Day 28: O Pedrouzo – Santiago de Compostela 19.8 km

The last day. The final 20 km. 675 km walked in 28 days, two parts, over two years.

I wake up early again, it’s just after 4. After lying awake in the dark for a while, I’m engulfed with emotions again. I’m still not sure where they’re coming from. The tears stop rolling, and the dorm starts to stir, I pack my bag for this momentous day. My walking companions aka The Primitives are in another hostel, so I agree to meet them at the cafe we stopped at yesterday afternoon. As I get into the cafe, I reach for my wallet, and it’s not there. I scrabble around, panic raising in my chest. Losing this would completely transform this most important of days. I run the half a km back to my albergue, the only place I could have left it. I pass Ade, the Dutchman. In a conversation a few days before, I learned that he walked to Santiago from Holland, over a period of more than a decade. Between various debilitating injuries and family deaths, his Camino journey has been interrupted many times over the years. He’s finally at the end of his very long journey too.

I race into the Albergue, now steaming hot inside my jacket. Retracing my steps, the last chance is in the dorm. It’s there on the bed. Maybe this wasn’t as stressful as last year’s bed bug fest, but it’s certainly the rudest awakening I’ve had of this year’s walking, and also happens to be my last day. I’m not a forgetful person, but lack of sleep and my intense emotions have disoriented me. If I’d realised it was missing 5km down the road, my day would have been ruined. With great relief, I join the Primitives at the breakfast bar. After a coffee, I calm and cool off, and we’re on our way into the approaching light of the dawn. One of our group has an objective today: to arrive in Santiago before midday, so we can see the Pilgrim Mass at 1230, it looks to be tight, we should have left 45 minutes ago. Myself and the Italian contingent are less worried about this, but we go along with it anyway, out of respect for our companion.

I’m now walking again along the closed woodland path from yesterday. Retracing my steps with different company. In the darkness, we see a small light, and hear a ringing melodic rhythm. There’s an older, bearded man, wearing a brimmed hat and wool cardigan. Signs with various quotes are placed on the approach to the light, he is playing a rhythm on what I learn is a tongue drum. It’s quietly magical here, an island of light and melody, in the middle of the woods. The peace is interrupted by a group of singing Spanish tourists in pursuit, one can only assume Sarria tourists, pursuing us. To avoid this, and with our deadline, we push on into the morning.

I am chatting a few days later with a Dutch lady, and she tells me she stopped here and listened to the man. After a while, he put his drum down and approached her. He reached out and held her in a strong embrace, all the while, looking directly into her eyes from under the brim of his hat. This (presumably consensual) hug lasts for ten minutes. He says to her: “I see you, the universe sees you”. She tells me she felt something entering her at that point, a wave of emotion. Her aim for her journey, she tells me, was to awake her inner child. I started my journey with no such personal aims, but the Camino seems to have teased them out of me. This “seeing”, is to resonate with me very much in trying to understand why I’m feeling such strong emotions.

It’s quiet for the moment, we managed to outpace the singing tourists. The morning blanket of mist is slowly peeling away as the sun burns through the sky. We enter a freshly harvested eucalyptus plantation. Bark is lying all around us, it looks like a battlefield. As the sun comes up, it takes on an apocalyptically beautiful atmosphere. Our companion asks to hang back, so we let her. We all walk separately, but within enough distance of each other to know we’re not far away. It’s a nice metaphorical lesson about asking for space, not demanding too much from others, being separate but not alone.

I’ve pushed on ahead and arrive at Monte de Gozo, a hill above Santiago. While I admire the view, the rest of The Primitives arrive. The huge cathedral we’re aiming towards is finally visible from the top of the hill. After all this time, we can finally see our destination. What a sight. Our little band carries on down the hill into the city together.

