Hello, Ewa e ne en skel kel, Kwe-kwe, Bonjour, Kaixo, Hola, Ola, Nihao! These are some of the greetings of the places that I have been this year - British Columbia, Ontario, Québec, France, Basque country, Spain, Galacia, Barcelona, Beijing and Xi'an - places which I hope to tell you a little about in this newsletter. Those of you who I've known for a little while will probably be used to my annual newsletter, but if you're receiving this for the first time I'll tell you that this is something that I've been doing to keep my friends and family up to date with my comings and goings since before I had email - let alone social media - to do so. Now that these more efficient tools have become established the idea of the newsletter seems to have gone by the wayside in many cases, something which you (or at least I) generally only get from organizations which want your money or political support. But I still find great value in the tired old newsletter to reflect on the past year and to think of you, one of my diverse friends from near or from far, who will read this (well, the first half?) and remember our days together. If you would like to check out my older letters - from when I was ten years old and setting out across the Pacific up to this one - you can find them archived on my blog, bradleyclements.blogspot.com. And if you'd rather not be on this list for any reason, just let me know and I won't mind. I wrote my last newsletter to you after a lovely Christmas and New Years with my Grandparents, Uncle John and other family and friends of Princeton, the Sunshine Coast and Victoria, before the start of my last semester at Camosun College. The semester was another intense and highly enjoyable one as I took five interesting classes (Geography of Cities, Cultural Anthropology, Social Systems and the Environment, Archaeology, and Physical Geography of the Biosphere and Atmosphere), went to conferences, chaired and sat on several College and Student Society boards and committees, organized and partook in various rallies, and the usual. I enjoyed my courses and was honored to receive the generosity of the Outstanding Social Sciences Student and Associate Degree - Year Two awards. After a great semester I said goodbye to my many friends, the Camosun College Student Society board, my archery students and head coach at Saanich Park and Recreation, and Bill and Maureen who I had been staying with and our mutual friends, throwing some lovely parties before I flew off to Ontario at the end of April. After my long flight Dad greeted me at the airport in Ottawa and I spent a couple of weeks with the family sorting my equipment for the Camino de Santiago. The preparation and act of walking the millennium old pilgrimage across southern France and northern Spain was a half-decade long act of serendipity; I connected to something very natural for me as I flowed through Europe's landscapes. I walked along the Chemin d'Arles from Toulouse to Oloron Ste.-Marie, the Voie Piemont to St.-Jean Pied de Port, the Camino Frances to Santiago de Compostela, and the Caminos of Finisterra and Muxia to the Atlantic. I made some close friends and had a phenomenal, powerful experience. Although it was an experience which I can never hope to replicate, I have found a love for long-distance walking and plan to do more some day, whether in the hills of Tuscany, the coast of England, the Qadisha Valley of Lebanon or another of the French pilgrim routes. Now, almost half a year after finishing the pilgrimage, I continue to remember it constantly. Ques come from nowhere and I find myself again at a random point along the 1300 km path, asking directions from a French farmer at the corner of his newly tilled field, limping down the cobbles of a street overhung by medieval homes, leaning into the wind before a wooden cross under a sky of torn cloud, damp in the mist of an Atlantic coast forest, or watching a friend wave his walking pole, miniature on the slope of the bulk of a perspective-defying green hill. The day after I arrived on the Atlantic coast (and Spain jubilantly won the Eurocup in football) I talked to Mom and Dad on the phone and learned that Mom was going to Beijing on assignment for work... did I want to come? Still sinking into the acceptance of homecoming I was a bit disoriented, but, yes, of course I did! First, though, after my return to Ottawa via Barcelona, Madrid and Montréal was a trip down Ontario's 19th Century Rideau Canal on a rented houseboat, marvelling at the two-hundred year-old technology as we locked up and down, and mooring in solitary lakes, little historical villages, and in the downtown of the nation's capital. Aunty Mary flew over from Victoria to join us for part of the trip and we had a great time together, canoeing, swimming, kyaking, hiking and exploring. In less care-free news, our cat Clouseau was getting himself in trouble with the law due to his nocturnal excursions in Barrhaven, a community with bountiful by-laws, and when it came down to significant fines for each time that he was reported out at night we tried to find him a more flexible home. However, after he had been a few weeks at the Humane Society without passing their adoption test and becoming ever more unhappy with being incarcerated and vaccinated we decided that it would be best for