A Lot of Effort for a Walk

I left London on some shitty British Airways plane from the Gatwick airport that reeks of cologne and salted pretzels at 6:40 a.m. Bordeaux was warm and sunny and a great relief to the Washington-like weather that I found in London. I hopped a bus from the airport to the train station and fumbled through a few apologies and phrases I had looked up on the bus ride until I found a very kind women who spoke english. My train was cancelled. Ugh. Problem solving without a night of sleep under my belt is not my strong suit. I resisted the urge to take a terrible nap on a bench in the station and went to the nearby Albergue Juessen, checked in and took a terrible nap on the couch in the common room there instead.

Treating myself to cafe au lait and a decadent croissant seemed like the right move. On the walk to a cafe, I noticed something and I don`t know if this is true of France in general, but Bordeaux is a sexy place. I mean the people, they are really sexy. There are several universities there, so it makes sense that there would be a large popular of young attractive folks who dress to impress. But the people in Bordeaux apparently think differently about aging. Every single person looked more fashionable and confident than I would on a date. I felt woefully underdressed and exhausted by the time I got back to the hostel from falling in love every stranger I walked passed.

I took the previous day’s ticket to the train station and hoped the nation-wide rail workers strike would speak for itself and I would not have to explain why I had the wrong ticket. I don’t speak French. And that’s about all I can explain in French. I asked the only train conductor I could find who spoke some english where I was supposed to sit and he responded sternly, “No seat. You can get on the train. No seat.” I waited for everyone else to board and snuck into and empty seat and kept my head down. I was relieved in Bayonne to see a bunch of other people with trekking packs with shells dangling from the back. I followed the herd of them onto the bus for Saint Jean Pied de Port and again boarded a bus with the wrong ticket and was again relieved to not explain myself.

Saint Jean Pied de Port was what I imagined southern France would look like. Nestled in a lush valley, the features seemed too perfect. The small river that bisects the town under the old missionary building seemed too quaint. The streets too narrow and the cobblestones too askew. The air intuitively felt warmer than it should have been and the fields looked to green to be grass.

At six a.m. I realized the difference between a pilgrimage and a vacation. I could easily lounge in a town like Saint Jean Pied de Port for weeks; running the hilly country roads, drinking wine and walking through the picturesque mountains. My alarm went off at six though and gravity felt stronger than normal having slept only three of the last five nights, this was the moment on vacation where I would void whatever brilliant plans I had made for the day and throw my phone across the room and sleep until it was too warm to stay in bed. I washed my face and repacked my bag in the half dark and set off south by myself up a steep narrow road towards Orisson and eventually Roncevalles. I felt no ceremony in my first steps towards Santiago.

The air was sweet with spring bloom and manure and the occasional diesel from cars that abruptly passed by, sucking up the dark world in a wedge of high beams and spitting it back out in accentuated blackness. The mountains cloaked the sun and the immense backdrop of the crisp moon brightened long before the orange sphere of the sun crested the rounded ridges jutting up in the east. Up the steep hill the from the town the night mixed with the yellow sliver that was the temptation of day and from the vantage I could see how the slopes warped the fields and the sparse rows of trees and slanted fence posts outlined the crooked pastures with horses stooped head over barbed wire and sheep asleep against feed posts or under old carts used to haul hay now left for the weather.

I reached Orisson, 8 km up the road and about 800 m of elevation, by eight thirty. All the bus rides and flight itineraries and train schedules of the past few days stressed me out, compounded with the fact that I speak hardly any Spainish and even less French left me feeling entirely inadecquet. But here, walking uphill by myself in the morning darkness, passing other pilgrims with overloaded packs who had never walked 27 km in a day and certainly not 27 km up and over a mountain range with a pack on, I could feel confidence in my body. The cumulative disorientation of the previous six days of ocean and time zone hopping, sleepless nights, rapid changes in climate and language and culture, and the beginning of a Pilgrimage relaxed as the hills rapidly rose, my heart rate steadied and my feet and breath shortened to match the tilt of the mountain.

I walked by myself for the first 15 km. The narrow country road wound past farms near Saint Jean, and then ventured out into sage brush hills and crested the foothills of the Pyrenees and snaked atop the ridges headlong into the wind towards the peaks themselves. I ran into a German woman named Julia who I had sat next to on the bus into Saint Jean the night before and we ended up walking with two Italians, Simone and Sara. By the time we reached the highest point of the Camino in the Pyrenees the four of us had formed a makeshift group and my hands were too cold to zip my wind breaker and there was snow melting in the north facing ditches.

For many people, the walk from Saint Jean to Roncevalles is their first major trek over mountains and tests their spirit and dedication to pilgrimage. I was very tired by the time we descended into the valley, but I was relieved to finally rely on my body to travel and in an unexpected way, I felt at home in the massive albergue that evening.

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