We have travelled from Ssantiago to Madrid, then to Sevilla and Granada - all in quick succession. And now we are inn Barcelona having a 2 day break. We are feeling a little bit over the tourist-thing (sightseeing and standing in queues and battling crowds of people to see things or purchase something), but on the whole we are still getting on well together and navigating around pretty well.
Whenever things get a little tense, Rick acts the fool which keeps the kids spirits up.
We saw plenty of art in Madrid - loved the Prada! The modern art at Reina Sophia was a little too much for Mads and Gabe, but we did get them there which was an achievement in itself!
We enjoyed the Alcazar in Sevilla and attended a flamenco performance there also, which we loved.
Saw the Alhambra in Granada which was a long hot process. Perhaps because we were so tired we didn´t appreciate it as much as it deserved.
We are now experts at travelling on overnight trains. We were tucked into bed before the train left the station on the trip from Granada to Barcelona.
Emma - I saw your note in the St Peters newsletter. I hope all is going well for you and Sean and Paul. I think of you often. I really think we have a better form of Church in NZ than here in Europe - despite the history!
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Friday, July 3, 2009
We Are There!!
Today we are resting and enjoying the sights of Santiago!
It´s hard to beleive that we have actualy arrived - we keep meeting pilgrims in the street that we have shared a meal with, or walked with, or slept with! and they all look like us - a little surprised to be here!
The last three days of our walk went like this - Sarria to a little place in the middle of nowhere called Casanova, 30K, (great little albergue and meal), Casanova to Brea 36K!! (we couldn´t find an albergue and Rick was threatening us with sleeping in the bracken with the giant slugs!), Brea to Santiago, 23K (arrived around 2.30pm, hot and thrilled to get there).
So basically we booted it to make it by Wednesday as planned. Mads and Gabe were great and even on the day we walked 36K they didn´t complain and just kept plodding on. That day we walked from 7am to 6pm with breaks for meals and morning and afternoon tea! We were really relieved to find a pension over a bar on the main road at Brea and even better, it had a 10 bed dorm with only us in it! And it had sheets on the beds. All this luxury improved our spirits so much that we set off for Sanitago the next day in fine form. But after climbing the two big hills before Sanitago, we found that all our aches and strains had come back to bother us and we stumbled into Santiago mid-afternoon. We went straight to the Cathedral and visited James Relics and placed our hands on his statue behind the main altar as all pilgrims do. I liked the quiet little chapel with the relics which was under the main altar - uninhabitied apart from me and the relics for a full 3 minutes, so time to pray for everyone I have been carrying in my prayers while walking....
Then we went and got our compostellas - our certificates. Mads and Gabe seem very proud of theirs. Today we went to the pilgrim Mass and clearly heard pilgrims from Nouvella Zealand mentioned several times in the list of pilgrims that was read out (not sure which ones were us...) - so again we felt very proud.
For me the Mass, which was packed, was a mixture.
Disappointing, because as usual we miss the opportunity as a church to talk to people where they are. There were at least 200 pilgrims there and it seemed the perfect opportunity to celebrate and include everyone, by data-projecting the liturgy in all the different languages. I don´t know what the priest said in his homily, but if it was me I would have been challenging pilgrims to use their sense of achievement in whatever they went on to do - to serve, to live in harmony with others, to keep searching and listening for God. But i suspect none of that happened. It was a plain Mass, said fully in Spainish, with one nun leading the sung responses. But on the positive side, the Mass did give me a sense of timelessness. The sense that hundreds of pilgrims had been to this Cathedral in the same way as us and had celebrated this Mass over humdreds of years in this great Cathedral. That thought was pretty awe-inspiring...
So that is our Camino!
Thanks for all your prayers and support - we couldn´t have done it without you!
Now our travels continue - we are off to Madrid tonight on the overnight train. Today Madeleine and Gabriel are shopping - so life is pretty much back to normal!
We will continue to update from time to time to let you know what we are up to and where we are.
God bless and buen camino!
It´s hard to beleive that we have actualy arrived - we keep meeting pilgrims in the street that we have shared a meal with, or walked with, or slept with! and they all look like us - a little surprised to be here!
The last three days of our walk went like this - Sarria to a little place in the middle of nowhere called Casanova, 30K, (great little albergue and meal), Casanova to Brea 36K!! (we couldn´t find an albergue and Rick was threatening us with sleeping in the bracken with the giant slugs!), Brea to Santiago, 23K (arrived around 2.30pm, hot and thrilled to get there).
So basically we booted it to make it by Wednesday as planned. Mads and Gabe were great and even on the day we walked 36K they didn´t complain and just kept plodding on. That day we walked from 7am to 6pm with breaks for meals and morning and afternoon tea! We were really relieved to find a pension over a bar on the main road at Brea and even better, it had a 10 bed dorm with only us in it! And it had sheets on the beds. All this luxury improved our spirits so much that we set off for Sanitago the next day in fine form. But after climbing the two big hills before Sanitago, we found that all our aches and strains had come back to bother us and we stumbled into Santiago mid-afternoon. We went straight to the Cathedral and visited James Relics and placed our hands on his statue behind the main altar as all pilgrims do. I liked the quiet little chapel with the relics which was under the main altar - uninhabitied apart from me and the relics for a full 3 minutes, so time to pray for everyone I have been carrying in my prayers while walking....
Then we went and got our compostellas - our certificates. Mads and Gabe seem very proud of theirs. Today we went to the pilgrim Mass and clearly heard pilgrims from Nouvella Zealand mentioned several times in the list of pilgrims that was read out (not sure which ones were us...) - so again we felt very proud.
For me the Mass, which was packed, was a mixture.
Disappointing, because as usual we miss the opportunity as a church to talk to people where they are. There were at least 200 pilgrims there and it seemed the perfect opportunity to celebrate and include everyone, by data-projecting the liturgy in all the different languages. I don´t know what the priest said in his homily, but if it was me I would have been challenging pilgrims to use their sense of achievement in whatever they went on to do - to serve, to live in harmony with others, to keep searching and listening for God. But i suspect none of that happened. It was a plain Mass, said fully in Spainish, with one nun leading the sung responses. But on the positive side, the Mass did give me a sense of timelessness. The sense that hundreds of pilgrims had been to this Cathedral in the same way as us and had celebrated this Mass over humdreds of years in this great Cathedral. That thought was pretty awe-inspiring...
So that is our Camino!
Thanks for all your prayers and support - we couldn´t have done it without you!
Now our travels continue - we are off to Madrid tonight on the overnight train. Today Madeleine and Gabriel are shopping - so life is pretty much back to normal!
We will continue to update from time to time to let you know what we are up to and where we are.
God bless and buen camino!
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