May 1: On camino

A few days ago, I claimed that we had not (yet) met any pilgrims. This has changed.

We met Francoise on our second day, but they formed a “camino family” with a pair of American walkers and we didn’t have much interaction. We passed them on the trail from time to time. However, yesterday, we stopped into a garden café, about 12km from our destination. Francoise had arrived a few minutes before us. We sat and talked.

They are very informed about (and practice) meditation, as a secular practice for individual and communal well-being. They are inquisitive about those around them, and shared with us that the café owner had previously had a “very materialistic” life and had left it (and the ambitious husband) behind to live on the Way. Francoise has flawless English, which enabled the conversation. They have “many jobs”, including director of a performing arts centre on the peripherique in Paris. Their own artistic medium is primarily photography.

We also sat with Francoise at dinner and at breakfast in our hotel in Conques. They have returned to La Puy and thence to Paris. I thought about them, a lot these days. We have walked along many kilometres of country roads since they left. Francoise spoke eloquently about how much they enjoyed the off-road portions of the trail, where you are “really” in nature. While road walking, you can stretch out your arms without hitting a tree, bush or grass – and there is always the risk of traffic.

Carey and I are less attuned in some ways: we rather enjoy a bit of road walking. The pilgrim paths are often very marginal: the old camino would have been where the roads are now. It was a trade route, a busy thoroughfare. Today, pilgrims are sent up/down goat tracks, along streambeds and between fields. It’s fun, but inauthentic if one is trying to replicate the “original” experience. But then, who is? Bandits? No thank you. Hot showers? Yes please! We take a road when there is a road, a ravine when there is a ravine.

One thing you do get with a road is much better photographs of critters! When you see a bug on the trail, you have maybe 5 inches while it appears at one side and legs it across to the other. Photos are nigh-on impossible. On the road, the insects are (i) not necessarily startled by (or even aware of) you and (ii), you can chase them along trying to get them in focus. You will notice that most/all of my photos of insects are on manmade surfaces. This is why.

One thing I do want to share about these days is that we have been walking beside/between fields of barley. There is nothing like seeing the wind ruffle a hillside of barley. It is as if the land were an animal, responding to a stroking hand. It really makes an impression of scale and of the layers of living things spread out around you.