We pass by the city sign, stop for photos, and continue into the city. We’re almost drunk with anticipation. Some of us have been here before. My friend points out a spot she got drunk. We go past an albergue I stayed at the last time I was here. We’re pass into the cobbled streets of Santiago old town. We bump into Baptiste and Carlos. This man from Bilbao who looks like Tintin on steroids and has a dental plate in his mouth, he’s virtually unintelligible, but obviously excited, overwhelmed. After failing to get into the service, we enter the main square. The Praza de Obradoiro is a huge and open space with nothing but pilgrims during the day, and mostly empty at night. On one side of the square are porticos that shelter a student band in the evenings, who play for pilgrims to celebrate their journey’s end. The cathedral towers over the other side of the square. I didn’t come here for spiritual reasons, but at the end of this long journey, one can’t help feel a sense of divine from it’s presence.

We trickle, as a river into a sea, into this huge open space. Our road has come to an end. We collapse. We contemplate everything the road travelled. The moment is heavy with meaning. I feel overwhelmed, unable to take it all in. We walk down to get our certificates, then we head out for some amazing tortilla in the middle of the city’s medieval lanes for the next few hours. Food fuels us, Estrella Galicia livens our spirits and dulls our aches. Occasionally, I look at my friends and feel overcome with gratitude for this moment and the people I’m sharing it with. I know I’ll be saying goodbye to them soon too. I hold it together, just.

Eventually, I check in, and return after an hour. Italian Primitive has left for his hotel out of the centre, and won’t return that evening. My Spanish friend cracked his prickly toxo shell and I’m told he even cried some tears at goodbye. I sit in the square with Spanish speakers, not being able to catch their words. After some of this, I need to have a break from this. It’s frustrating and I’m feeling quite emotional. I make excuses to head off for some water, but I think my friend can see I’m upset. I wonder later whether this is what I’m upset about, or is there a deeper meaning here for me? Does this sitting on the outside of a group, not being able to participate, understand, have some deeper significance for me?

The story of the tongue drummer in the woods resonated with me so much after hearing it. In my little camino group, as well as with the other people I touched during the walk, I felt seen, then accepted. It was a really powerful feeling. A warm embrace of the soul. Pilgrims seem to have the same rhythms. We walk with similar goals, free of distractions and stresses. We are free of the masks we wear from our cultures, our roles in life. We are raw, exposing our soft underbellies, knowing they’ll be treated with care and respect. This beautiful thing, I’m leaving behind. I’m returning to a world where I only occasionally glimpse this in other people. It will take some thinking to frame this positively. I’ve struggled with making proper connections living in my own culture for many years. Doing this walk reminds me that I’m not at fault, a negative message that I perhaps internalised over 15 years of living in Brighton. I will reflect over the coming months at what changes I need to make. The Camino isn’t real life, but I can take some lessons from this experience to guide me towards a more satisfying life.

I come back to the square but I’m overcome with emotions. Again. I don’t want to rejoin the group in this state. I sit in the far side of the square and let the emotions flow out of me. A cyclist comes up to me and asks if I’m alright. Kinda? He’s from Sardinia, I say I’m from Brighton. He knows there’s a Sardinian community there. I know another Massimo in Brighton from Sardinia, when I mention his surname, he asks if he’s from Cagliari. He is. A little connection, from someone who decided to check in with me. It’s a funny moment. I can’t think of this happening anywhere else but in this square.

I say “see you later” to my close Primitive friend, it turns out I wasn’t going to get the proper opportunity. Now we’re at the end of our journey, there’s a sense of “what now?“. So much of my existence for the last few weeks has been guided by such simple patterns and needs. Yellow arrows, guidebook stages, hunger, thirst. I’m a little lost and directionless. I meet another pilgrim who had gone on ahead days before. We drift around the cobbled medieval streets of the city centre, drink wine with fellow pilgrims. We head to the main square to watch the Tuna - the evening music under the portici. These merry men, dressed in gowns and hats play and sing for a rapturous audience. Tomorrow night, the same band will play the same songs to a new set of pilgrims, many of whom arriving that day. Walk, eat, sleep, repeat, walk, eat, stop.