Soul searching, sole destroying

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Leon to Santiago, Spain, 317km

Oh camino!!!! How I love you so!!!

I've tried to write this blog a thousand times, but I can't find the words to do it justice.



It's the kind of experience I think everyone should do once in their lifetime. There is nothing more simple than being a pilgrim on the camino. No planning required, your mind is free to wonder and reflect and the simplest things provide so much pleasure!

A typical day might go something like this;

Rise before the sun, get dressed, throw on your pack and start walking under the stars.

Stop somewhere along the way for breakfast, keep walking.

Find a place for lunch, keep walking

Look for a place to sleep the night, change into your night clothes, wash your day clothes, find somewhere serving a pilgrims menu. Eat, sleep

Get up and do it all over again!! It's that simple.

Each day is between 25km to 35km depending on energy, heat ( it was bloody hot!) and how far it is between possible stoping points.

I started the camino alone but on my first night met the nicest Kiwi ladies, Jenny and Natalie, and it turned out I ended up walking the whole way with them! They were my camino family from start to end and after hearing so many beautiful stories about their families I feel like I've known them for a long time! I met many great people and shared and listened to so many stories!!

The most asked question on the camino "So what is your reason for making the pilgrimage?", the most common answer " I seen the movie 'The Way'". But I heard many other answers from the death of a loved one, to fitness reasons.

Why did I do it? I felt like I needed to do it for me. For reflection I guess. I didn't access the Internet or social media or anything the whole time. It was important for me to just be present.

My favourite night was in a small town called Acebo. That night we sat outside and watched the most beautiful sunset. It was magical! I truly felt like I was exactly where I was suppose to be in life, right there, in that moment.

There was pain! With only 50kms to go an old injury resurfaced and I knew that 50 was going to feel like 500! And it did, my blistered feet and aching legs were well and truly ready to stop walking by the end.

Reaching Santiago took me 12 days, It had been around 30 days for Jen and Nat (They were machines, no injuries, and had been walking for almost 800kms) and the other Aussie Jade, travelling in our little group had been walking 45 days!!! A real trooper, she had also been doing the 800km walk but had been struck down by injury several times.

The hardest part of the walk was saying goodbye, especially to Jen and Nat. I did get a little teary, but tried not to let them see (because us Aussies are tough)!

To finish i went to Finisterre. In the old times they thought this was the end of the world. Being the end of world, the end of my camino, i was expecting something spectacular. While I thought Finisterre was beautiful, as i sat and watched the sunset, I couldn't help but think that the end was no more spectacular than any other day.

And my final thought on the camino.....

'I've learnt that I don't need to know where I'm going, it's ok to take one day at a time' - Pilgrim Katherine.

I seen this written on one off the walls along my pilgrimage and it has stuck with me. I like it. It pretty much resembles my approach to this extended break. No real plans, just take it as it comes. I'd hoped that maybe during this trip I'd have some kind of 'light bulb' moment on where to next in my career, but I haven't and I'm ok with that. It's fair to say my eyes are wide open because who knows what opportunities tomorrow will bring.

Buen camino

B

X

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Photos

Sunset at Acebo
My favourite moment on the whole trip

A message to my family
People leave messages to loved ones at the highest point.

Finisterre
The end of the world