Russ Eanes's Blog, page 4

MORE Camino Magic

[image error]Albergue Ave Fenix, the site of more magic

This story is adapted from my book The Walk of a Lifetime: 500 Miles on the Camino de Santiago.

The best experiences on the Camino aren’t orchestrated. They are the unexpected encounters with friends in cafés, the sandwiches, cookies and apples shared at a picnic bench, the cups of coffee discovered on sleepy mornings, the stranger with an amazing story to tell. By my fourth week walking the Camino Frances, I’d experienced enough of them that I should have seen one when it was coming.

It was still early morning when I overtook my friends Pam and Kathe as we approached the beautiful town of Villafranca del Bierzo. The Bierzo valley, about 40 kilometers wide, lies between two mountain ranges (Monte Irago is in the first) and pilgrims have to cross over both before entering Galicia, where Santiago de Compostela lies. The region has its own microclimate, excellent for growing fruit and grapes and I experienced its delights. Spring was at its peak as I passed through, with orchards of cherry in brilliant white blossom surrounding row after row of grapes. Villafranca is at the western end of the valley, at the confluence of the Rio Burba and the Rio Valcarce. The Camino Frances follows the Valcarce westward up to the O Cebreiro pass and into Galicia.

At the entrance to Villafranca lies the ancient Iglesia de Santiago, begun in 1186 A.D. In the Middle Ages, pilgrims who were too sick to go any farther could enter the church via the north portal, the Puerta de Perdón, and receive the same indulgences and forgiveness of their sins as they would if they had reached Santiago de Compostela. I’d read that there were intricate and well-preserved carvings above the Puerta and I lingered there for several minutes to take photographs of them, reminding myself that I was not, “in a hurry.” Pam and Kathe walked on while I paused longer to look at the carvings and find the best angles for pictures. Satisfied that I had taken plenty of good shots, I continued down a paved path that descended to the center of town, intent on catching up to them.

Going only a few meters, I was passing the Albergue Fenix when the driver of a compact station wagon stopped, rolled down his window and beckoned to me. He was apparently one of several porters who carry backpacks for pilgrims to their next lodging. He had loaded up and was about to pull out, when he put on his brake, shut off the engine and climbed out. He started talking to me rapidly in Spanish and I didn’t understand what he was saying, nor could I understand what he was motioning for me to do. Seeing that I didn’t understand, he gently took hold of my shoulders and spun me 90 degrees, guiding me toward the doorway of the albergue, where he insisted I pull off my pack. I was still baffled and slightly resistant as he pushed me towards the door of the dining area, tugging at my pack and poles at the same time. I was suspicious, confused and defensive, all at once. What was going on?

I reluctantly complied, dropped my pack, though I still couldn’t figure out why or where he was pushing me. He opened the door of the dining area, ushered me in, and there I figured out his intent: there had been too much food laid out for breakfast and much of it was left over. He told me in Spanish that I was to eat whatever I wanted: it was gratis or free. I surveyed the dining area and saw laid out a feast: eggs with various cheeses and roasted peppers, toast, jam, fruit, orange juice, coffee, pastries. A vision of a Heavenly Banquet was in front of me and he reiterated that it was all for free. The pilgrims had all gone and the left-over food would go to waste. My face broke into a wide grin and I nearly broke out laughing. “Gracias, gracias!” I said, nodding my head in comprehension. He smiled back, waved his hand again over the food, then returned to his car.

I wasn’t all that hungry, but knew that in an hour I would be, so I ate, taking my time, savoring each bite of the delicious food, until I sat back, stuffed. It was the best breakfast I’d had yet in Spain. Sitting alone in the dining room I mused once again at my good fortune, feeling foolish—embarrassed, actually— at my initial resistance. A passage from the Gospels slowly came alive: the parable of the Wedding Feast, where God is compared to a master preparing a great banquet, but those invited are too preoccupied with the busyness (and business) of their lives and decline the invitation. Disappointed, the Master instead invites the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame. There is still room so the Master orders his servants to search even wider, the roads and the country lanes, to “compel” more people to come. I saw myself as someone who was “compelled” to come in to the feast.

I can’t say that there was a single “most important” lesson that I learned along the Camino; there were far too many to list only one. Likewise, there was not a single incident that stood above the others. But if there was one incident that encapsulated what the Camino means, it was the one that day in Villafranca del Bierzo: Life is offering us a feast, if only we will lay down our suspicions and our fears and receive it. On pilgrimage, it is referred to as “receiving the Camino.” I was being offered a feast, I didn’t know it and I resisted receiving it.

How often in life do we resist a feast that is laid out for us? How often do we have plans and miss the feast? This meal was a metaphor for the entire Camino, for life. There is so much out there for us, but we are content to miss it. We have to be in control of things, we have to follow a schedule, have to hurry along to the next appointment, the next task, the next item on our mental to-do list. Meanwhile, there are feasts waiting for us. The best experiences I had on the Camino were when things didn’t go as I’d planned, but experiences which, if allowed, would become normal. They are gifts—moments of grace.

My youngest daughter asked me later that day in a message if I was learning anything new. I thought of my experience that day as I answered her. “I’m not sure if I’m learning anything new… just re-learning a lot of things I knew before… I’ll put it this way: you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, but you can teach an old dog his old tricks.” 

Book sales top 1,000

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Last September I published my own book, The Walk of a Lifetime: 500 Miles on the Camino de Santiago, and set the modest goal of selling 1,000 copies in my first year. I’m happy to say that I crossed that milestone early this month, after only ten months, and I’m celebrating.

Like many other authors, I was on a roll this winter. I had done three author appearances to over 400 people in February and sales were phenomenal. I loved talking to readers and signing copies of the book. More events were planned, or in the planning, for March and April and into May. I was doing what I loved, especially talking directly to readers.

Then Covid-19 hit, everything shut down, and book events vaporized. To make matters worse, book sales on Amazon, my biggest customer, screeched to a halt. (They were too busy shipping hand sanitizer and toilet paper.) Things looked dismal. I could no longer do the thing that I loved most.

But April came and with it, book sales suddenly went back up. While Amazon was still slow, I discovered that they had shifted most of the sales of my book to Ingram, the book wholesaler, and the picture brightened. (Amazon and Ingram both do Print-On-Demand, or POD, and when Amazon couldn’t keep up, it gave Ingram the sale.) For that reason alone, I was glad that I had set up my book through Ingram as well as Amazon.

