remember the name of. Anyway, when she said where she was from, both of the girls I was with (the ones from Arizona and Wisconsin (you can probably see where this is going)) gave out little gasps of surprise/excitement/whatever-emotion-you-usually-feel-when-you-have-these-encounters. You see, the family of the girl from Wisconsin (her name was Erika) had moved to that town this year. You, as the educated person you are, probably already guessed something along those lines though. But you probably have not correctly guessed why the other girl gave out her squeal of surprise/excitement/whatever-emotion-you-usually-feel-when-you-have-these-encounters. You see, in that town, there is a house. An old house. So old, in fact, that it was one of the first houses ever to have electricity installed in it. And, that house is now a museum. And, the grandma of the girl from Arizona (Noelle) was the last owner of the house before it was turned into a museum. And, I would be quite surprised if you guessed that correctly. And, I am on a roll with these sentences starting with 'and'. And, ... I should probably continue on now. Anyway, they were somewhat excited and psyched about that, so they talked about "how small a world it is" and all that stuff and took a picture with her before we re-accelerated back to the pace we were walking at before. Anyway, on to Melide. Melide was our rest stop for the day. It also happened to be known for pulpo, my newest favorite food. So, a group of 12 of us that were scattered out front all stopped at a pulperia to share a pair of plates of pulpo, which, like all the times before, was incredibly tasty. After about an hour of eating, we broke up into two groups: one who wanted to stay and rest and eat awhile longer, and one which wanted to start walking again, which was the one I went with. After a couple of kilometers, we encountered the Erika and Noelle, the two girls I had left a few kilometers outside of Melide. It turned out that they had only taken about a half hour to eat, so they had ended up in front of us but thought that we were kilometers in front of them. Needless to say, they were surprised to see us come up from behind them. So, we continued on as a group for the next 6 kilometers or so, until I ended up dropping back with Erika and Noelle. You see, Erika hadn't finished the second day of walking because she ended up going to a hospital to have them look at her foot, which was hurting quite badly. That problem was fixed simply by resting it a bit, but she also had a blister that was real bad. And after 24 kilometers or so of walking, it had gotten a lot worse. So she ended up having to slow down a lot over the last 5 kilometers or so, and Noelle and I dropped back with her. Now, this is going to sound a bit mean, but it was quite fun walking the last few kilometers with her. That actually doesn't sound that mean, yet. You see, her pain made her quite moody. But it wasn't like a normal moody, it was an incredibly exaggerated moodiness. And, you see, I like messing with people. A lot. And so I did just that, which, in hindsight, was somewhat mean, but which, at the time, was quite fun. Her moodiness consisted of her laughing at everything and her cussing at everything. So, she would start out laughing, I would say something somewhat mean or discouraging or sarcastic, you would break down and start yelling and cussing about everything, I would encourage her until she felt better, she would start laughing at jokes and stuff, and then I would start over again. Kind of an assholey thing to do, but Jon, who caught up to us about 3 kilometers outside of the town the albergue was in, got a video of it that was incredibly funny. Anyway, moving on. We got to the albergue just before 3:30, which was the latest that I came in over the whole trip. Like the previous days, we showered, relaxed a little, and then went to buy something to eat. After getting back from the supermarket, we, just like on previous days, played cards and just kind of hung out until dinner. Unlike on previous days, I did something that I can remember after dinner other than go to bed. And, it was quite fun. You see, this kid from Turkey named Mert, a girl from Belgium named Leah, and I were all sitting in a sort of common room a floor below our room. There was a table with a bunch of magazines and books in front of us, and one of them found a bible. But the bible was written in German, French, and English. So, we, meaning Mert and I, attempted to read the bible in French, while Leah, who speaks French as a first language, and the person who wasn't reading would sit there and laugh at the horrible pronunciation of the reader. And, reading over that bit that I just wrote, it doesn't sound that fun. Well, I promise you it was. So much so that at one point we were all crying because we were laughing so hard. Anyway, after that we went to bed.
