On the Camino

I stumbled across this by accident: http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=gl&u=http://www.asnauga.com/index.php%3Foption%3Dcom_content%26view%3Dcategory%26layout%3Dblog%26id%3D1%26Itemid%3D18%26lang%3Den&prev=/search%3Fq%3DCotolaya%2Bcertificate%26start%3D10%26sa%3DN%26biw%3D1024%26bih%3D448 The article describes two Nautical Pilgrimages to Galicia to celebrate the 800th anniversary of Saint Francis of Assisi's pilgrimage to Santiago. One will be through the Mediterranean calling at ports in Italy, France, Spain and Portugal and covering about 1,500 nautical miles. The second will be through the Atlantic and will cover 210 nautical miles calling at ports in France, Ireland and England before meeting with the boats covering the Mediterranean Way at Rias Baixas in Galicia. The nautical clubs of Galicia have arranged the Pilgrimage for June and July of this year to remember how saint James' body was transported by sea to Santiago and 30 boats and ...

My last post was about the certificate being issued only for this year by the Franciscan monks in Santiago to celebrate the 800th anniversary of his Pilgrimage to Santiago in 1214 and that made me want to see if I could find out a little bit more. The information that I found suggested that St Francis made his Pilgrimage on the Northern Way although the precise route that he took seems to be unclear (as far as I can work out he was on his way to Morocco in 1213 sometime after May but illness made him stop in Spain which does fit in). According to legend the Convento de San Francisco de Valdedios was founded by Saint Francis when he reached Santiago at Val de Dios - 'Valley of God' (and the land for it bought from the monks of San Marino for a symbolic annual rent of a basket of trout a tradition that continued until the late 18th century). Cotolay, a coal man who greeted Saint Frances with his family when he entered Santiago, was ch...

Every 100 years the Francistern order produces their own 'Compostela' to celebrate the Pilgrimage of Saint Francis of Assisi to Santiago which happened in 1214 - 800 years ago and so this certificate is available this year (and then there won't be another until 2114). My certificate is below: This reads: Pax et Bonum Sancti Francisci Conventus Composelae Peregrinus Sancti Jacobi Composservi Dei, Francisci Assisi protectione, aedes, quas dominus Cotolaya fundavit, ad praesentiam et permansionem Fratrum Minorum in hac urbe Metropolitana, visit De mandato fraternitatis suae Revmae Fr. Francisco Javier Castro Miramontes Guardianus et humilis in Domino Servus This translates (imperfectly) as: Peace and Good San Francisco Congress Composelae Crusaders of the Holy One of Jacob Composservi of God, the protection of Francis of Assisi , house, and the protection of other buildings, which the Lord hath founded the Cotolaya, in this city at the pres...

After a long journey yesterday we're home. In the taxi from Nottingham to home we passed all of the sights that are so familiar to me - the QMC, the University and others and nothing seemed to have changed. After the Camino you always think that things will be somehow different because of the things that you saw and experienced on the Camino: the people who you met from around the world, the distance that you travelled, the way that life slowed down to the pace of one foot in front of the other to the simple concerns of simply finding a bed and some food and being content when the showers were warm and you could dry your clothes. After the Camino you always take some time to get back to life, to the speed of things and to not having everyone greet you with a smile when you go past and that's fine. And, if you're like me, you start to wonder about where you'll walk next, which Camino you'll walk and when because I've found, as many others who I met on this ...

At home I'm responsible for all lunch pack-ups for when we go to work including those of my parents and, when looking up ideas on what to include, I read that cards with pictures and facts can encourage reading and thought that that sounded like a good thing and so often include them in my Mum and Dad's lunches. While we're in Portugal Mum will be working for only four days but I thought that I should leave her something a bit special to include - I'll put the cards in the small 'money envelopes' so that she can't read them early and mark each with the day when they should be read so that she opens them in the right order. I started by drawing a map on five cards (because I thought that she might work on the Friday as well or that she might go out somewhere on that day) - this was not fun trying to work out how to 'stretch' the map so far and keep it (somewhat) accurate. The cards are 5X8cm. Then I measured out the cards on the computer and...

