ULTREIA!

Jan in front of the Catherdral

Wednesday September 24th

ULTREIA! This was the greeting from pilgrim to pilgrim on the Camino before it became BUEN CAMINO!  ULTREIA! ONWARD! That is our mission today as we make our way to Santiago.

We have water, fruit, a little cheese and some bread in our pack, but we need coffee and some breakfast.  There is a very nice cafe/bar across from our hostel.  We order our cafe grandes and large flaky pastries with almonds and sugar. We ask the patrona if she could stamp our credentiales for us.  Alas, she does not have a sello to give us a stamp. When we are ready to leave she offers us a gold seal sticker that she use to seal pastry boxes. We each put a gold sticker in our credentiale,  gratefully.  It competes with the green martini glass sello from the bar in Mino!

It is a brilliantly sunny day. We are in forest areas and see logs being hauled out. We cross over and under  super highways several times.  We stop at a bar to have water and coffee and the patron brings us a plate of ham and bread to go with it. ULTREIA!  We reach another small village and come upon the village lavedero where everyone would have come to wash there clothes.  It is cool and shady and there is a nice bench.  We stop for lunch lunch.

Mel on the Cathedral steps.

Santiago is near.  We are walking through an Industrial Park on the outskirts of the city.  Soon we have a fleeting glimpse of the Cathedral spires.  It is time to stop for coffee.  ULTREIA! almost there.  The scallop shell symbols and yellow arrows seen to be disappearing.  We are in Santiago but we feel  lost.  Finally we find ourselves near the University and then the Church of St Francis and then we hear the bag pipes playing.  ULTREIA! We have arrived! We are in the square in front of the Cathedral. We did it! We walked 120 kilometers in six days.  And I did it with a lot of help from my FRIENDS.  Thank You!

We want to go right to the Pilgrim Office to claim our certificates.  The next person we see is Juan from Madrid!  Of course, he arrived hours ahead of us and has done  all the rituals.  At the Pilgrim Office there is a mob of hundreds waiting in line to claim their Compostela.  It is warm and sunny, we are still carrying back packs.  The Pilgrim Office is open until 9 PM.  We decide to go to the hotel, unload our stuff and come back later. As we walk through the Square in front of the Cathedral we meet Eduardo who has just arrived. We all congratulate ourselves again. We all did it!

After checking in to the hotel, we unpack, sort our stuff and shower.  We each do a lot of laundry in the small bathroom sink.  We have a wonderful view of the Cathedral spires from our room.  Luckily, we have 3 large windows in which to string lines and hang our clothes to dry. Thick socks take much longer to dry than quick-dry hiking trousers. ULTREIA!

We are ready to head back to the Pilgrim Office to get our official recognition.  We arrive at 7:30, there is still a line but the many 100's have dwindled to about 50.  A few folks ahead of us ask others if they would save their spot while they do a few souvenir purchases at nearby shop.  They no more than walk out of the line when a security person herds us inside the courtyard and closes the gate.  Only the people in the courtyard will get their Compostelas tonight.  Jan and I are second to last to be issued certificates tonight.  The green martini glass and the gold pastry shop seal are all accepted.  We have our Compostelas in hand.  ULTREIA!

The view from our hotel room

We treat ourselves to a well deserved dinner and a nice glass of wine.  It is getting late, very late for us.  We head back to the hotel, on the way through the square in front of the Cathedral we are attracted to the sound of guitars and enthusiastic singing and clapping.  A group of troubadors in 16th century costumes are singing folk songs.  We stop to listen and join in, while clapping to the beat we are greeted and congratulated by the Italian girls from our Camino family!  It is Midnight and a wonderful ending to the day, and our Camino Ingles.  ULTREIA!

Buen Camino

Mel

p.s. I am so grateful to Jan who took the time out of her busy life to walk the Camino Ingles with me.  I needed her every day.  She made this a beautiful trip for me. She is an even more beautiful person1


p.p.s. I hope to have all pictures posted by December1, 2014

The Botafumeiro in flight