us to bring him home and hope he could reform his habits. Dad built a pen attaching to the shed, accessible through the pet door by a tunnel formed by a bench, and he has adapted surprisingly well. My cheap tickets took me to Beijing via Detroit, whose airport I got to know well over my long stop over (let's just say that when I arrived in the morning the woman at customs saw my connecting ticket and told me to rush to my gate before realizing that the time on it was "PM" rather than "AM"...). I was one of the few Caucasians on my flight and learned a few Mandarin words from the elderly couple seated next to me as I flew over the iceless Arctic. I got ripped off for a taxi to my apartment when I landed around midnight, being too tired to haggle, and Mom had already arrived on her government-paid flight. The next day we walked the length of Dongjimenwai Dajie, the major street near our apartment, down to the Agriculture Museum past the Canadian Embassy in one direction then back to the Yuan Dynasty Drum and Bell towers. Over the month that I was there I went on long walks on the weekdays while Mom worked at the embassy, especially exploring the hutongs. These courtyard communities of family households crowded around treed allies, their tiled roofs sprouting with grass and gourds, delighted me. I could simply take any un-noticed side-street off of one of the bustling major commercial thoroughfares and find myself lost in Beijing's heritage, and I never once saw a fellow Caucasian. After wandering for ten or fifteen minutes I could count on finding an ally bustling with vending stands of fruit, fish, vegetables, crustaceans, meat, shoes, clothing and all manner or wares, small tables with diners and game-players huddled about them, bicycles of all forms laden high weaving between romping children and cane-supported elders, music, chatter, laughter and haggling. I once popped into one of the hole-in-the wall restaurants in such a junction where the four men seated on the benches at the little tables stared at me loose-jawed as if I'd fallen from outer space. I sat at the unoccupied table, hoping that I was not being completely culturally unacceptable, and conveyed to the cook that I was hoping to find something to eat although my Mandarin was almost as scarce as their English. She stirred a cauldron of noodles and vegetables in chicken broth and her husband served it for each of us and tossed a few cloves of raw garlic on our tables to munch with our meals. I tried to eat as quickly and loudly as my fellow patrons and made sure to finish virtually the whole 5 Y (less than $1) bowl as they had although I thought I would burst. On another occasion I climbed Jinshang Park, the human-made hill north of the Forbidden City built of the earth from the palace's moat to protect it from the spirits that fengshuei had warned of, and saw the red-roofed halls recede in procession into the haze as I stood at the feet of the Buddha seated at the peak. As I sat and drew the scene from a pavilion a man asked me if I could take his picture, which I did, and we got into a conversation. He was a traditional medicine practitioner and researcher from Shanghai with good English, visiting Beijing on a business trip. Eventually he went off and I finished my drawing, but later I met him again and he invited me to join him to go to a tea house which one of his colleagues had suggested. We sat in the traditional little house smelling and drinking several wonderful teas out of tiny ceremony cups, having been elaborately brewed in a specific progression of pots. On other days I visited the Forbidden City, the Yonghegong Lamasary, the Old Summer Palace, a smaller Buddhist monastery which I stumbled upon in my hutong wanderings, and many parks which were always alive with music, dancing, games, singing, calligraphy, fishing, and every manner of activity. Because restaurants were almost as cheap as buying food - at least the sort that we knew how to cook that we could get from places that we could find - and because the vibrant public culture hosted a seemingly infinite number of restaurants of all kinds, all bursting with customers, we ate out a lot and tried all sorts of food (sometimes to the exasperation of those around us when we had no clue how it was supposed to be eaten!) On weekends Mom and I visited more major attractions, like the Summer Palace, the National Museum, the Temple of Heaven, and more parks. After Mom felt like she was more in shape, we decided to go on an excursion to the Jinshanling section of the Great Wall. A driver took us with one of Mom's colleagues out of Beijing and through the pinnacle-like mountains until we reached the Wall, cresting the twisting ridges and setting a watchtower upon each peak despite the writhing hill's attempts to shake the thing off. We climbed up to the largely unrestored but remarkably intact fortification and walked along it for many kilometres I marvelled at the thoroughness of the fortifications, each tower designed to repel forces not from both the north and the south, but from the adjacent sections of wall in the event that any of these were taken: steep and narrow stairways into the towers prevented the wielding of a weapon within them, terraces of crossbow bunkers as the wall climbed up toward a tower, auxiliary walls whose