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On the Camino: One Day at a Time, one Photo at a Time 8.0

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Carrion dos Condes, on the CF
Real Monasterio Santa Clara
hospederia

photo taken November 14, 2012




This view of adjacent monastery tiled roofs aglow in the autumn sunshine was shot through the window of my cell-like room in the Santa Clara hospederia.
 
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“Caminante, son tus huellas
el camino y nada más;
Caminante, no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar.
Al andar se hace el camino,
y al volver la vista atrás
se ve la senda que nunca
se ha de volver a pisar.
Caminante, no hay camino
sino estelas en la mar.”
Wayfarer, with your footprints
The way and nothing more;
Wayfarer, there is no way,
The way is made by walking,
Walking makes the way,
And turning round to look behind you,
You will see the path
You will never walk again.
Wayfarer, there is no way
Only passing wakes on the sea.
Antonio Machado

A frequently quoted camino poem, although not necessarily written in reference to the Camino de Santiago.

Antonio Machado lived from 1875 to 1939. He was an open Republican who fled at the end of the Civil War and died in exile in France a few days after leaving Spain. His health already poor, the experience almost certainly hastened his death.

Machado is a highly regarded poet and his former house in Segovia is now a museum.

 
dick bird said:
And turning round to look behind you
You will see the path
You will never walk again.
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I do this so often, reflecting on how each moment is new. And while I may walk this way again, neither it nor I will be the same.
A man can never step into the same river twice....
Click to expand...
Or walk the same camino twice. Each time I cross the meseta it is an utterly different experience.

Looking back at dawn, between Rabe and Hornillos, June 2019.
 
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kirkie said:
This is the one I was searching for among my photos recently! Thank you. Don't ask me now why I was searching. At least I still remember that I was searching for something!
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Wherever it may be several of us seem to find this mural fascinating. .
 

Ithaka​

As you set out for Ithaka
hope your road is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them:
you’ll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare excitement
stirs your spirit and your body.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
wild Poseidon—you won’t encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.

Hope your road is a long one.
May there be many summer mornings when,
with what pleasure, what joy,
you enter harbors you’re seeing for the first time;
may you stop at Phoenician trading stations
to buy fine things,
mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
sensual perfume of every kind—
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
and may you visit many Egyptian cities
to learn and go on learning from their scholars.

Keep Ithaka always in your mind.
Arriving there is what you’re destined for.
But don’t hurry the journey at all.
Better if it lasts for years,
so you’re old by the time you reach the island,
wealthy with all you’ve gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.

Ithaka gave you the marvelous journey.
Without her you wouldn't have set out.
She has nothing left to give you now.

And if you find her poor, Ithaka won’t have fooled you.
Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,
you’ll have understood by then what these Ithakas mean.

C. P. CAVAFY
TRANSLATED BY EDMUND KEELEY
According to Dr. Francisco Prado-Vilar (Harvard), mediaeval and early Christian writers associated Santiago de Compostela with Ithaka, home of Ulysses and with Paradise. This made a kind of allegorical link with both the pilgrimage and Ulysses’ journey home, the Odyssey, and with the ‘translatio’ or transfer of the body of St. James the Apostle through the Pillars of Hercules to the coast of Galicia.

The view of Santiago cathedral is looking back on the way to Finisterre.
 
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Marvao, Portugal
photo taken January 2013



This view of roof tiles and clouds is from Marvao, a picturesque mountain town in the Alentejo region of Portugal. For future pilgrims Marvao will be part of the Caminho da Raia presently being developed from Mértola to Alpalhão as noted here. ..Bom caminho!
 
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Another from the Vasco. Once through the Roman tunnel, you end up following a long section of the very old road, climbing up through the Beech forest, and then down towards the Alava Valley:


Edited to add: @dick bird , that Cavafy poem has long been a favorite. Paired with your photo, the duet is gold! Thank you.
 
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SJPdP --> Roncesvalles
CF, 27 Sept 2016

While sitting in college classes (in person) for the first time in three decades (since completing my last degree), I've thought of this later-in-life college experience as similar to that first day on the CF... just gotta get over the initial climb.