The next morning we were again out around 8:30 or so. This stage was shorter than any that we had done so far, which everyone was more or less looking forward to. We started the day out at a fairly fast pace, even those who usually went slower. It was fairly flat compared to previous days, and we knocked down the first five kilometers or so quite quickly. After stopping to get a sello (I don't think I have talked about sellos yet, but I don't feel like doing it at the moment, so I will do it later on in the post), Solomon and I jumped ahead of the others and ended up walking with a group of Irish women. They were probably the most interesting people outside of AFS that I met while on the trail. They were doing the trail as a family reunion, and they were 10 - 6 sisters, 2 brothers, and two sons. Anyway, we walked and talked together for about 7 kilometers. We talked mainly about the school system in Ireland when they were growing up, the school system that we have in the States, the school system here in Spain, and, more than anything, the difference in language between American English and British English. I found it all quite interesting, and it made the 7 kilometers go by quite quickly. After they stopped for a break, we continued on until reaching our designated rest point, which was only 4 or 5 kilometers away from the hostel. There we ate and waited for the group behind us to catch up. After they had also had a little time to eat, we continued on towards the town. After another kilometer or so, we stopped to buy fruit and talk to the guy at the fruit stand about why he was living in Galicia and if he liked it. After that, we continued on until we reached the hostel. This time, after showering, I didn't go out to get food with the others. Instead I stayed in the hostel and relaxed and played cards. After everyone had gotten in, we did another activity where we were put into groups and had to answer random questions that were given to us on a sheet of paper. It was rather pointless, at least from my standpoint. We then were split into different groups to do a second activity. The goal of this one was to make as many cubes of paper that had tape on them and were of certain dimensions as possible. The part that made it not a simple race though was that each group was given different resources to start with, and then you could go trading. My group ended up winning simply because we were given all of the tape minus one small strip. And, because the cubes weren't valid without tape, we went trading small strips of tape for sheets of paper, which we had none of to start out. So basically, we controlled the amount of cubes that the other groups could successfully make. After the time was up, the volunteers counted how many valid cubes each group made, and then explained that the activity kind of represented the world right now. Although the rich countries, represented by our group, who started with almost all the tape, a pair of scissors, a ruler, and 2 markers, lack the natural resources to build stuff, because they have artificial resources which are needed in the building and which the poor countries need, they are able to make unfair trades to the poor countries, represented by a group that started with only paper, for natural resources. Although when they explained it it sounded a lot better and clearer. Anyway, after we finished that activity, we headed off to dinner. After dinner and dessert, the people working at the restaurant got out the things needed to make queimada, a traditional Galician drink. It consists of orujo, a Galician liqueur made from the residue of wine production, sugar, lemon peels, and coffee beans. All of this is thrown into a large clay pot and then lit on fire. It is then slowly mixed until the flames turn blue. When this happens, the fire is put out, and it is served into small ceramic cups that are more or less the size of shot glasses. As the drink burns, a traditional "spell" is recited in Gallego, so a host sibling who was walking with us and was from Galicia was called upon to recite it as the drink was being mixed. When he finished, we all were given glasses, toasted, and drank. It was quite sweet, but also quite tasty. And it was extremely cool to watch it all being mixed while on fire. After that, we headed to the hostel, and all went to bed.
The next morning, we were off walking at 6:45 or 7:00. We were up and out earlier because we wanted to get to Santiago and finish before 12:00, when "misa" (mass) started in the cathedral. Anyway, it was dark when we started walking, which was quite cool, and because the sun was just starting to rise, the fog made the forest we were walking through look quite pretty. I walked the first 7 kilometers or so with the semi-cripples who started out at the back and way slow. But after the 4th kilometer or so, we started speeding up, and Claire, who was semi-crippled at this point, and I ended up catching up with the front group by the 12.5 kilometers to go mark, which was just under 7 kilometers into the day. We all stopped to take a picture in front of a marker with about 12 or 11.5 kilometers to go, passed the airport all together, and then started breaking up again as we entered into the little towns surrounding the city. And the next 10 kilometers passed by normally, with everyone just walking, talking, and singing a bit. As we entered the outskirts of the city, I was part of a group of six of us that were a fair ways ahead of everyone else. So, we waited for them in a small park right outside the city center. And 8 minutes later they came running by (they were in a hurry because of the time), so we were forced to quickly swing on our backs and go hurrying