remains were just discernible on the slopes on either side, and beacon towers on the tallest surrounding peaks - to say nothing of the mountainous landscape crossed by deep river-cut valleys - made the prospect of attacking the even lightly defended ensemble seem like suicide. But the feat of engineering was not so awe-inspiring for its apparent military genius as it was for its aesthetic splendour, the masonry serpent flinging itself to improbable hights before promptly falling away, dashing over the green mountains until it finally rose to Simatai on a ridge of jaw-dropping proportions which faded into the distance like a stairway to heaven. The week before I was to leave Dad arrived and I gave him a bit of a tour around Beijing, a place that I had become somewhat accustomed to but which he found to be as alien as another planet. We explored the 798 Art District, an incredibly inspiring contemporary art scene which has emerged from the Bauhaus industrial landscape. For Mom's birthday we flew to Xi'an, the historic walled city which had been a centre of power for much of China's early days as an empire. We stayed in a traditional courtyard house which had been converted into a hostel and visited perhaps two of the most significant archaeological sites in the area - among the most significant in the world, in fact - on Mom's birthday: the tomb and terracotta army of Qin Shihuangdi, the first Emperor of China, and Banpo village, a matriarchal community of China's Neolithic. The next day we planned to walk around the city walls, but they were closed "for protection." We did not realize why until we headed into the centre of town to find a large demonstration being broken up by police which, it was explained to us, was an anti-Japanese rally sparked by tensions that had recently re-emerged over the ownership of the Diauyu / Sinkaku Islands. We saw several smashed and overturned Japanese-brand cars, and all businesses flew the Chinese flag and had nationalist slogans scrawled across their store-fronts. We instead went to the Little Wild Goose Pagoda, a thousand year-old twelve-story Buddhist pagoda (it had been taller before lightening had struck off the top stories). We stopped in at a little gallery where a man taught Dad and I some calligraphy. I showed one of the owners my sketchbook and she was impressed, asking me if I was a famous artist. "I'm not," I said, pointing at Dad, "but he is!" and they begged him to paint something for them. He denied it, but they took us to the back of the gallery where a calligrapher was at work on a large table laid out with an impressive array of traditional equipment, explained the situation to him, and he quickly moved aside and set up a sheet of paper for Dad. The owners watched in puzzlement as Dad painted an abstract composition with the long calligraphic brushes, but his fellow painter stood in wonder. Although he spoke no English, he burst out in happiness when Dad was finished and presented him with a painting of blossoms which he selected from his collection and pulled out a camera, insisting on having their picture taken together. We said farewell, climbed the pagoda where I had a conversation with a local history enthusiast of about my age, then we headed to the Muslim Quarter for dinner. We dined on snacks as we wandered the cobbled streets and narrow allies, busy with business even in the rain, and laughed at Dad being pulled into bargaining with the ruthless salespeople. We bought wonderful naan fresh from a sidewalk tandoor with a group of men around it who wanted to converse with us in their minimal English and my minimal Mandarin, and I confused the matter further by greeting them in Arabic. As we headed back toward our hostel we found the main street barred by police officers standing shoulder to shoulder, and had to walk almost to the north wall before we could skirt them. Soon I was on my way back to North America, leaving Mom and Dad for another few weeks in Beijing. I stopped over in Tokyo after a thorough security check, and a reporter was waiting to ask me about the protests as soon as I disembarked. After another long flight via Tokyo and Portland to Vancouver I took the skytrain and bus to Horseshoe Bay and the ferry to Langdale, breathing in the missed West Coast air, and Uncle John met me as I landed on the Sunshine Coast. He had seen my Uncle Rick and Cousin Alice, so we went to visit them at Alice's figure skating class at the Robert's Creek rec centre and had dinner with them and Aunty Lisa (at a Japanese restaurant, ironically!) As John and I finally drove through the night-time forest to his home I was on the edge of sleep, seeing ghostly Chinese architecture materialize in the trees. We had a good few days together, visiting and hiking, then I headed over to Victoria. Bill met me at the ferry terminal and we had a long drive back to the house, catching up on our musings. I stayed with him and Maureen and visited many of my friends, including our traditional potluck and jam session with them, Berry, Carmen, Derek, Joanne, Ashley, and Ned, a UVic prof who I had met on the Camino, and my great friend Madeline also organized a party with some of my wonderful CCSS friends (yarr!) All too soon I headed back to Ottawa where Harry and I held down the fort in Mom and Dad's absence. I got