Castro-Urdiales

 

Yesterday I walked to a town called Castro Urdiales.. It is along the coast, and I think I am starting to leave the  Basque region.

On the way there I went through a rest stop, picnic area, and met a woman from Poland named Martyna.  We spoke in French.  She is camping out, but had her tent and sleeping bag put away by the time I passed her. She said it’s not legal, but they look the other way if you’re on the Camino. 

When I came out onto the coast she was there again and took this picture of me ( see Castro-Urdiales in the distance) and also this selfie of the two of us. 

I walked a lot of bicycle/ pedestrian rail- trail yesterday which was nice. But at one point I had to choose to take a very steep trail that was 4 miles longer, or walk on the highway. 

In June I did the Maryland Camino, which was 90% highway. So I chose the highway. The difference this time was yhat thrre weren’t any shoulders to the road. After looking at the sign, I sawan elderly woman sitting in front of her house. She said she didn’t think it was bad. “Tiene que tener cuidado,” she said.  “You have to be careful.” Iprobably won’t make this choice again. I was very careful and arrived in town by 3pm  

Then treated myself to gelato.

The Bridge at Portugalete

 

Today I walked to Potugalete. There is a bridge here designed by a student of Gustav Eiffel. Instead of having a road surface for cars and people to ride on, there is a ferry suspended by wires from the bridge. People walk on, and cars and motorcycles drive on it, and then the ferry moves through the air to the other side.

I crossed the river by a little motorboat, then came back on thr suspension bridge  Here is a picture of the ferry coming across to pick me up. You can see the shadow of it in the water.

On the way to Potugalete I saw this giant globe along the river  it was a tribute to the first crew to circumnavigate the world  they did it in three years, from 1519 to 1522.

A man saw me taking the picture and he started to tell me about it . Ferdinand Magellan was in charge when they left in 1519. He was killed in the Philippines and a Basque, Juan Elkano, became the captain.  Five boats and 250 men sailed from Seville. Only one boat returned.

I am staying in a very nice albergue tonight. Because I had a short day today- only 10 miles-  I am planning a long hike tomorrow. Today I met some really nice people. Sarah from Lancaster who’s a professor at Franklin and Marshall, and Lina a teacher from Germany. I also talked with Ha and John, a husband and wife from Pusan, South Korea. 

I

Meteorites

 Two days ago I was inside a little church that contained three huge meteorites. The placards said that they were from pre-Christian times, were worshipped by the locals, and they built the building to incorporate the two beliefs. 

The top photo is what we saw coming in the door. The stones filled up the church. They could not have more than one hundred people in the building- and they would all have been at the edges.

There is a man on the left holding a pilgrim’s passport. He just got it stamped. These are folders we carry and as we pass through a community or a bar or an albergue we get it stamped to show we’ve been there. The church and municipal albergues (very cheap, often asking just a donation, called a donativo) want you be an actual walking or biking pilgrim to use their facilities. The passport tells them you are.

 The bottom photo is the view looking down on them from a balcony. 

September 8, the Birthday of Mary

 This morning I went to mass at the monastery. When I did the French way 19 years ago, probably half the people staying at the albergue went to the mass in the evening or the morning. This time it was me, the woman in charge of the albergue, a monk, and a visiting priest who said the mass. It was a very private mass. I didn’t realize going in that it was the day that we celebrate the birthday of Mary. So it was nice to attend, if a 

Then I started to walk, it was 9 AM until I ever left.

I stepped out of the woods onto a street and off to my right, I saw some garbage bins and an arrow pointing to the left. A yellow Camino arrow. I immediately turned left, what I did not know was there was another street behind the one I was on that was supposed to be the one where I turned left. Sadly, I went straight up a hill, kind of like Gold Mine Road going over Peters Mountain. Straight up. 

I was surprised not to see other pilgrims, because the road is so crowded with us. But I persevered. After about 40 minutes, probably a mile straight up, a man came by in a car. He stopped and rolled his window down and said are you on the Camino?I said yes, and he said you are on the wrong road. It is down the hill. I said, but I turned left at the arrow. He said there is another road behind this one. He shook his head and said a lot of people make this mistake.  Needless to say, I descended a lot more quickly than I went up.

It is raining here and when I finally did get on the right road after an hour of wrong road, we went through a woods that had 100s and hundreds of steps in a descending staircase. It’s kind of like the turkey path up in Tioga County, those who know that set of staircases.I was so thankful it was stair steps, because I really slip. in the mud. So I had a railing to hold onto and was very safe the whole time.