It seems to have become a bit of a tradition for us that I give Dad and Becky a 'Congratulations' card the night before we get to Santiago, I've always just bought these before but wanted to do something a bit different this year and so decided to alter cards to make them more Camino-y.   This is the first card - fairly plain ready to be decorated with a nice big space at the bottom I drew the outline of Santiago Cathedral and then cut it out and turned it over so that my pencil lines could not be seen Then I stuck it on and drew my design of three Pilgrims walking on with pencil Then I went over it in pen and, when the pen was dry, rubbed out my pencil lines My other card has different versions of 'Congratulations' on it. I started by cutting out small triangles in blue and yellow Then I sewed on a black 'loop' to be the string that bunting hangs on And stuck on my felt triangles to be bunting! Nice and easy but looks g...

Arrived in Santiago yesterday at aboit half one after 25km walk - the last 3km or so was all uphill through the new city with no arrows or shells to guide us! Not helpful. We queued and got our Compostellas and then went over to the Seminario for the night (which was filled with schoolchildren whose teachers left them from 2 onwards whilst they went to lunch. In the meantime the kids ran riot running around , shouting and managing tobreak a door handle and a window - not a good nnight! ). We went to Polgrim Mass today and saw the Botafumero swing

The door of the Church - one of Thomas a Becket's symbols is the mitre (Bishop's hat) so this may allude to him. Apparently uploading one picture is the limit for today. Will update when I can. Finally remembered to add this photo of the front of the Church This is the only Church dedicated to Saint Thomas in Galicia

We walked 23km today and are now only 43km from Santiago! This route involves a lot more road walking than the Camino Frances (although a lot in the last 100km are mainly quiet country roads but all of that tarmac gets to your feet!). There are though some lovely parts walking through forests with no-one else in sight, just the sound of water running down small waterfalls from last night's rain to be heard and then we emerged from the trees and into a bit of rain to behold a beautiful rainbow gracing the sky. If anything (except for in the cities which always seem to be a problem) the Camino Portuguese is better signed than the Frances - the Galician way markers aren't every 500m but the arrows seem to be more abundant and painted with more care and at crossroads there are nearly always yellow crosses to tell you, 'Not this way!' There are fewer bars and albergues but that hasn't been a problem so far. Tomorrow it's Padron with it's famous pep...

Found somewhere with wifi again! A walk over over 20km means that we are now in Pontevedra and so are 65km from Santiago.  Three days and we will arrive and I find myself once again in that bittersweet posistion of wanting to arrive and yet not wanting my Camino to end. In a guestbook yesterday someone had written that, 'the Camino never ends,' and I suppose that if you try to live your life with the same friendship and comradary that you find on the Camino than it doesn't end ..... exfept that it does and you find yourself instead searching for others who have experienced the difficulties,  joys, pain , tears and wondrr of the Camino that you have. Pontevedra is a beautiful place though. The Chapel of Santuario da Peregrina has a floor plan in the shape of a scallop shell (this would be the point where I loaded some pictures for you but it doesn't want to comply .. I'll try and add some later).

In the albergue - bed number 3 and I like it A single bed! There's no pillow but I'm not using my fleece right now so that rolled up will be fine. The showers are rather hot though. Haven't looked at the kitchen yet but there is one. The view from our room's balcony to the outside area. Next is wash clothes and then investigate the kitchen - should we cook again or go out? We ate out but the kitchen looks well stocked with a stove and microwave. Small sitting area available with a (slow) computer

I've given out four of my badges so far - one to David from Australia,  one each to Barbara and her friend (who's name I do know but my mind's gone blank!) and one to Philis from Ireland

I LOVE this albergue! We had ten beds (singles, not bunks!) in the room with twi baths and showers in a wooden chalet with other beds elsewhere. Extremly friendly owners who provided lunch at 3, a wonderful meal at night (so kuch food and all yummy) with a variety of alcohols we could try including port and homemade wines and then breakfast this morning. All for a donation!! I have more pictures on my camera which I'll sort out later - looks like I'll be doing mist of my writing about this Camino at home but I'll keep looking out for wifi to blig! Postcards to write now and less than an hour until the albergue opens now!

The town on the Portuguese Camino famous for the Cockerel. A picture is worth a thousand words - the legend which is very similar to that of Santa Domingo de la Calzada on the Camino Frances. This is why Portugal's symbol is the Cockerel. The albergue here was small but lovely - modern with ten beds in two bedrooms and then mattresses in the reception area. Separate men's and women's showers (although the two women's showers have no division between them -they are just in one room). Small kitchen with microwave and camping stove with two rings. Only a few pans, pots etc. .