down to looking for work in the area and ended up in Mom's office (although a different branch) in a clerical position at CIC's litigation branch. It has been very intense and I have been learning a lot working with a great group of colleagues. Besides the ever more hectic work, we spent the days leading up to Christmas taking turns baking deserts and making a very ugly sweater for our long-suffering Muslim boss. I'm continuing to try to be involved in my community, temporary and busy as I might be. In the last week I have had the honour to support the Idle No More movement, marching with thousands of aboriginals and allies from Chief Teresa Spense's tepee to Parliament Hill and volunteering in the preparation of the feast that followed on the 21st, and joining in the round dance outside 24 Sussex Drive the next day. Mom and I are volunteering with the Ottawa Chamber Music Society and going to some great concerts, I took part in PowerShift, a nation-wide youth climate conference, started volunteering with the Ontario NDP in anticipation of spring provincial elections in Ontario and BC, I've gone to Question Period in the House of Commons, got to visit with some of my CFS BC friends at the Canadian Federation of Students AGM, have gone to several Sisters in Spirit and Truth and Reconciliation Commission events, visited with the surprisingly large diaspora community of Victoria friends in town, gone for some good bike rides and hikes, and have been going to Quaker Friend's meetings with Mom and Dad. Dad recently had his birthday, for which we went to a great Jesse Cook concert, and had an art show with the Stone Bridge artists. We've all been keeping up with Uncle John as he has been working through an amazing time to purchase the property that he has lived on and farmed for decades, and we're considering the opportunity to join him to help create the agricultural / spiritual / social community that he and Gran have envisioned there for a long time. I'm enjoying the time with the family, but I am very much looking forward to returning to Victoria this spring to continue my Anthropology degree at UVic. My plans aren't yet set in stone and I'm still looking for a place to stay and some part-time employment, so if you happen to know of anything or anyone please let me know! So lots happening with me / us! How about you? We'd love to hear from you, as always, and hope that you and yours are well. Blessings for an amazing new year! May it be filled with unexpected adventure, deep insight, and realized love. Your friend, Bradley Ottawa, Ontario

Learning How To Walk: Muxia - Barcelona - Madrid - Montreal

Hello again! After my pilgrimage ended physically in Finisterre and I sent you my last email I have made my way back to Mom and Dad's place in Ottawa and have had a neat little trip back that I'll try to summarize here... I spent one day in Finisterre, going back out to the Cape to watch a last magnificent sun set, then bid farewell to all of my friends who were still there as I walked alone toward Muxia, 31 km north. I climbed into the mist of the forest in the morning of July 3rd, encountering several pilgrims, some familiar, walking in the opposite direction on the more traditional route from Muxia to Finisterre. As I sat on the new bridge above the barely submerged stepping stones that used to be the only fording of the river, making a sandwich for lunch, a muscular little fellow named John with a big grey beard and jolly eyes came stumping along. We walked together a bit and he turned out to be quite an Australian swagman, having done long distant walks of all kinds in Australia, New Zealand, the British Isles, Spain, Portugal, China, North America, Africa, and more... The next morning I went out to the Cape of Muxia, a medieval site of pilgrimage as legend had it that the Virgin Mary had appeared to St. James on the spot in a stone boat to encourage him on his apocryphal mission in the area. The little Church of the Barques, with models of ships hanging from the ceiling, was built with its main gates right upon the stone beach. Two huge boulders on the rock of the Cape were thought to be the hull and the sail of the boat, and the hull being credited with the ability to cure back problems I lay out upon it, thinking that I'd take any help that was offered to avoid the hereditary arthritis in my family. I climbed as near to the ocean as I could get on the rocky outcrop, the slippery stone and barnacles feeling almost as difficult to navigate as the sharp cliffs of Finisterre. Watching the breaking sea swells rushing toward me, I observed the wooden staff that had carried me from Gimont, France, where I had found it in my time of need on my second day of walking. The bottom end was a rounded stump, the long fibers having rolled back, clipped themselves off, and rolled back once again after 1300 km of hard use. I suppose it's possible that another pilgrim had carried it to the spot next to the Chemin d'Arles where I had found it, making it conceivable that it had walked further than I had. It had kept my balance on difficult paths and stream crossings, protected me from ferocious dogs, relieved my feet, ankles and knees of tones of strain, and had been held to my heart when my heart had need its support. I had even run back in the direction that I had