after them. They ended up waiting just outside the plaza for us, and the second we were in view, they went sprinting into the plaza in front of the cathedral, yelling and singing "We Are The Champions". Because we weren't that keen on the idea of sprinting (and because we didn't really want to be associated with the horrible singers in front of us), we meandered into the plaza behind them, walked up to where they were laying in the middle of the plaza, and shortly thereafter entered the Cathedral to catch the first part of mass. Now, if you give them your name the day you finish before 11:30, then it will be read at the start of mass. So, to start mass they read off the names and places of origin of the people who finished that day, but, because we were a large group, in place of reading off individual names, they named our group and all the different places we were from. Not quite as cool as hearing your name, but still fairly cool. Anyway, most of us stayed another 5 minutes or so before heading back outside. While some of the AFSers stayed for the whole of mass, the rest of us hung out and napped in the plaza. Then, when mass was over, those of us that wanted to went inside to see the Cathedral and hug the Saint and all that stuff. Just so you all know, it is a beautiful Cathedral, easily one of the most amazing I have ever seen. So, if you ever get the chance to, you should definitely go see it. Anyway, after seeing the Cathedral and all, we headed over to get the certificates they give you for finishing the Camino, and after that we began the hostel hunt. You see, we hadn't pre-booked an albergue for the last night, so we had to find one that day. Originally, the idea was to stay in the public albergue, so we walked across the city to it, only to find that it would cost more than we had originally thought. We then got a call from a guy who we had talked to earlier but who had said they didn't have room saying that they had room. So we walked all the way back to the center of town, where we were divided into rooms that were cheap. But not really all that nice, and not at all spacious. You see, in my room at least, we slept two to a one person bed, and we had six of us in a room originally designed for two. But we didn't mind that much. We were all probably tired enough to sleep on the street if we had to, so it wasn't a big problem. Anyway, after getting settled in our rooms, we walked around the city a bit, and just kind of hung out until we went back to our rooms around 11:00 or 11:30. We then hung out in the rooms for awhile, and at one point, those of us in our hostel (we were in two different ones that were separated by a block or two) went out to watch a bit of a parade that they do for Semana Santa, which was quite weird. After we watched the procession a bit, we went back inside, hung out a while longer, and then went to sleep.
The next morning, everyone in our hostel was up fairly early, simply because we had to be out of the hostel pretty early. At least I think. The truth is that I was up early because those of us going to Madrid left at 9:45, so we had to be up early. I don't really know why everyone else was up early. Anyway, those of us going to Madrid got our stuff together, said goodbye to everyone in our hostel, and headed off walking to the bus stop. We then got on our bus, and went home.
And that is how I spent most of my week and a bit between the second and third semesters of school here in Spain. I am now back in school, which is kind of a bummer (I liked walking the Camino a lot more), and not much else is going on. So, here are some pictures from the trip:
People on strike the first day we arrived in Santiago.
Three guys I took pictures of while waiting for Leah (the Belgian) to arrive.
The dog from the first day in Santiago.
Another picture of it, but this time in black and white. I had started playing with the monochrome options a couple of the days while waiting, so I have a few more like this on my camera.
Our cooking team with our Mac & semi-cheese. (Photo taken by: Unknown)
Everyone waiting to start outside of the hostel the first morning. (Photo taken by: Andrea Chua)
Jon and I spent the 45 minutes we spent at the rest stop waiting for others the first day by taking pictures of random things, including each other.
The view from the park in Portomarin, the town we stayed in after our first day of walking.
Solomon and Dani lazing about in the park. (Photo taken by: Jon Reyr Johannesson)
Me napping. (Photo taken by: Jon Reyr Johannesson)
The sheep.
And the tractor
A burnt bit of forest Claire and I encountered the second day of walking. It looked really cool in the fog.
The group I walked with the second half of the second day (Brazilian not included). I also walked with all of them various other times over the course of the trip. (Photo taken by: Matheus Low Eizerik)
The cow shitting.
Another cow in the small herd that was in front of us
Massages after the second day of walking. (Photo taken by: Matheus Low Eizerik)
Cards after. (Photo taken by: Matheus Low Eizerik)
Pulpo. (Photo taken by: Andrea Chua)
A group of us at the 50 km to go marker. (Photo taken by: Matheus Low Eizerik)
Part of the daily blister ceremony. This was from the second day though, so the blisters had yet to get large. (Photo taken by: Andrea Chua)
Some of us playing cards after the third and longest day of walking. (Photo taken by: Jenny Bjorklund)
The majority of the group by a marker saying that we had finally reached the outskirts of Santiago. (Photo taken by: Unknown)
What I believe to be all of us in front of the cathedral in Santiago. (Photo taken by: Unknown)
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