Reaching Santiago de Compostela

Oct. 2, 2012

Most guidebooks break up the walk from Arzúa, where I had spent Saturday night, to Santiago de Compostela into two days, leaving a short 20 kilometers or so for the final day so that Peregrinos can make a special noon Mass at the cathedral. Sunday morning I knew I would stretch for Santiago if conditions were right. Would the paths be good? Would the weather cooperate? Would my feet — and my will — hold up? How could I not? I could always attend the pilgrims’ Mass the next day.

My long walk Saturday had left me about 36 kilometers to travel to Santiago, and I had done that distance plus some on about two occasions, so I knew I was capable of it. This was a day to reach deep.

I spent the morning walking through forests of eucalyptus trees. The earthen paths felt good beneath my feet. I was drinking plenty of water and stopped for a beef empanada and café solo americano after five kilometers to supplement the two oranges I had had for breakfast. A couple of people tried to talk to me, but I had closed the circle and was deep inside my head.

At the ten-kilometer mark I worried that I wasn’t traveling fast enough if I wanted to make Santiago by dark, and the Pilgrims’ Office, which hands out the Compostela, closed at 8 p.m. I increased my speed. At some point I fueled up with half a package of Chips Ahoy cookies. And I was drinking all the water I could fit into my pack, plus buying Aquarius energy drinks every time a Coke machine appeared.

Sixteen kilometers put me near what was supposed to be the goal for the day, Arca do Pino. It was one o’clock, but I just hadn’t walked enough. I stopped by the tourist information office, where they offer to make reservations for accommodations all the way to Santiago. I had only two hotel options — about five kilometers apart — until I was about five kilometers from the city, where there is a pilgrims’ hostel in the mountains. I liked the odds. If I began to falter, I could just strive for one of those locations. I kept walking.

On I went. Through the forests. Up one mountain. Past the Lavacolla airport. And then the home stretch.

Guidebooks warn about the climb up Monte do Gozo (Mount of Joy), the last mountain one climbs before Santiago. Portions are steep, but you’re walking on gravel or dirt paths or an asphalt road. It just takes forever, especially when you’re burning with impatience, when you yearn to reach Santiago.

Just before I began that climb I found a Coke machine and bought a Powerade. I had never had one before and didn’t care what it tasted like. I don’t even remember the taste.

I had been listening to music on my iPhone all day: Faith Hill, George Strait, Whitney Houston, Clint Brown, Levi Kreiss, P!nk. I needed something special. Dolly.

I queued up her version of “Stairway to Heaven,” crossed a small wooden bridge and the climb began. Dolly and I, we climbed for what seemed like hours but was probably thirty or forty minutes. And I cried.

I had cried off and on all day while walking, the tears falling wetly onto my sunglasses and down my cheeks, but I was bawling on the Mount of Joy. I cried because I was so close, within six or seven kilometers of the Cathedral of Santiago. I cried for all of the kilometers I had walked. I cried for all of the people I had met who had made this walk. I cried for those who had walked before me, and I cried for those who would walk after me. I cried when I heard my mother’s voice chiding me like I was a child, telling me to get out of the street before a car ran me over. I just cried.

I cried because I knew I would make it. A broken leg might slow me down, but I knew I would finish this, and I would finish that day.

I cried at the impossibility of it all. I cried because there was no reason why I should be able to do this. I was just an ordinary person with an idea. How could I have walked almost 800 kilometers? Had I really traveled that far? Was this even real? At one point I even imagined that I had died, that my body was somewhere in the forest and my spirit had walked on, that I would be discovered miles short of Santiago, but inexplicably my walking stick and iPhone would be found on the Mount of Joy.

Because it was so late in the day I was mostly walking alone. The tour groups were gone. All but one or two pilgrims had stopped for the day, and the remaining ones peeled off at the albergue on the Mount of Joy so they could walk in for the Mass on Monday. I kept walking toward the setting sun and eventually I stopped crying.

Pilgrims have walked to Santiago for centuries. In my mind I saw a broad avenue of welcome leading to the cathedral but the walk into Santiago is nothing special.

Modern buildings obscure the cathedral and the walk is not inspiring. Down a steep hill where feet have worn away the grass along a road. Down a staircase. Along a gravel path on the far side of a guard rail. Along a path of broken railway ties. And then three or four kilometers of concrete. Winding through what could be any city. Except. Except for the brass scallop shells embedded in the sidewalk pointing the way every few feet. They glowed in the setting sun, and I focused on each one. No tap-tap-tapping of my walking stick anymore. It was held firmly in my left hand, and I was walking, barely seeing people. Just following the shells and looking for yellow arrows.

Past an optometry school and restaurants. Past a park and apartment buildings. Past this albergue and that one, until the buildings got older and the streets narrower, and the quiet of a Sunday evening began to buzz with people in the streets.

And suddenly there is the cathedral to my left, but it looks so small! And I realize this is just one of the facades, so I walk on, through an arch and onto a plaza, the Praza do Obradoiro and the towers of the west facade. It was huge. It was massive. And I was spent.

Groups of people stood around taking photos. People buzzed in and out of the doors. To my right the Hotel Reis Católicos, a pilgrims’ hospital now a luxury Parador. Across from the church, the magnificence of Santiago town hall. It was all so grand, and here I was.

And here I am.

I have said prayers of thanks, but I have to attend Mass today. And there is much to see here in Santiago and more prayers to be said and much reflection to be done. And planning.

And each day while I rest here I will wait on the Praza do Obradoiro and welcome my friends who walk into Santiago.