In June I began to do some Facebook Live events and got some luck with a good story in the AARP online magazine and through it encountered an entirely new audience. While in the past 1,000 copies would have been lackluster, it’s not any longer. Self-publishing has created tens of thousands of new titles per year and readers are finding their attention distracted by social media and smartphones. Bookstores are hard to find, if they are even open. A good-selling book in the past would have needed to sell 10,000 copies; now it’s one-tenth of that.

And I’m doing all the promotion myself, without the aid of a publisher’s marketing department. All things considered, I’m happy with that benchmark. My goal is now to reach the next 1,000 in six more months.

I also got to that goal without any gimmicks, deep discounts or strong-armed promotions. I often say I have figuratively and literally hand-sold over half of those copies. It’s been a lot of work, but it’s also been immensely satisfying. And I should add that I’ve been pretty consistently in the top 1-2% of all books on Amazon. That’s been a much better perspective than looking at sales’ ranks or raw numbers. I have sold a lot of copies through my own website and that has enabled me to connect directly with readers.

I’m thankful to my many friends, classmates and relatives, who offered advice, input and encouragement, read drafts and wrote reviews and hauled copies of my book to Spain. More about how I used crowd-sourcing to write my book can be read here. Developing a wide and diverse community has been an advantage for me. And through my book my community has expanded.

My next book project, which was to be on a walk in Italy, the Via di Francesco, is now shelved, since I’m not traveling overseas for at least another year. So, in the meantime, I’m starting a formerly-back-burner project about a bike ride along the Great Allegheny Passage and the C&O towpath, from Pittsburgh to Wash. D.C. That’s 350 miles along a rails-to-trails and an old canal towpath. I hope to have that one out early next year.

I love writing and the fact that I could rediscover this passion at this point in my life. It’s never too late.

A Year of Downshifting

This piece was originally posted in January of 2019 on the now-defunct blog, The Rusty Walker

“So, what are you doing these days now that you are retired?” This is a question that I get asked regularly.

“It’s complicated,” is my first response, followed up by, “actually, I’m not retired. I’ve downshifted.”

In a car, you downshift to slow the vehicle without having to brake. The term came into use a decade or more ago to describe people who have deliberately decided to slow the pace of their life. Sometimes they are younger people who have worked crazy hours at some start-up, earned a fortune–but not a satisfying life–before the age of 40 and decided to sell it all for a tidy sum. Nice idea, but that’s not me, as much as I might wish.

If you search for the term online you might come up with this definition, “[to] change a financially rewarding but stressful career or lifestyle for a less pressured and less highly paid but more fulfilling one.” That’s closer to what I’m doing.

I decided some years ago that I did not want to retire in the typical fashion, which according to common wisdom seems to mean to pile up a lot of money and then stop working and play. I have no problem with people who want to do that, but I have a different plan.

I’ve also known quite a few people who worked hard for many years at jobs they did not enjoy, pinning a lot of hope and excitement on retirement, only to be faced with severe, unexpected health problems, even death, before they could do it. Their “pile” was left to someone else.

My children are mostly grown and the financial and time demands of raising a family have eased. I’m close to, but still a few years from the age where people can retire (AKA the age you can get Medicare.) I have some “margin” so to speak in life and so a year ago I left my job–which I enjoyed, but which was also very demanding– and decided to make this past year a sabbatical of sorts, a year of rest and a year to learn a new, slower pace of life. In slowing down, my wife and I also adjusted our family budget, living more simply so that our needs would be fewer. My personal mantra became, “I’m not in a hurry.”

In the past year I did a lot of travel–more than usual–and fulfilled some dreams. I visited coffee farms in Colombia, walked 500 miles across Spain, biked 1,000 miles across England. I caught up on some projects at home which had been waiting for a long time, like a new vegetable garden. I started reading the books I had been collecting for years. I began to write a book (and this blog.) I began to get rid of stuff. I learned how to slow down, to refuse to let “hurry” back into my life.

And lately I’ve pondered what to do next, especially how to earn a living and how to work for the next few decades.

In the course of my life I have met many people who worked at something they loved well into their 80’s. (Think of Supreme Court justices, like Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who is still serving at age 85.) Some had to adjust their pace and work fewer hours, but they never stopped doing the thing they love. I believe that if you work at the things in life which you love–which come from your deepest self and which help meet the world’s needs–why would you ever want to stop?

So, I hope to keep doing what I love and what meets the world’s needs, to exercise a  creative and entrepreneurial nature, to use my experience in the areas I’m passionate about: publishing, nature, peace and justice, the environment, all informed by my faith. I hope to tinker with new ideas, new dreams, new visions, to co-create with others a world for our children and grandchildren that is more sustainable and is less consumptive. I will continue walk, bike, travel, discover and write, at a slower speed of life. I’ve downshifted for good and I’m not in a hurry anymore.

Walking the Camino: the inner preparation

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From the first that I heard about walking the Camino de Santiago, (and the Camino Frances in particular) I understood it to be a unique spiritual experience and one I would actually dream about for 20 years.  This means that the inner preparation for the pilgrimage began decades before that cool and wet March morning in 2018 when I departed St. Jean Port-de-Pied, bound for Santiago, 500 miles and 35 days away.

I knew the walk would be physically challenging since I was planning to average 15 miles per day and was going to carry my 16-pound pack every step.

I knew it would be emotionally challenging; I was going solo, putting thousands of miles and an ocean between me and my large, close-knit family and community of friends at home. I would have to confront a “long loneliness.”

Those physical and emotional challenges would be melded into a larger spiritual challenge that would become one of the most profound of my life. 

Anyone who walks this pilgrimage is crossing a sacred landscape, the characteristic that separates it from other long hikes. The Camino has a peculiar “magnetic” draw on people, which makes the individual part of a unique community of pilgrims. Ironically, the majority state at the outset that they are neither spiritual nor religious.