come on several occasions when I had forgotten it somewhere. Now I lifted the length of wood above my head, it having reached the end of its pilgrimage, and threw it like a javelin into the froth of a huge breaking wave. It was carried it torpedo like to the sea to writhed like a free eel through the water. I made my way back to the boulders above the tide mark and donned my sack, feeling slightly strange walking on only my two feet. I climbed the hill behind the church to what had once been a pagan site and sat at the base of the cross that attempted to hide the hill's ancient power at it's summit. I sat there for a long while, observing the little town and the extensive archaeological remains of the foundations of large dense stone habitations that spread out beyond it. Eventually I descended and had lunch at the waterside before catching my bus into Santiago, the first piece of motorized transportation that I had taken since Toulouse, speeding past the places that I had walked by over the course of the previous week in the space of about two hours. John and I walked into Santiago from the bus station, following the Camino and encountering pilgrims having a very different experience as they arrived for the first time. I checked into the same hostel that Florian was staying in, having returned from Finisterre by bus to take one more rest day before returning to Lyon. The bus from Finisterre had been much too fast for him, having been transported by his own power for longer than I had, and now he was bracing himself for the bus trip all the way back to his home where all of his friends would be waiting to see him at a gig that his band would be playing... too much all at once he was afraid. We went out for a wonderful dinner of salmon boiled in olive oil with garlic with another French couple who had walked the Chemin de Puy who we had met on and off over the Camino, and Takei, their Japanese friend who they had met on the Chemin de Puy. The next morning Florian and I bid farewell as he headed for his bus, and I ran some errands before attending the pilgrim mass at the cathedral one last time. I had an early dinner then prominaded the city parks a bit with Ben from Toronto and was delighted to meet Belas and Miriam, the lovely guitar-carrying Catalans who I had enjoyed walking with for a few days on the meseta. The last farewells said, I boarded the bus out to the airport and caught my flight to Barcelona. Over the course of the next few hours I traversed about the same distance as had taken me almost two months to walk and I landed in Barcelona at about 1 am. I took the bus into town, then walked strait to my primary reason for visiting the city: Gaudi's unfinished masterpiece, El Temple Expiatori De La Sagrada Familia. The massive bell towers appeared suddenly before me after a long walk, looming in the darkness, unilluminated in the early morning. I stood before the exploding Western portal of the transept, the Passion Gate, and muttered to myself "this guy was nuts! This guy was absolutely off - his - rocker," and I marveled at the genius of a mad man when it was allowed to manifest. I walked around the entire basilica, wondering at the glowing abstraction of the stained glass of the apse and the enigmatic bell towers that rose into oblivion in the distant darkness. Having slept only very little on the flight, I used my pack as a pillow on a park bench in the treed plaza flanking the Western transcept and slept a little. I arose as the early sun caressed the stone and went around to the Nativity portal as the pure white doves sculpted into the East transept took celebratory flight. After marveling at the sight in the quiet of the lonely morning, mirrored in the flat pond of the plaza before it, I walked back toward the centre of town, through the Atlantis of timelessly fantastical architecture and luxurious gardens. I stopped for breakfast and walked through the huge parks and plazas of the Arc de Triumf with their extraordinary gardens, fountains and statuary before entering the medieval Jewish Quarter, passing the ancient Roman fortifications, and entering the Picasso museum. With an exemplary collection of Pablo Picasso's early works housed in his home town and set in chronological order I came to much better understand the father of Cubism, especially as I had now visited several of the places he had grown up in. I ate lunch in a beautiful plaza, then checked into a hostel and visited several art exhibitions and pieces of Gaudi's architecture on my way to and from booking an overnight train to Madrid for the next evening. After eating a delicious vegetarian quiche for dinner in the park I enjoyed a free solo concert of Bach's Solo Cello Suites intermixed with contemporary works, sitting below the huge ornate fountain of Venus in the glow of the setting sun. I did not sleep very well as I had unwittingly checked into a party hostel - the other being full - and was awakened in the middle of the night by my drunken room mates. The next morning I headed back to the Sagrada Familia and continued to stare at it as the line to enter the basilica wound around the building blissfully slowly. The sheer beauty and uniqueness of Gaudi's style was mind blowing, and I wandered around the huge building, inside and out, for over four hours. Afterward I