See Ya, Sarria!

This may be the shortest post on the blog, as it felt as though I did not do anything on this day. Other than walk, of course. I chatted with a few people briefly on the road, but for most of the day I was just plodding along.


The one big noteworthy thing that happened was that I finally passed Sarria. Sarria is the last city before the 100km mark required to get your certificate, so it is the most popular starting point on the entire Camino. While I think starting there is perfectly valid, I also think it's an extremely different experience from starting earlier, and that is reflected in both the people and the businesses you encounter afterwards. The people are less friendly, as they tend to view this more as a fun hike than as a communal experience, and the number of them playing music on portable speakers increases dramatically. The businesses become more about, well, business, and much of the charm is gone. Also, there are way more vending machines.


I did not stay in Sarria, and although I was planning to have lunch there, the trail left the city sooner than I was expecting, and by the time I realized we weren't going to go through the downtown, it was too late and I didn't want to add the extra distance. I pushed on to my stopping point for the night, an albergue in the middle of nowhere, but the only place I could find to reserve at the distance I was looking for. I got there around 2:00, checked in, got some lunch, and took a shower. Dinner wasn't until 7:00, so I read a bit, watched the finale episode of a game show I and some friends follow, and had a very pleasant phone call.


Dinner was good, though somewhat lonely, as it was not a communal meal, but more of a restaurant setting. They did make the best cheesecake I've had since leaving NYC, though. After that I went back and headed to bed early.


I'm not sure how much of it is me walking longer days and how much of it is the Camino actually changing, but the spirit of it really feels different after passing O Cebreiro. It doesn't so much feel like I'm walking a pilgrimage route any more, or even like the Camino I had gotten used to. Instead, it feels like a big vacation experience, catered to everyone, and without any real cameraderie, as people seem far less interested in talking or making friends than earlier on. I've still had some very nice experiences along the way, but they have been much more fleeting and less memorable the last few days. We'll see what the rest of the Camino brings, and whether anything changes if I'm able to catch up to my friends. Only time will tell, I suppose.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

My Camino Packing List

Image
Hello, everyone! Thanks for checking out my travel blog. :) I'm going to discuss briefly what I plan to do on this blog, and then below that I'll cover my initial packing setup for the Camino. First, about the blog. I'm going to try to write a blog post every day, as a way for me to both record memories and share my trip with friends and family. I'll try to include photos as well, since I know some folks especially want to see those. Some days might be pretty short, though! Now, as for my packing. Here's what I packed! But since that's a little hard to see, I've also made an annotated version: 1) Rain cover. Since I'm going in October, there's a good chance of rain along parts of the route, and this will keep my pack dry(er). 2) Puffy blanket. This is a bit of a splurge in terms of weight and size, but since Octobers can get cold and I don't enjoy sleeping while I'm chilly, I decided to bring a packable blanket. 3) My ...
Read more

Arrival in Spain

Image
And we're off! I have officially landed in Spain, and am on my way up to the start of the Camino. I've got some time on the train, so I figured I'd write this blog post a bit early today, and talk about the flight, my arrival, and my first impressions of Spain. My flight was extremely uneventful. It was a red-eye, leaving around 10:00 PM New York time and getting to Spain seven hours later at around 11:00 AM Madrid time. (The mathematically inclined among you may have already calculated the time difference between NYC and Madrid from this, but for those who don't want to do the calculations, it was a six hour time difference.) We were served a meal about a little over an hour into the flight, meaning that we had dinner at either 11:30 PM New York time, or 5:30 AM Madrid time — neither of those make a ton of sense, but the food was good! Some surprisingly well-cooked chicken over fried rice. Certainly better than I'd expected, given that I chose a somewhat budget air...
Read more

Settling In

Image
Starting off today was bittersweet, as we said goodbye to two of our friends before even leaving for the road this morning. It was lovely to have met them, but very sad to see them go so soon. One of the things that seems to be a constant on the Camino is that things come and go, and you never know which will stay, which you will end up meeting again later, and which are only crossing your path briefly. After a lot of the rest of the group did an early-morning yoga session and I dealt with some bank nonsense, we headed off. Today's hike was probably the first time things have started to feel routine. We were all pretty familiar with the rhythm of hiking and talking, grabbing lunch at a cafe, hiking and talking some more, maybe stopping at some historic sights or churches, and then checking in to our albergue for the evening. Today largely followed that pattern, and it was nice to feel that, while the details were still a mystery, we could all relax into the overall form of the day....
Read more