I did a great deal of reading about the Camino, my favorite being the book The Way is Made by Walking, by my friend Arthur Boers, which he gave me in 2008. Arthur’s book, full of his rich spiritual experiences, had further clinched my own desire to walk it, but that hope and dream would have to wait another decade. During that time, I did other, shorter pilgrimages in Europe, to whet my appetite and satisfy a deeper, inner longing. I traveled in particular to holy places such as Glendalough, in Ireland, and Iona and Lindisfarne, in the UK, in 2015 and 2016. 

In 2017 I sensed that my current work was nearing an end. I was too young to retire, but felt it was time to “downshift,” to slow down the pace of my life and find an inner renewal. I made plans to leave my job in early 2018 and made plans to finally realize my long-held dream to do a pilgrimage to Santiago.

I made plane reservations for late March, set my date of departure and focused both my physical and inner preparation. As I read, prayed and meditated about my upcoming journey, I distilled my thoughts into a list of seven simple principles that I intended to follow as I walked:

1.  I will try to go about 25 kilometers (15 miles) a day.

2.  I will make no reservations for lodging. I will simply accept whatever accommodations are available when I reach a destination.

3.  I will not be in a hurry (and will remind myself of this continually).

4.  I will carry my pack the whole way. I will be forced to keep the contents light.

5.  I will walk the entire way—no taking taxis or buses between towns.

6.  I will make it a priority, since I am not in a hurry, to slow down and listen for the voice of God speaking around me or through those I meet. These are the “signs.”

7.  I will accept, within reason, whatever is offered me, as a gift from God.

These “rules” or principles were all essentially spiritual in nature.

For example, maintaining the pace of 15 miles per day, and insisting on walking only, became the inner discipline of perseverance. I would have to keep moving, avoiding the temptation to quit. Along the way I could pause all I wanted, but I would not stop until I came to my selected destination for any given day. This might mean walking in cold, snowy or uncomfortable weather (which in fact, I did), which might me to take a bus or taxi. The pace meant I needed to keep my focus on the final destination, which at first seemed impossibly distant. Keeping moving meant that I was a pilgrim and not a tourist. 

Not making reservations was a spiritual discipline of abandonment: I would have to accept whatever came my way. In retrospect, this meant that I was forced to stay in some rustic places that were not my first choice, like the municipal albergue in Zubiri, which was in an old school without much heat. It meant staying another time in a town which had no open restaurants and eating apples and yogurt for supper, instead of a nice, hearty pilgrim meal. Learning to “let go” is a hard thing for someone who always likes to be in control.

Not being in a hurry—which, to some, might seem to contradict my pace—would enable me to observe my surroundings and listen deeply to those I encountered. Coupled with the inner discipline of solitude, slowing down was perhaps the most important thing I learned on the Camino and led to some of my most profound encounters with others.

Leaving my plans open also meant being open to give: maybe to help with a physical need, or maybe the emotional need that someone else had for companionship, even just a companion to walk with in silence.

Keeping my pack light meant the spiritual discipline of simplicity, learning to live with less—a lot less in fact. It was a stark, and welcome, change from living in a house full of stuff.

The discipline of accepting whatever I was given was a discipline of humility; I would have to admit my own need, my own poverty, either physically, or of my own poor choices or planning.

As I look back on it, I am grateful for that inner preparation, which served me well, and yielded a rich experience that remains one of the most significant of my life and which still guides me on a daily basis.

Solitude and mind clarification: Walking the Meseta on the Camino de Santiago

Several pilgrims I met before Burgos told me they planned to skip the Meseta, the broad central Spanish plain. They had heard it was long, dull and monotonous. They were going to take the bus to Leon, cutting out, at very least, seven days of walking. 

I would not have skipped it for anything. The wide-open horizon, the long and lonely days, would allow me many hours of joyful solitude; the monotony would test my spirit. I was into my third week of pilgrimage when I hit this broad and wind-swept expanse.

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The Meseta can be bleak, even boring, and the first day all I saw were endless fields of sprouting wheat, piles of white and speckled limestone, occasional clumps of trees (often clumped around the rock piles) and scattered pilgrims along the ruddy, dirt road. The terrain was flat in all directions, but the vast sky as wondrous as the ocean. The road headed off straight to a vanishing point on the horizon. It was still early spring, so the fields were more brown than green and it was all set against a dull sky. I only heard the wailing wind and the cries of the birds. The lack of scenery and sensory stimulation was a profound change from the previous weeks, where the Camino Frances traversed hilly and even mountainous country, full of vineyards, olive orchards, forests and charming towns and cities. In the summertime the Meseta is known to be treeless, with little shade, the sun intense, the heat merciless. In winter and spring pilgrims brace themselves against the strong, cold winds. Many of the small towns are just a single street, with few places to stop. Some villages are hidden in canyons, reminding me of Texas: you don’t even know they are there in the flatlands ahead until you find yourself descending a steep cut in the road, when they suddenly emerge.

Eighty kilometers to the north, I could just make out the Cantabrian Mountains, a range that parallels the sea, linking the Pyrenees in the east to Galicia in the west. They were a constant as I crossed the Meseta. A few days past Leon some of them curve south and then I would cross them, but I still had nine days of walking this vast, flatland ahead of me.

* * *

Most days along the Camino, I started out alone. This was intentional. At various times during the day, I walked and talked and socialized with pilgrims or hospitaleros—sometimes at length, maybe even for an entire evening. But the start of the day was almost always in solitude. I am an introvert and have always enjoyed solitude, even in the midst of crowds, and the Camino afforded me all the solitude I might want. In fact, walking the Camino was the longest unbroken time of solitude that I experienced in my life. I love the early morning; in a large city I enjoy getting up and sitting out on the street/sidewalk before it becomes filled with people and traffic. At home (I live on the edge of the countryside) I head out onto my deck first thing, spring through autumn, to enjoy the spectacular vista of the Allegheny Mountains to the west. In winter I start by a fire in the living room. I need at least an hour by myself to enjoy a cup of coffee and let my thoughts awake to the day. It is a time to read, pray, journal and reflect. This assures that my day gets a good start. 

Some mistakenly think that being an introvert means I don’t like being around people. It’s not true—what it means is that as an introvert I gain energy from being alone. Now I had lots of alone: hour after hour of alone, week after week of alone, alone with my thoughts, alone with the quiet, alone with the scenery, alone with God. I thrived in it, I reveled in it, I bathed myself in it. It became one of the most significant aspects of my pilgrimage.