I am concerned that looking up this blog results in a message that says it is closed. If they discontinued my account, I’m not sure why they are continuing to let me post. I hope that Some of you are seeing this. I got a hotel tonight, so I will have a lot more time to check on this, and I am hoping to either find a good address for this one or start a new one that everyone can actually read.

One of the staircases. And a beautiful garden in the mountains. For Harper. 

Saturday Adventure in San Sebastián

I Wanted to mention a few things that happened on Saturday when I went to San Sebastian.

I returned by bus because I had lost a pair of socks and my friend Lisa lost her Kindle.

The albergue said they had her Kindle, but they never found the socks.

So I returned to San Sebastián because I had already gone back on the trail to get a room Friday night, and I was closest. Plus I had to go to the sporting goods store in order to get hiking socks.

There are a lot of municipal bathrooms in the towns here. I was walking past a park that had one, and I thought to use it. They are electronic. I pressed the green button, which meant it was available, and the door popped open, and I went inside.

The green button changed to red as the door closed. That way you know the door is locked.

I used the bathroom, but when I went to leave it, the red button did not release the door. Perhaps I was doing something wrong, not positive. Every time I pressed the red electronic button, a buzzer sounded and the toilet flushed. But I could not make that door open.

I pressed and pressed, and I tried to push the door. It didn’t open. 

Remembering what people did on the TapTap, the truck taxis in Haiti, to get the driver’s attention, I took out a coin, and started banging on the door with it.

I did not want to call the police.

I actually texted the Albergue, and said, I was on my way there, but I was stuck in a bathroom in the park nearby. I thought it might be good to have somebody know where I was! But I didn’t want to call the cops. 

After about five minutes of this, the door suddenly opened. A man on the outside had heard me tapping, and he pulled while I pushed. I thanked him and he asked, could I give him some money for lunch? I said I’m kind of poor myself, but I gave him two euros for helping me escape from that bathroom

After getting the socks and the kindle I had a huge adventure trying to get back on a bus to return to the Camino. It was probably only 30 miles but it was a Saturday and I couldn’t find a bus. I wound up taking a train. I finally arrived in Deba around 3pm, exhausted. I didn’t feel guilty doing a short hike on Saturday. I had over 10,000 steps just going to the different train stations and bus stops. 

Sunday night at the Monastery

 I hope that you are able to find this blog.

I realize it is from 2009, but when I started trying to set up a new one, The site kept referring me back to this one.

So I decided to continue. Now some of you have  told me you are having trouble finding it, and in fact when I went to post tonight, I had to look for five minutes to find it.

So apologies if I’m not getting through.

Today I set out to do 12 miles, but at the 12 mile mark, I still felt energetic, and decided to try to come to a monastery in the mountains. I like to come to monasteries when I am on a pilgrimage, because they have such a tradition of many centuries of hospitality.

In fact, this one is very beautiful and very old, Something I really love in a monastery is a cloister.

At the cloisters museum in the north of Manhattan, they have several original cloisters. At the bottom, I will try to post a picture of their cloister here.

Also, tonight there was a blessing of the pilgrims.And it is just sweet to hear that blessing and to know that in this monastery, they have been saying that prayer probably for over 500 years.

 Also, this afternoon, I said goodbye for now to two new friends, Lisa from Australia, and Nicolette from San Francisco.

They were staying at other places tonight. I will see them both in Guernika tomorrow. So we went to a cafe and had coffee before we parted. Tonight at this albergue are many people who were at my albergue last night. Some walked from the town before that and some probably did 20 miles today. One lady from Russia finished her third day today—-she began in Irun like I did, but she covered in 3 days what took me 5. 

Tomorrow I will be in Guernika, the town that Francisco Franco bombed with the help of Hitler’s Air Force. 

I will try to post some pictures tomorrow. They aren’t loading tonight. Anyway—I had a beautiful day of hiking,  seeing friends from all around the world here to hike the Camino.

Sunrise in Zarautz

 Here is the balcony of the place I stayed at last night. The window on the left is my bedroom, and those are my clothes laying there trying to dry.

You can see the beach in the distance.

I wanted to show you the walkway that comes out of the elevator. You can see it just to the right of the balcony in the distance. It’s funny in the other picture that you can’t see any of the walkway, but I guess the angle is 

I am on a bus on my way back to San Sebastian to try to get some things we forgot in our Albergue there. Then I’ll take the bus back to catch up with my friends. 

Things are really crowded this weekend. All the places we know of to stay tonight are already booked. We will have to keep checking, I am with two very nice ladies, one from Australia, one from near Yosemite in California. So if we must get into a hotel, at least we can share the bill.