At this point, the sheep in the photo represent all of the individual classes I must take to achieve that which is important for implementation of our plan for our futures as "young-old" people (the term some psychology professors use for people in their 60s and 70s). Many of them I have taken before, but institutions of higher learning act as though I attended college back when we wrote on stone tablets with dinosaur bones... so I must take them again to prove my brain still works.

That feeling of freedom we get while on Camino will be even more intense this summer upon completion of the Napoleon route this semester.
 
FourSeasons said:
Yes and those pigeons are drawn to that one roof in particular, I wonder why?
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I wouldn't mind betting they roost in there as most of the windows seem broken. Amazingly, I hadn't noticed the pigeons before and I've seen that photo lots of times ... good spotting FourSeasons
 
With all that information mspath, I'll look at my photo of Torres del Rio in a different light. Loved this tiny little town where we spent the night.
 
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Almost at the top, approaching O Cebreiro.
CF, May 5, 2028



Half an hour later, as I sat in the ancient church, I wept tears of gratitude, for I had made it to the peak of the most challenging day, and I knew that I would make it to Santiago without difficulty.
 
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Anne&Pat said:
A welcome morning coffee break from the pouring rain in popular Meson Don Pulpo, San Amaro. Between Pontevedra and Caldas de Reis. CP, May, 2016.
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The best pulpo I ever had was from a food truck in Abadin, on a market day, 2019 on Norte. It's after Mondonedo. Having said goodbye to all those lovely ocean views the day before; I was in my very deep sadness but having a huge plate of freshly cooked pulpo with ice-cold beer instantly cured me. If you are ever near Abadin on Saturday, you can try all kind of foods there. I am always fascinated by the intelligence and curiosity that octopuses display. There is a great movie called "My Great Octopus Teacher". I love watching octopuses' movements in an aquarium, but sadly for octopuses I still eat them although I wouldn't think about eating any octopuses that I personally get to know---gosh this sounds even worse, isn't it? I guess it's like when I talk to cows on the Camino, I would never think about making steaks out of them but somehow, back home I still eat steaks relatively guiltfree. I must be a terrible person!

Here are a few facts about octopuses: I didn't write them; they are from the Internet.
  • Octopuses have blue blood. Not from royal genes, but from copper. They have a high metabolic rate, and therefore a high demand for oxygen. Copper-based hemocyanin is more efficient for transporting oxygen at low temperatures and low oxygen concentrations than is the iron-based hemoglobin that makes our blood red.
  • Octopuses also have three hearts: two just to pump blood through the gills and one more to circulate it to the organs. The circulating heart stops beating while an octopus swims, which explains why these cephalopods prefer crawling: Swimming exhausts them.
  • The giant Pacific octopus is considered to be long-lived compared to other species, with lifespans typically 3–5 years in the wild. Many other octopuses go through a complete life cycle in one year, from egg to end of life. (There is an aquarium near where I live, and they display a giant pacific octopus named Paul who's been there for over 20 years. After reading this, it dawned on me that either Paul has a really long lifespan, or they are impostors of Paul. ???)
 

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I remember this stretch. But it was all worthwhile to me when I saw this.
 

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Blessing the Boats
(at St. Mary’s)

may the tide
that is entering even now
the lip of our understanding
carry you out
beyond the face of fear
may you kiss
the wind then turn from it
certain that it will
love your back may you
open your eyes to water
water waving forever
and may you in your innocence
sail through this to that

from Blessing the Boats (BOA Editions Ltd, 2000)

Lucille Clifton

The fact that boats are being blessed suggests that they will meet hardship and danger, as do human children and I read this poem as a wish for whoever it is aimed at to be brave and come through life intact and uncorrupted. Clifton was once asked how she would like to be remembered: “I would like to be seen as a woman whose roots go back to Africa, who tried to honor being human. My inclination is to try to help.”

These particular boats were in Finisterre harbour.
 
"young-old". Do I like that? I think so. Personally, I suspect that I am just immature.
 
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The same path looked very different mid-May 2013 Rowena. Check out the young man walking bare footed.
 

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FourSeasons said:
CF After O’Cebreiro August 9, 2019. Ducked in out of the wind for a cafe con letche and found the hairiest host. Follow me to your table pilgrim. This dog is huge!!
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I believe this is the same cafe FourSeasons. We and many others took refuge after walking from O'Cebriero in white-out conditions. We stayed quite a while with our cafe con leches.
 