The previous decades raising my family had been fulfilling, but in recent years the long hours of stressful work had depleted me. Now, walking in solitude, I was replenishing my inner life. Writer and Benedictine Joan Chittister wrote,

Solitude is chosen. It is the act of being alone in order to be with ourselves. We seek solitude for the sake of the soul. Even with easy access to other people we take time to be by ourselves, to close out the rest of the world, to concentrate on the inside of us rather than wrestle with everything going on around us… solitude opens us to the wonders of the world without noise, a world without clutter, a world purged of the social whirl, at least for a while. At least long enough to immerse ourselves in the balm of simply being… In solitude we wait for all the noise to quiet in order to find out what we are really thinking about, what we are really saying to ourselves underneath all the layers of other people’s messages that threatened to smother the words of our own heart.

Joan Chittister, The Gift of Years

The Camino was foremost a spiritual experience for me. I am by nature a contemplative, and during the journey, my mind and spirit relaxed and my thoughts clarified. On the wide-open Meseta, with more time alone than ever, with my head bundled up inside my hood against the stiff wind, all the thoughts, memories, dreams and ideas, all that I had mentally bundled up over a lifetime—even any gripes and grievances—were loosened and revealed themselves. To my surprise, the negative stuff dispelled itself pretty quickly; in fact, it vaporized. I was so entranced by beauty, by simplicity, by the blowing of the wind across the wide-open sky, by the movement of the clouds, by the path in front of and behind me, by the wonder of what might happen next, or who I might meet next, by having all the time in the world, that any painful thoughts from the past seemed hardly worth the time to ponder. They were puny in comparison to the beautiful grandeur of my experience.

My own need for solitude goes beyond my needs as an introvert. Modern, Western lives are noisy and the noise of my youth—radio, TV, newspaper and magazines—has been superseded by 21st century digital devices and the Internet, which allow us instant 24/7 contact with the world, an unbounded stream of limitless data. My inner life cried out for solitude as an antidote to digital overload. Antxon González Gabarain described the solitude of the Camino this way: 

It’s a place where there is no room for the usual bombardment of boredom, superficiality, consumerism and violence. A place where I can hold the silence in my hands, and hear the melodies of air, stone, earth and grass. A place where I can dwell for hours and days with that part of me that is neither body nor mind, gloating over the privilege of having all this quiet to myself, all the time in the world, and pushing. I push, and push and keep pushing. I throw off all the ballast, I purge the demons and charge myself with spiritual energy.

Antxon Gonzalez Gabarain, The Great Westward Walk

As thoughts surfaced, I turned over the most fruitful ideas in my head, polished and preserved them. I felt a deep love and appreciation for the world well up inside, for life itself, for God who gives us all life, alongside a deep grief for injustice and ugliness, the over-consumption of the Creation. I felt connected to the past, to the present, to the world, to the ground I walked over, to my family and friends (even though I missed them), to my fellow pilgrims, but most of all to God. 

As soon as I had an open stretch to walk, I took time to pray, beginning with my new personal reminder: “It’s a great day to be alive.” I had all the time I might ever need to pray, and it sustained and filled me. With hours of walking ahead, I engaged in a quiet, unhurried, listening attitude, contemplative prayer that was more of the heart than the head. I felt no hurry to get through it—I had all day. 

Walking in solitude also clarified my mind—new thoughts and old dreams emerged—and that’s where I found God speaking to me the most. Dots connected. I felt like some pattern inside was being repaired, and I didn’t even know it was broken. As Chittister says, “It is here in the well of the self that our unfinished self, our real self, lies waiting for attention.”

As my mind became clearer, I started writing; at first it was just letters and postcards, but it expanded into written postings on social media for friends.Cam It was as if there was an abundance of creativity waiting for its opportunity to surface. The threads of wonder that I discovered along the ancient road—whether a wonder of nature, or of the culture or of history—were woven into a rich tapestry. Each day was, “a great day to be alive.” Life became richer and I felt an irresistible urge to express this through my lifelong dream to write. 

The result of my urge to write was a book about my experience, The Walk of a Lifetime. This is excerpted from a chapter on Solitude. More about the book and a free download of the first chapter here. I also offer a signed copy of the book, shipped for free.

Feet, Shoes and Mud

Take long walks in stormy weather or through deep snows in the fields and woods, if you would keep your spirits up. Deal with brute nature. Be cold and hungry and weary.

Henry David Thoreau–On the Duty of Civil Disobedience

My hiking shoes finally gave out on the snowy final trek into Burgos, my 12th day of walking. 

Issues with my shoes had been building from the very start. My first walking buddy, Raymond, had alerted me to a problem as we trudged into Pamplona on the third day. Walking behind me, he noticed that the outer heels of both shoes were wearing off, meaning that my feet were tipping outward with each step. I looked them over when we arrived in the city and noted that not only were they worn to the outside, parts of the sole were starting to peel off. These shoes, not that old by my reckoning, were comfortable and familiar trekking companions. We had done some great hikes together, from the Swiss Alps to the Scottish Isles, from the coast of Ireland, to the Appalachian Trail near my home, from coastal walks in Maine to coastal walks in California. Walking around Pamplona, I looked at shoes in some sporting goods stores and reluctantly began to think about replacing them. Passing through Santo Domingo a few days after that, I even stopped to try some on, but found nothing quite to my liking. I would look more when I arrived in Burgos, where I had planned a rest day.

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Squishing through a lot of mud was my reality for the first two weeks of the Camino. A very wet, snowy and cold winter in northern Spain, combined with thousands of pilgrim’s feet, made for a messy, muddy churn along the dirt paths. The weather had turned cold and wet ever since leaving Grañon, with intermittent rain and fog. The climb over the Montes de Oca was the worst: nothing but mud, kilometer after kilometer. Nine hundred years ago, the area had been rife with bandits, terrifying medieval peregrinos until San Juan de Ortega2 had cut this new, safer road through the thick stands of oak and pine in the 13th century. There were no bandits about as I crossed over; the only thing concerning me was slipping in the endless mud.