walked up to the architect's Park Guell and walked around the wonderland of structures which grew from the stone of the Earth. I then went to attend a Catalan mass in the Crypt of the Sagrada Familia, next to the tomb of Antonio Gaudi himself. Afterward I went to touch the waters of the Mediterranean, where so much of my imagination had sailed. Realizing I had misjudged the distance to the train station, I began walking quickly towards it, weaving through the crowds of tourists which had congregated on La Rambla, and soon broke into an all out sprint. I arrived, having run half the width of Barcelona, my clothing and hair soaked with sweat from my long run, ten minutes after my train had departed. I briefly lamented the fact that I had wasted the ideal train and the fare for it until the station closed and I lay out my poncho and sheet on the tobacco-littered sidewalk and went to sleep there on the ground rather than in my bed that was speeding toward Madrid. The station was open again by the time I awoke and I got on the next, faster and more expensive train and sped across the barren Don Quixote landscape to arrive in Madrid only about an hour after the other train would have. I went strait to the Museo del Prado, the huge national art gallery of Spain, long renowned for its outstanding collection of masterpieces by the Old Masters, where a Classical guitar player picked the Spanish melodies of Fernando Sor and Joaquin Rodrigo. I spent all day just visiting the first half of the gallery, including such pieces that I had studied my whole life as Pieter Brueghel's "The Triumph of Death," Heronymous Bosch's "Garden of Earthly Delights" triptych, Albreicht Durer's "Self Portrait," Fra Angelico's "Annunciation," and many, many more. Unfortunately the museum closed before I had reached the majority of the works of Titian, Rafael, El Greco, and other greats.... I walked around the parks, plazas, palaces and promenades of Madrid for the rest of the evening - and spent my last Euros on gazpacho, paella, pinchos and helado yogurt for dinner in a small Spanish version of Ottawa's Byward market - before relaxing and observing the bustling Plaza Mayor and eventually retiring to bed in the only single room I had slept in in all of Europe. The following morning I had breakfast and headed out to the airport where I caught my flight to London, where I had a beautiful view of the London Eye, Big Ben, the Tower of London and Westminster Abby as we landed, then transferred to my flight over the Atlantic to Montreal... As I flew back home at a speed hundreds of times faster than that which I had come accustomed to traveling I felt strangely normal, and that confused me. I wrote "It feels like I haven't done anything. That doesn't feel good or bad, just normal. The idea of walking across half of Europe through medieval pilgrim towns to a place called the End of the Earth seems laughably quaint and odd. My memories of the trip seem more distant than those from before it, like a dream, and indeed I don't really believe it happened. I've just awoken with the glorious sound of a majestic organ and a nun's song stuck in my head, and the jolly laughter of people that I love who I may never meet again. I'm flying, but where from? Maybe this is the end of my gestation period, and who can retain the memory of the womb after they have learned to walk? The space before me is as unknown as the space behind, and that emptiness seems too difficult to fill. The perfection of Picasso's knowledge of form drives the frustration to murder it, the magnificence of Gaudi's architecture's product is its insanity. What the hell can I do? [Signed] The Lost Pilgrim." After landing in Montreal I found Dad waiting at Arrivals, having driven from Ottawa. We hugged and drove to the hotel and slept in magnificently comfortable beds... but even though I'd been awake for 24 hours I still woke up at 1 am, the time that I was accustomed to getting up at with the time change. In the morning we made our way to the Musee d'Art Contemporain, visiting several private galleries along the way and having lengthy conversations with their curators. Dad and I thoroughly enjoyed the two small exhibits of exceptional abstract works, mostly by Quebec artists. Although the works were of such a high caliber, so complementing of eachother, and very much in my aesthetic, I think that the experience of having walked and observed beauty without distraction for two months allowed me to enjoy the show much more than I might have before. After our visit we walked back to the hotel and drove to Ottawa with the radio playing in time for dinner with Mom and Harry, a distance that would have taken a week to walk. So here I am in Nepean, the suburb of row houses, highways and strip malls. There are some nice parks around, though, where we walk Max, the dog, and we have a community garden plot to tend to, a nice little garden out back, and a house full of beautiful paintings. I've been playing with paint with Dad a bit in his studio as he experiments with new media, cooking dinners for the family, and catching up with friends. In the next little while I'll be painting the trim on the house, volunteering at the Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival, and travelling for a couple of weeks with Mom, Dad and Harry on the