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Late afternoon in the square outside the Real Alcázar in Seville. The owner, in white, brought his two Collies to the square for some exercise. After picking oranges from the tree he played fetch with his dogs for quite a while. You can see the younger dog bringing the orange back in its teeth.
 

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Bronte DownUnder said:
I believe this is the same cafe FourSeasons. We and many others took refuge after walking from O'Cebriero in white-out conditions. We stayed quite a while with our cafe con leches.
Click to expand...
Wow, all that snow! Yes, yes. Quite the refuge from wind, snow and sleet providing a cafe con leche just in time. I'm guessing, you weren't greeted by the lovely host. He was probably hibernating, could you blame him?
 
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The Pilgrimage.

I Travell’d on, seeing the hill, where lay
My expectation.
A long it was and weary way.
The gloomy cave of Desperation
I left on th’ one, and on the other side
The rock of Pride.

And so I came to phancies medow strow’d
With many a flower:
Fain would I here have made abode,
But I was quicken’d by my houre.
So to cares cops I came, and there got through
With much ado.

That led me to the wilde of Passion, which
Some call the wold;
A wasted place, but sometimes rich.
Here I was robb’d of all my gold,
Save one good Angell, which a friend had ti’d
Close to my side.

At length I got unto the gladsome hill,
Where lay my hope,
Where lay my heart; and climbing still,
When I had gain’d the brow and top,
A lake of brackish waters on the ground
Was all I found.

With that abash’d and struck with many a sting
Of swarming fears,
I fell, and cry’d, Alas my King!
Can both the way and end be tears?
Yet taking heart I rose, and then perceiv’d
I was deceiv’d:

My hill was further: so I flung away,
Yet heard a crie
Just as I went, None goes that way
And lives: If that be all, said I,
After so foul a journey death is fair,
And but a chair.

George Herbert

Written about the same time as Bunyan's Pilgrim hymn, but by a very different person with a very different message. Bunyan seems mainly concerned with how one should live one's life, Herbert more with how to prepare for the afterlife. Born into an aristocratic family, he gave up a promising political career to follow his vocation as a priest. He must have known his time was short as he suffered from what was then known as consumption but is now known as tuberculosis. He died aged 39.

I don't know the artist of this painting, it seems to be from El Greco's time. It is in the church of San Bento on the Plaza Cervantes in Santiago.
 
Alto de Perdon
photo taken October 3, 2004



Near the summit of the Alto de Perdon on the CF the pilgrim figures and their packs of this huge, handsome contemporary sculpture in rusted steel were silhouetted against an ominous dark grey sky.
 
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Did you know that if someone sneezes in Spain you are supposed to say ¨salud¨; second time "amor", and the third time "dinero"? Here, I saw the sign that says it in different order but for all the right reasons, which I wholeheartedly agreed. Norte, 2022.
 

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Santiago de Compostela
Cathedral
dome

photo taken December 9, 2012



After walking into Santiago de Compostela and up the hill to the cathedral thus completing my 8th CF, I sat alone in the dim afternoon light offering silent thanks for all that had been which enabled these precious moments.
 
Tarantella (1929)​

Do you remember an Inn,
Miranda?
Do you remember an Inn?
And the tedding and the spreading
Of the straw for a bedding,
And the fleas that tease in the High Pyrenees,
And the wine that tasted of tar?
And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers
(Under the vine of the dark verandah)?
Do you remember an Inn, Miranda,
Do you remember an Inn?
And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteeers
Who hadn't got a penny,
And who weren't paying any,
And the hammer at the doors and the Din?
And the Hip! Hop! Hap!
Of the clap
Of the hands to the twirl and the swirl
Of the girl gone chancing,
Glancing,
Dancing,
Backing and advancing,
Snapping of a clapper to the spin
Out and in --
And the Ting, Tong, Tang, of the Guitar.
Do you remember an Inn,
Miranda?
Do you remember an Inn?

Never more;
Miranda,
Never more.
Only the high peaks hoar:
And Aragon a torrent at the door.
No sound
In the walls of the Halls where falls
The tread
Of the feet of the dead to the ground
No sound:
But the boom
Of the far Waterfall like Doom.

Hilaire Belloc​

Apparently written in Canfranc, which would have had a splendid new railway station opened just up the road.
 