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I passed through the town of Ages and stopped overnight in Atapuerca, a small village about 20 kilometers from Burgos. Atapuerca is famous—the earliest human remains on earth have been found in caves nearby—but I was tired the afternoon I arrived and it was Sunday. Even if the museum had been open I would not have wanted to walk to it that day. All afternoon there were occasional breaks in the weather, patches of blue sky alternating with brief rain showers, but the weather forecast for the next day was for continued precipitation—and cold. It might snow.

I registered at the new and very clean albergue El Peregrino. I shared a room with some pilgrims that I met for the first time, including Fred, a seasoned Camino walker, aged 72, one of my Camino mentors. He was walking the Camino Frances for the fifth year in a row and he could walk far and fast. He had some principles, as I did, and one of them was that he never had a cup of coffee until he had walked at least five kilometers; another was that he always walked in shorts. He reasoned that bare legs dry more easily than a pair of pants. Even so, I wondered how he would fare the next day in the cold rain and snow.

Monday morning I began my pre-dawn walk into Burgos in a drizzly, dreary fog. The temperature hovered around freezing and the Way climbed upward into a broad ridge called the Matagrande Plain, part of the limestone Atapuerca Massif. The drizzle turned to rain and then to snow as I gained elevation; the dirt road wore down to rough rock, which with the precipitation, became slippery. The weather would hover between cold rain and snow for the next 36 hours.

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It took a great deal of concentration to keep on the track, which meandered between white, fenced pastureland and woods. Fred, who had left an hour before me, told me later that he had gotten lost that morning, taking a side trail that abruptly ended in the thick forest. My guidebook had told me that there was an overlook where I could appreciate “great views of the city of Burgos” just ahead, but with the fog/snow mix there was no view of anything that day, nor was it even on my mind. All I could do was concentrate on keeping my footing on the wet, rocky path (my poles came in handy again) and keeping my eye on the trail, my focus solely on getting down the other side of the ridge safely and finding a place to warm up. I was thankful that before too long the trail descended and hit a blacktop road, the snow turning back to rain. My pants and shoes were now soaked. 

I didn’t appreciate it at the time, but with that descent I had arrived on the far-eastern edge of the Meseta, the broad Spanish Plain that I would be crossing for the next ten or more days.

After two more kilometers, or 25 minutes of walking, I came upon my first stop in the village of Cardenuela Riopico. I stepped into the first café, already crowded with other pilgrims trying to warm up and dry out. Glancing around as I shed my pack and propped my poles in a corner, I saw lots of familiar faces.

Eyeing an empty spot at a table, I peeled off my raincoat, which was drenched on the outside from rain and on the inside from sweat. Next came my damp fleece. I squeezed my way alongside a long table, draping my layers over a vacant plastic chair. My spot secured, I headed back to the queue at the bar, ordered a café con leche, some orange juice, a slice of Spanish tortilla and a sugary pastry. I grabbed a banana off the counter and added it to my bill.

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After paying, I turned back to the table and I realized that I was not going to dry off much, nor warm up much. With the door constantly swinging open from the stream of pilgrims entering and exiting, the floors and tables puddled from the wet and dripping crowd, it became apparent that the best I could hope for was a simple rest and some food. Warming up and drying out was going to have to wait for Burgos, still another nine kilometers away. Looking down at my shoes, I did not like what I saw: they were soaked, as were my feet. I had been pretty sure before I had left for the Camino that my shoes were not waterproof and now I was convinced of it. Fumbling through my pack, I found a pair of dry socks and gloves and pulled them on. I finished my food and even though my fleece and raincoat were still damp, I put them on as well, swung my pack onto my back, grabbed my poles and headed out into the gray damp air. 

For the next three hours, I walked completely on auto-pilot: one foot in front of the other, not thinking of much more than my next landmark. I reached the airport on the outskirts of the city after an hour of walking, and by then the rain had turned into snow: quarter-sized, wet flakes coming down so thick they limited visibility beyond a few hundred meters. I had to admit that I was not enjoying myself. At this point, my pilgrimage was simple endurance; it was the first time on the Camino that I felt this way.

The airport in Burgos is where the Way forks; a slightly shorter option goes through industrial areas, while a scenic route runs along the river. I met up with other familiar pilgrims, Iago from Brazil and Donald from Dublin and together we chose the “scenic route” though with the heavy snow we really couldn’t see anything. After another half hour we found ourselves in the suburbs and stopped for a hot café con leche. Briefly warming, but wanting to push on to our destination, we headed out through more mud, the River Arlanzon now on our right. By this point I was soaked inside (from the sweat) and out. The hood of my raincoat drooped over my eyes, keeping me from seeing anything more than the path directly ahead. Yet another chilled and wet 45 minutes squished by and we finally found pavement and the bridge into the center of the city, where my hotel awaited.

The night before, seeing snow forecast for the coming days, several of us around the dinner table decided to book hotel rooms in Burgos. Already planning a rest day, I jumped at it; and when I arrived shortly after noon at the Hotel Norte y Londres, I was even more glad. A friendly desk clerk, seeing my cold and wet condition, booked me early into a room on the second floor. I climbed the stairs and headed down the hallway to my room, my frozen hands fumbling to turn the key in the lock. I entered and within seconds dropped my pack and poles, peeled off my wet raincoat and fleece, removed my other layers and sank into a steaming bath. I felt instant relief, drawing the heat into my frozen bones, and dozed off in the tub for an hour. Finally warmed, I emerged from the bath and put on dry clothes, washed out my muddy pants and draped the rest of my wet things over the radiator. I wrapped myself up in blankets and dropped onto the bed for a long nap.

When I awakened in mid-afternoon, I took stock of my gear. My old shoes would dry out, but they were pretty well shot. I decided that my mission for the rest of the afternoon was to buy a new pair of shoes, preferably waterproof. A pilgrim told me earlier that day about an enormous sporting goods store, Decathlon, a few kilometers from the center of town. I headed downstairs where the same helpful desk clerk showed me where to catch a free bus that could take me there. On the street I came across my friends from California, Paul and Lauri and another friend, Patrick, from England, and the four of us headed out there together.3 I tried on several pairs of hiking shoes, finally settling on a pair of waterproof Columbias. I also picked up a pair of rain pants, just in case.4 

Returning to the center of town, the four of us met another friend, William, from Scotland and we headed out for supper and a farewell, since Patrick was heading home and William, Paul and Lauri were continuing the next morning. I would stay in touch with those three for the rest of our journey, though I never caught up to them.