We think it's about 28ºc today, our hottest day so far (we're already more tanned than we got in 33 days on the Camino Frances,  and we are, as the title suggests, waiting fir the albergue to open at 4 - another 1.5 hours!! The offending albergue - we did ask the hospitelero if we could get in earlier but she said no and proceeded to cover up the code with her hand as she put it in as if Pilgrims couldn't be trusted!! Ponte de Lima is quite pretty with a mediaeval bridge on Roman foundations that's 300metre s long (longer than the river is wide at least at the moment). The bridge - I'll try to upload a better picture later. The town itself seems to consist almost completely of cafés. Today's walk was away from the cobbles which realky hurt your feet and seem to be everywhere in Portugal. And there were some eucalyptus trees to provide some shade. We did manage to get lost for 20 minutes when, for an unknown reason, we turned off the path and then...

A nice, light (I hope!) craft to take on Camino with us this time as a little gift. I bought a very cheap kit to make Easter egg hanging decorations that came with the three lots of front and back pieces for the eggs (or you could cut your own out from felt), felt 'bands' to go across the eggs, thread and stuffing. You can see the felt that came with the kit but I took one of the bands and cut it out of dark blue felt instead (and did three copies, one for each egg). Then I cut out three arrows from yellow felt and used glue to stick the band on one egg of each colour and then glued one arrow on top of each band. Next comes the sewing - this kit is meant for children so the holes for this were already made. Sew almost the whole way around each paired egg set leaving enough of a gap to push the stuffing in (you can use the end of a pencil or a knitting needle to push the stuffing in if need be). Then sew the small gap closed and tie off your thread. I the...

Will update you soon but are now in Ponte de Lima

We arrived in Porto by 12 and promptly followed the arrows in the wrong direction to get to our albergue (Hostel aeroporto)! A kind man set us straight so that we could dump our bags and go exploring. We caught the tram into town and pretended to be tourists for the day. We saw a lot of Portugal's Cockerels but these were my favourite hiding down a back street for us to find.   The view from the river is amazing and you can see these boats near where the port distilleries are - I think that they used to transport the port up and down the river. Porto's Cathedral - up a hill, it took us a while to find it. Inside it's quite dark as there are few windows as it has been squeezed into a small space. It's a defensive Cathedral where citizens could go for shelter if the city was attacked (I'm not sure when or if it was used for this). Walking around we saw both blue and yellow arrows but, unlike on the Camino Frances, the blue arrows do...

Airport floors are very cold to sleep on! Did manage to get a few hours though and got through security fine so just waiting for the plane to Porto!

Actually getting to your starting point on the Camino always seems to be more complicated than actually walking the Camino. A mass of different forms of transport seem to need to be involved as you walk to the bus to catch the train, ride the train to catch the bus, catch the bus to get the coach and get the coach to reach the plane! I am, though, getting a little ahead of myself as we're waiting to catch the coach to the airport in the middle of London (well at Victoria station which is near enough to being the middle of London). We started with the train at half nine. I got a little sleep on the train and then got a bus through London for the first time. It was amazing to see just how busy the city is at midnight (and still is now at almost one)! The coach journey's an hour and a half and will be followed by the fun activity of trying to sleep on airport seats ..... the life of a Pilgrim hey!! We should have plenty of time to explore Porto tomorrow though .......

In Spain the Easter processions are organised by 'Co-fradias' or 'The Brotherhoods' and the floats that they carry are called 'tronos'. The people who carry them are called 'Costaleros' (a 'costal' being the small cushion often used to stop the tronos causing sores when being carried - the tronos can weigh up to 6 tons!). The people who follow the tronos who wear the cone-shaped hats (these are worn in the belief that it will bring them closer to the heavens) are called 'Nazarenos'.

Rather than make these from scratch I decided to just alter a one card and make the other, this saved me time and a bit of effort so was good on all counts!     I liked this one because of the stars (Compostela means 'field of stars') and there was a fairly big space at the bottom for me to decorate. Next I checked the distance of Santiago from Porto - 239.6km according to my guidebook. Then I used Paint to draw a distance sign (I chose paint as you can save images as JPEG files making them easier to post here). Two oblongs, the inner one with a thicker line, then the words for distance and the two metal poles for it to stand on (I based it on the sign that cheers you up as you leave Roncenvalles in the morning). Then it was simply printing this out, sticking it onto card to give it some rigidity and then sticking it onto the card. If you want to make a similar card here's a blank version of the sign for you to use: The...