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Chenahusky said:
Definitely a repost, but it is my favourite flower verge on the Meseta, enroute to Boadilla del camino.
CF June 2016.

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Who wouldn't want to walk along a verge like that ... beautiful. We came upon many ancient facades covered in climbing roses on the Camino Le Puy in France. They really bring colour into the day.
 

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Postcard Poem about Spain – España

Suddenly, the blazing sun rises
to greet the Spanish dawn with
blinding light.
Terracotta rooftops burn like flames
in the claustrophobic countryside, and
villa walls pulse with heat like radiators.
Far off, a hot hound howls,
inspired by the midday heat.
A squadron of feathered menace
revolves up high in planetary-like motion.
Wooden sentinels snake their way
into the cerulean sky and watch over
the scorched landscape.
Fruit trees and cheerful birds celebrate
the glorious day in vibrant colours. An
orchestra of invisible cicadas hum lazily.
Evening cools the humid air.
Now the dark giants
murmur silently, in the
hushed voice of evening’s breath

Joe Fraser

This poem was literally written on a postcard in a competition for poems by young people, written on a postcard, which Joe (deservedly, I think) won. He lives in Grassington, England.

I'm glad you all seem to be enjoying the poems. I'll be back with more in about a week's time - we're off an a camping trip to the Snowy Mountains (yes, they have snow in Australia). The photo doesn't do the poem justice but it kind of follows the theme of views of rooftops. This one is from the window of our room in San Martín Piniero, Santiago.
 
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Camino Frances, alternate route
from La Virgen del Camino

photo taken November 13, 2011




I chose to follow this alternate camino to walk SW towards Villar de Mazarife. Escaping highway noise and suburban sprawl was pleasant. However, mid-November hunters' shots could be heard, often a bit too close for comfort!!
 
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I'll also post my photo a little early. This will be for my Sunday photo. It isn't the Canal de Castilla but it is beside it on the other side of the track. It is near Fromista as you can see. It has poppies too.


If I can easily find a link to a photo I've already submitted I'll likely post the link. I still have others not yet seen publicly though.
 
Rick,
If you are looking for the site of your photo I believe that is located after Boadilla del Camino and, of course,
before the Canal.
 
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So enjoying everyone's posts, though I've been quiet. Randomly chosing something from the galleey here, because I'm on my phone. And it's truely random, because I cannot see the images that come up to be chosen - it's just a blank screen. So...luck of the draw!
View media item 9781Edit. Now that I've posted and the image finally popped up - haha! Flowers. With a handful of stray wheat.
In this case on the Vasco, right before the Via de Bayona parts company with it, and heads to Burgos.
 
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It was ANZAC day, April 25 2013, a significant remembrance day for all Aussies. I picked a red poppy, pressed it into my Brierley walking guide and still have it as a wonderful memory of the early days of our Camino Frances.
 

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In 2018 I turned left at Triacastela, and walked to Samos. Stayed at the monastery albergue, had a tour of the monastery, a very good dinner right across the street, and in the morning a good breakfast at a cafe on the way out of Samos. What more could a pilgrim ask for?

 


Walking out of Porto along the Douro River.
CP, 5 Oct 2019

The first time I saw Porto was brief; glancing out the window of a bus crossing the bridge in the distance going from SdC to Lisbon post-CF in 2016. We were excited to see Lisbon and didn't give much thought to Porto as we passed through. I'm so glad I was able to discover how great it is 3 years later.
 
mspath said:
Update
Rick,
This might be that hut.
View attachment 117955
Click to expand...
Well, @mspath, you've given me a lot of entertainment last night and this morning. I was pretty sure my pic was taken by the canal and closer to Fromista than Boadillo. I've finally narrowed it down to near the red pin on the map below. I can't see the building using Google Map's satellite image but Flickr has an image search feature that looks for pictures with GPS coordinates within a certain distance. With it I've discovered my hut and I have a link to Flickr pics within 100 meters of 42.2625,-4.3882, the location of the red pin.



Flickr Search

www.flickr.com
https://www.flickr.com/search/?lat=42.2625&lon=-4.3882&radius=0.1&has_geo=1&view_all=1
 
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If you consider that I was searching by memory that's not too bad. I also took a photo of that hut in winter during my camino years but can not find it.
Carpe diem.
 
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