I felt out of place sleeping alone in my hotel room that night, but I needed a restful night to be able to sleep as long as I wanted to. When I awoke, it felt uncharacteristic not to head out for another day walking, even though I appreciated the rest. I spent several hours in a warm, dry café, sipping espresso, eating pastries and fruit, writing postcards, letters and emails and updating my journal. I found the post office as I was walking the city, mailed the postcards and my letter to Jane (nearly two weeks in the writing) and bought more postage stamps. I toured the gorgeous and enormous cathedral, but was slightly overwhelmed by the number of golden chapels. 

The snow continued until the afternoon, though strangely, it never stuck. I took more naps. I tested my new shoes and they felt good; best of all they were dry. In the evening I joined a group of pilgrims in a restaurant for some tapas. Itching to get going and a bit apprehensive of the long walk the next day, I went to bed early.

I knew that breaking in the new shoes would be tricky; I would alternate new and old shoes over the next three days, finally parting with my old amigos at the parochial albergue in Carrion de Los Condes. They had served me well, but when it came time to leave them, they looked forlorn on the shoe rack; I felt awkward abandoning them there, but I left them with a prayer that someone else might find them useful.

This is taken from chapter 8 of my book, The Walk of a Lifetime. A signed copy is available for direct purchase here.

Camino Magic

I was in a funk: not enough sleep and not enough caffeine. I had left Puenta La Reina that morning just before sunup on my fifth day of walking, a full moon hanging in the sky directly ahead of me as I crossed the bridge out of town. Now it was mid-morning and I was passing through hilly country, with olive orchards, their leaves a dull green, and grape vineyards, their vines just starting to sprout. For half an hour, I’d been watching the beautiful and historic hill-top town of Cirauqui get closer, sure that when I got there I would find my badly needed and much beloved second cup of coffee. Maybe I would also get my second breakfast.

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The sky overhead turned overcast and my mood matched it. Finally, when I reached the gates, I wound my way upward into the charming town, under pointed stone archways and through the old city walls, my expectations rising. But then for some inexplicable reason—I would unfortunately encounter this again and again in Spain—the village was more or less closed. Ten a.m.—nothing open; no café, just a tiny tienda, a shop with a few bananas and coffee machine.1 Disappointed not to find a place serving “real” coffee, I continued to climb and arrived at the town square, where I was distracted by the fantastic architecture, especially the 13th-century church, Iglesias de San Roman, with its ornate Mudéjar portal. I lingered, taking photos, momentarily setting down my pack. This town was the Camino at its finest…but, no café. Taking one last look, I re-shouldered my pack and plodded out of town, walking on the actual Roman Calzada, the road with its bridges built by the Romans nearly 2,000 years ago. I stopped to take a photograph of my shoe on the smooth, ancient stone pavement and thought of them with a certain reverence: stones that were laid nearly 2,000 years ago were under my feet. I stowed my camera and looked at my guide book and noted that the next village was more than five kilometers away, at least an hour’s walk. No second breakfast, no cup of coffee—at least not for another hour. Things were not going as I’d planned. I sighed and tightened the straps on my pack, hoisting it a bit higher on my back. Fortunately, it did not look like rain that day.

Twenty minutes later, cresting a hill, I was met by the unexpected: a funky sort of place, right on the path, pretty much in the middle of nowhere, with a “New Age” feel. There was a gate on the path and next to it a bell with a pull-cord and sign that said, “Ring for Good Vibrations.” I pulled the cord and the bell rang. I swung the gate and stepped through, following the road that ran below a low wall, an olive orchard above. My eyes were fixed ahead on a snack stand, something that I would encounter many more times along the Camino. A large sign said La Volutad or “free-will offering.” Incense was burning and soft music was playing. The owner was busily laying out fruit and pastries and homemade souvenirs. But the first thing I saw was the thermos marked “coffee” and I headed straight for it.

Only pausing to pick up a banana, I poured myself a cup of hot coffee—it turned out to be wonderfully strong—and added milk. I climbed a few steps up to the olive grove and, finding a bench to sit on, pulled off my pack and gladly set down my poles. Lifting the cup and enjoying the double aromas of coffee and incense, I took in the scene around me. There were gently swaying scallop shells hanging from the olive trees, tinkling in the breeze; scattered around were potted plants, easy chairs, tables and wooden cabinets containing books, clothing, even walking gear—anything a pilgrim might need—all for free and all completely out in the open. I wasn’t interested in picking anything up myself; the coffee and fruit were more than enough. I sipped the coffee slowly, breathed deeply and laughed at my good fortune, and over my previous frustration and bad mood. It was a wonderful moment and I savored it. A few other pilgrims appeared and stopped at the stand; some also sat down. The longer I stayed, the more my spirit and mind calmed and a sense of wonder returned. After 15 minutes, I got up and stopped once more at the snack table, this time dropping €5 into the donation box and picking out a necklace with an image of a scallop shell burned onto a wooden disk. It would be a gift for Jane. Hoisting my pack and grabbing my poles, I continued along the ancient road, feeling refortified. It wasn’t just the caffeine that lifted my mood, but the utter unpredictability of it all. 

I now understood the oft-used term “Camino Magic” which describe this: the unexpected, the unplanned, the event that transpired just when my plans dissolved. It was the thing I found, but didn’t even know that I needed or that it even existed. It was the person—or persons—that I had not seen in days or weeks, but who suddenly appeared in the entryway as I sat in a café. It was the open door that I came upon when I thought all were shut. It was someone I hadn’t yet met, but who would become a friend. It was turning a bend and coming upon another pilgrim, sitting on a bench, who gave me a sandwich or a bite of chocolate when I was hungry, or who offered conversation when I was lonely. It was the hospitalero who would tell me just the right word of encouragement, or who laughed and insisted on carrying my pack to my bunk when I didn’t think I could walk another step. It became the essence of the Camino. Before I set out on this journey I knew intuitively that this was the kind of thing I would be looking for, but didn’t know what to call it. And now I had named it.

