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We
sleep in the pilgrims’ hostel of Arca the night of the 6th to 7th August.
Our last night in the Camino. The day before the hospitalera* organised
the hostel at once. This hostel is nice and it is well managed. In the
late hours of the evening some pilgrims, coming from Roncesvalles, arrive
at the hostel. There are some beds for them.
Tonight,
the last one of the Camino for almost all the pilgrims and walkers, is
bursting with impatience and zeal. It is half past two in the morning when
the noise starts and some pilgrims leave. They say they want to walk the last
bit of the Camino under the moonlight. To hell with it all, but what
if it is
cloudy! Well, it is all the same for them, they say they quit and they
quit. Others leave at four o’clock a.m.. Nobody can restrain their
excitation. Paca and I are tired, so we stay in bed until half past six.
Before
leaving this hostel I wander around our pavilion in a nostalgic way. I
understand that the Camino is coming to an end and want to keep in my mind
as many memories of the last hostel as I can. I would like to take
something, I do not resign myself to leaving the hostel
empty-handed. When I
watch carefully I notice that the pilgrims, in their rashness, have
forgotten a lot of things: some bars of soap, some items for personal
hygiene, some shirts, and a pair of trousers...
It
is still dark when Paca and I quit Arca, it is so dark that a girl and a
boy from Burgos come with us because they do not have a torch. We chat for
a while. Paca and I are sad. I think that people notice that we want to
walk all alone this day, so the two young people, just as dawn is breaking,
look for an excuse to fall behind.
We
enter a hotel in Lavacolla so as to have breakfast. The hotel manager is
aghast by the fact that we go in the bar with our rucksacks. She asks
firmly but politely to leave them at the entrance. We have breakfast
slowly, everything we do today is done dilatorily, savouring each moment.
The charming Camino is ending and it is very hard for us to abandon it.
We
crawl up to Monte del Gozo. The Xacobea cycling tour overtakes us for the
last time. Many bikers travel on foot over the slopes of Monte del Gozo
and at this stage we lose heart.
After
a while it starts to rain. It rains more and more. A strong wind blows and
a little hail falls mixed with rain. The storm does not stop. There
is no coat, plastic or Goretex that can save us from this. We are soaking
wet from head to toe, but we do not stop walking until we sight the
pilgrims’ hostel of Monte del Gozo.
The
hostel is modern. This hostel is prepared to shelter a great number
of
people and provide them with both food and a lot of facilities. This is
what Paca and I have been asking for from the time we entered Galicia.
However, how utterly stupid! We do not like this. We are looking forward
to leaving the place. We stamp our credentials and after having a snack in
the bar, we quit.
It
pours, but we fear neither rain nor gale. We are both drenched and with my
boots’ soles definitively split, walk our last four kilometres. We can
already see the cathedral towers. There are hardly any pilgrims at the
entrance of Santiago at this time (it is quarter to twelve a.m.) probably
because the heavens are open and it is pouring all the more. Paca and I,
half the time quiet and the other half talking, remember people and
friends that were with us along the Camino. Some of them were with us
physically, others were not; some of them were healthy, others ill; the
most part alive, someone dead. Yes, it is true, someone who died was with
us. The Camino belongs to all people, does it not?
Without
noticing we are already in the Puerta del Camino*. At once we arrive at
the cathedral. We go out to the Plaza del Obradoiro through the corner
next to the Hostal de los Reyes Catolicos. We look at the cathedral and
quietly Paca and I are hugging each other. A long hug. We also kiss each
other. We say nothing. We stop being pilgrims at this very moment. The
Camino, which started in our minds some years ago, will remain there for
the rest of our lives.
We stop being
pilgrims at this very moment.
The
Plaza del Obradoiro is crowded. Someone takes a picture of us while
telling off two boys that are teasing us.
The
Camino takes us back to the human tide that we left a month ago. We are
here again. Santiago de Compostela is a fiesta. In the broad sense it
looks like the San Fermin Festival. As a matter of fact, the groups of
young people sing the same songs in both places. There, all people wear a
red scarf: San Fermin; here, scarves are of different colours (red, blue,
green, yellow...) but they also match the celestial patrons: Calasancios,
Night Worship, Marianistas, Javieristas*... After all we have Saints and
confraternities for everybody, some of them with more bullfighting
tradition, some with less.
Good
Route! Good Way! Buen Camino!
Paca
and Salva.
hospitalera*.- Person who is in
charge of a pilgrims’ hostel.
Puerta del Camino*.- Old gate in
the walls of Santiago de Compostela
Calasancios, Night Worship,
Marianistas, Javieristas*.- Religeous orders and confraternities
Stage 30  End |