As a busy modern American, my life has been tightly scheduled, controlled and well-planned. I don’t like having things go the way that I don’t want them to. I don’t like traffic jams, or red lights, or inconvenient signs on stores and restaurants that say “closed.” I don’t like picking the slow line at the check-out register. If I leave the house, I have a “to-do,” or shopping list, errands carefully plotted. I check my watch often, leaving nothing to chance. I have weather apps, traffic apps, shopping apps, and map apps. I want to know where I am, where I’m going, how long it will take me to get there and anything I might encounter along the way. This is modern efficiency and control at its peak; it is very stressful and I don’t like it.

Sitting on that bench and sipping my coffee, I began to learn to let go. I began to see that I could live fully in each moment, could surrender my tight plans, my stressful efficiency. It would take me some weeks, but gradually I learned to look for, to anticipate the “magic” that would unfold, if only I would open myself and be ready for it.

This is adapted from chapter 6 of my book, The Walk of a Lifetime, which can be purchased here.

¡Solidaridad! (Solidarity)

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I took my youngest grandson Greg, 22 months-old, on a walk through town yesterday. I normally babysit him every other Tuesday while my daughter-in-law teaches English to immigrants. She was home because her school was closed, but I came over anyway and gave her a break while he and I went out. I don’t like to miss that time with him.

What we saw was a normally energetic downtown slowing to a halt. Shops had limited their hours or were closing outright. Few people were out on the sidewalks. Perhaps saddest of all was the notice that our beautiful and cheery public library was closed. Children and adults now forced to stay home have one less option.

On the other hand, the construction workers were still out in full-force, pouring cement, breaking up old gutters and curbs with heavy machinery, painting new businesses (hopefully) opening soon. It was a sign of hope amid a gathering gloom. He is familiar to most of these folks—they greet him with a smile, a wave and a thumbs-up as he watches them with intense interest.

Our communities, our nation, the whole world, is changing fundamentally, and it’s changing alarmingly fast. We don’t know when normalcy will return, or even what a new “normal” will look like. Some small, local businesses may be gone for good. My biggest loss right now is the silence in our vibrant public spaces, the libraries, museums, gyms and theaters. I fear that some of my favorite stores, restaurants, coffee shops and breweries may not reopen.

We are mourning the loss of some things that we can’t recover: the senior year of high school or college that ended abruptly. My youngest son was completing his final semester at the University of Richmond and he cannot go back to campus. The loss is huge for him. A research trip to the Galapagos Islands was cancelled, as were some conferences where he planned to present a paper on his research. He had to say an abrupt farewell to his college community.

My own personal and work plans are now on hold. My next book is on St. Francis, and I had hoped to research and complete it with a two-week walk in Italy. Now I don’t know when I will be able to go there. I also freelance as an editor and publishing consultant; I have no idea what to expect with that work in the near future.

In spite of these losses and uncertainty, I think more importantly about how we will remember this time and how others will remember our response to it. Will our memory be a sense of fear that drove us to panic, to rush to the store and hoard toilet paper? Or will our memory be courage in the face of fear, courage that drove us to generosity, to solidarity?

I’m encouraged these days as I see a lot more of the latter.

My oldest daughter in Brooklyn is a public high school English teacher and her school is closed until the end of April, at least. She is figuring out how to teach her hundreds of students from a distance. At the same time, she is thinking of her neighbors in her large apartment building, many of whom have children stuck at home all day. She has offered to take them on every day for “recess” and the parents have jumped at the opportunity, even offering to pay her. But she has declined the money, telling them that she is still employed, still drawing her paycheck. She does it because she loves children.

I am encouraged by friends in Europe who show me the response in Italy and Spain, to the solidarity they are exhibiting, a “we’re in this together” spirit. A friend in Spain shared this:

Local people know that they have to stay indoors for at least two weeks. If they walk their dog they do not approach another person, you wait outside the pharmacy until you are called in one at a time, there are queues outside of shops not because of the amount of customers but because everyone maintains at least 1 metre apart. 

“Solidaridad” is the order of the day. This is not just the singing from balconies and applause for health workers, solidarity is being made real in very practical ways. In my own barrio here in Santiago the corner shop has ramped up the “pay it forward for an elderly person” which we set up. The young people in the district have put up posters offering to go shopping for those who can’t go themselves. Queues part at shops to let an older person go first. 

A deep sense of community is emerging in surprising ways. It is a bright ray or hope as these days get darker for everyone.

(Johnniewalker Santiago on Facebook)

In our local community, teachers have signed up to work with the food services from the Harrisonburg City Schools to provide free lunches to students who are now at home for two weeks. Local groups have been formed on Facebook to share needs and offers of help. The list could go on. 

My wife and I are frequently checking- in on my wife’s aging parents who live nearby – either in person or through daily phone calls. We are offering to take in an “orphaned” college student who couldn’t go home when the university campus closed. We are thinking about how we can support others who may be unable to leave home, due to self-isolation. We are even thinking about how we can spend/give away the money that the government may give us to help businesses or individuals in the local area who are hurting the most right now. And we are learning about other creative ways of standing together as we observe the caring actions of friends around us.

We may have to isolate, but that does not mean we are not in solidarity. We are in this together and we can come out stronger and better. Our public spaces will be filled again someday with energy and a renewed appreciation for our larger community. I hope that we all remember this time, not for its fear and uncertainty, but for marshaling our efforts together, and bringing out our best.

Solidaridad!

How I packed for 500 miles–and what I learned along the Way

On the Camino de Santiago—or any other long-distance trek—bragging rights belong to the person who has the least.

I understood this in principle before I left for my six-week, 500-mile pilgrimage on the Camino Frances in the spring of 2018; but after my very first day—24 kilometers (about 15 miles) climbing over the Pyrenees—I understood it from experience.

Some of the earliest and best books on walking the Camino, such as Elyn Alva’s Following the Milky Way, or Kevin Codd’s To the Field of Stars chronicle theirs and others’ tedious struggles with heavy packs and the injury and pain they suffered. Alva walked to Santiago in 1982, not prepared at all for the weight of her pack and the distance she would have to walk with it. She continually recounts—in painful repetition—a plague of aches, pains and injuries that came largely from an overloaded pack.

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Books have been written about what to carry on the Camino; I had two of these on my bookshelf at home, one of which is called, To Walk Far, Carry Less, (by Jean-Christie Ashmore) the title of which sums it all up. The message? Go with less, less, less.

Carrying too much weight—and the ailments that go with it—is entirely unnecessary. For a modest investment, any modern pilgrim can outfit her or himself with adequate amounts of lightweight gear, and combined with the abundance of guidance about what to carry in books and online forums, there is no need to carry more than ten percent of body weight. Even so, during my six-week walk, I was repeatedly surprised to encounter people with overloaded packs, and their dilemma of what to get rid of.

My own pack when full—minus water—weighed just over seven kilos (16 pounds), just over ten percent of my body weight. Knowing the temptation to pack too much, I deliberately chose a smaller pack—its volume was 38 liters—an “ultralight,” weighing just under a kilo empty. This forced me to keep the contents of my pack light, since I was going to carry it the whole way.         Two weeks before I left I did a “dry-run” packing of my gear, weighing each object down to the gram, recording it on a spreadsheet as I stowed it inside my bag. I had thought I had the bare minimum, but when I totaled it I was shocked: 10 kilos or 22 pounds. I put the pack on and thought about what it would feel like after four or five hours of walking. Clearly, I was going to have to trim down. 

I pulled everything out and sorted it again. Gone went the extra shirt and sweater, extra underclothes, my winter cap, and my heavy rain jacket. I reluctantly swapped my Chaco sandals for my Birkenstocks, saving half a kilo. I sorted through and eliminated smaller items, such as spare charging cables and batteries, handkerchiefs, and a sizeable writing journal. Satisfied that I had reduced things as much as I could, I deleted them from the spreadsheet and looked afresh at the total: seven kilos (16 pounds.) I had reached my target weight! And I knew that if I still needed something, I could purchase it in Spain.

As I trained and gradually increased my walking distance in the weeks leading up to my departure, I also found another thing happening: I was dropping the weight of my “engine,” losing eight pounds.5 While in Spain, I lost another seven. My experience is that the weight of the pack has a far greater effect on the feet, knees and hips, than it does on the back. Many of the foot problems people develop (including blisters) are exacerbated by issues of weight. Considering that I walked approximately 1.25 million steps, I was glad my pack was as light as it was. 

I had been inspired months before I left by an “ultralight” backpacker, named Clint Bunting, aka “Lint,” who is known to take as little as eight pounds on long-distance trips. He says, (to paraphrase him), “People pack their fears. Whatever they’re scared of, is what they overpack for. If they’re scared of being cold, they pack a lot of extra layers…If they’re scared of bugs, they pack bug spray…If they’re afraid of being hungry, they pack more food…” In essence, it’s our fears that weigh us down, not just on the Camino, but in all of life. Free from fear, all of our loads, whether physical, emotional, mental or spiritual, lighten themselves. Along the Way, I learned that I could borrow from fellow pilgrims and that I could lend and give just as freely. So many of the fears we have in life are more in our mind than in reality.

The free sharing is part the bond of community that the pilgrimage creates. I recall at least three times I found myself, mid-afternoon, taking a break and feeling very hungry. In each case, there weren’t cafés or shops open in villages I had passed through, or maybe I’d just misjudged when and where I would be able to stop and buy something. In each case, I came across pilgrim companions who were more than happy to share with me whatever it was they had. It was this act of receiving that struck me more than anything else: I find it harder to receive than to give, because being “needy” affects my ego. I also found this free give-and-take made it easy for me to share something I might consider precious (hard-to-find) and to not worry. This is a principle of life and something that I need a daily reminder about.

It is now nearly two years since I walked the Camino Frances, but the lessons I learned about packing light inform how I live at home. Currently in a process of de-cluttering our house, I ask myself questions that I learned from packing light:

•   When was the last time I used this?

•   Will I ever need it?

•   Is this something I can do without?

Also, if I want to buy something for myself, I put the item on a list, with the price. Most things sit on that list a long time. I recall again the people I met in Spain who struggled with getting rid of things; I recall the ease of packing everything I owned in a 16-pound pack and heading off in the early morning, free of any great concern. 

That’s the way I still want to live.

This is adapted from the chapter “We Pack Our Fears” in my book, The Walk of a Lifetime.

Last week’s post went more into detail about some of the items I packed and also had a downloadable pdf of my list.

Camino Packing List

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Wondering what to carry for a Camino? At the bottom of this post is a list of what I packed for my 500-mile trek on the Camino Frances. It was originally in a spreadsheet; I’ve used them for decades in my work, so it came naturally to weigh each item I was intending to carry (in grams) and enter it on a spreadsheet. That way I could quickly see how close I was to my target weight and know how much it would change when I added or subtracted an item.

While my list is fairly detailed, here are a few more points about what I carried:

I started walking in very early spring–March 29–so I had to bring along warmer clothing.The books I took along were The Pilgrimage Road to Santiago: The Complete Cultural Handbook, itself a hefty tome, and The Village to Village Guide to the Camino FrancesMy electronics bag included charging cables (and spares) for an iPhone and Sony camera, extra camera batteries, a Jockey 6000mAh power charger and a wall converter for European wall outletsSince I am a writer, I brought along paper and pens for letters, plus a small journalI carried a lightweight pair of hiking shorts for wearing when I laundered my hiking pants, which were themselves a pair of zip-off or “convertible” pants.Everything was organized in my backpack into one of five stuff-sacksI bought a wide-brimmed hat along the way, and a winter jacket. They’re not on my original list and weighed an additional 700 gramsI had a pair of warmer fleece gloves and another pair of “touch-screen” lightweight gloves. Both came in handy when walking with my poles in the cold/cool mornings.I didn’t weigh my hiking poles, since I didn’t pack them. They are Hikelites from LL Bean and I highly recommend them.



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In the end, what I carried was around 16 pounds, or 10% of my bodyweight. The list has everything in detail, which included what I was wearing (or carrying around my neck, such as a camera) so the total at the bottom appears to greater than 16 pounds. I picked up some more things along the way, such as the winter jacket and broad-brimmed hat, so in the end my pack was heavier than when I started. But then I lost 7 pounds while walking, which more than made up for the additional items!

I have an entire chapter in my book, The Walk of a Lifetime, about carrying my backpack, which includes more about how I decided what to bring or not to bring.

Here is a downloadable pdf of my packing list

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