canals in the area. In the meantime I'll have to be studying Mandarin as Mom has been posted to Beijing from late August to October, and I am going to join her there for a bit! I'm hoping to also be able to visit my friends and family in British Columbia a bit on my way to or from China. By the time I get back to Ottawa where I am planning to stay for the next little while I will hopefully be close to pinning down a job to pay for my next few years of university, although the current political economic climate here may not be very conducive. If you have any leads, please do let me know! I'd also like to continue to learn languages, and to continue with my studies through reading and courses while I am taking a short break from school. So I guess this is the last letter of this series, although I may send out something from Beijing. It remains difficult to analyse this pilgrimage, but I know that I have met many good friends, seen and done amazing things, experienced beauty, and learned to move slowly, calmly, simply and naturally, following the guidance of God which becomes clearer when distractions are minimized. Marcus Aurelius said that "very little is needed to be happy." I may be abusing the translation, but I think that the arrangement of words is very apt: perhaps what one needs, in order to be happy, is little. Traveling with all of my necessities minimized to an 8 kilo sack it becomes even more apparent how much we provide for eachother, even across time and space, and how much the Earth, the Universe, God provides for us. I am neither Catholic nor Christian, but I have found that religions and what they have to offer are - or can be - gifts to all of the world rather than exclusive and polarizing clubs. For this reason I felt little discomfort walking on a Catholic path, gratefully accepting Catholic hospitality and prayers, and attending Catholic mass in Catholic cathedrals. As long as I am not seen as an intruder I am comfortable. These things could just as easily have been offered by Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus, Taoists or Atheists, as long as I am accepted by others and I am accepting of them there are many gifts that we can exchange. When I left on this trip my greatest achievement in preparation was my lack of expectations. It could have been a waste of time and money, I could have hated it, I could have been hurt or lost or rejected, but I would still have done it. I didn't walk this path expecting it to be the time of my life as it was, I did it because I was inexplicably called to. I may not yet - I may never - understand why, but the lessons, friends and experiences that I know I have had validate for me that my sense of calling was real. Anyway, life goes on! And, with care, so does the pilgrimage. Thanks so much for accompanying me on the Way, for your well-wishes, and for and being the recipients of these regurgitations of experiences and thoughts. It's been great to hear from some of you, and if we haven't yet we will have to catch up so that I can hear your story of the past few months! !Buen Camino, y Buen Vida! Your friend, Bradley Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Walking to the End of the Earth: Sarria to Santiago de Compostela to Finisterra

¡Hola! I am here, at the end of the known world, in Finisterre, and I will try to tell you how I came to be here since I last emailed... We enjoyed visiting the medieval market and sampling street food at the fiesta in Sarria on the evening of June 23rd, but I had to turn in at my albergue at 11pm before the huge bonfire was lit or the Galacian music had begun. The next day I set off through the Galacian forest with the throngs of new pilgrims who had joined at Sarria to walk the last 100 km, far enough to earn the Compostela document in Santiago. Most of them had no backpack, or only a very small one, their gear being transported by support car, and they tended to have a very different attitude toward the Camino as those from overseas often claimed to be doing it for a vacacion or an athletic experience, and those from Spain were often doing it to improve their resume or for a weekend outing with friends or family. However, I learned from my experience in St.-Jean Pied de Port, which had been similar, not to judge them and to have compassion and comraderie for and with them. Johann (Washington, DC), Mario (Mexico), Justin (Nova Scotia), Joe (Boston), Florian (Lyon, France), Miguel and Emmanual (Portugal) and I passed the 100 km to Santiago mark with great jubilation. That afternoon Joe, Justin, Johann, Florian and I left the camino and walked through forest out to the middle of a field fallow with soft green grass to sleep for the night. We meditated on the beauty of the scene all afternoon - the fields and forests over rolling hills and the distant village of Gonzar - and a wise letter from Johann's girlfriend that he read for us kindeled a deep conversation about community and God as we sat in a circle and broke bread for dinner. The sun set in the clear sky and the stars unveiled themselves slowly until the entire sky had exploded with them. We had a jolly game of cards by the light of our headlamps, then lay in wonder of the starry field in our sleeping bags. I slept wonderfully, and when I awoke I poked my head out of the sleeping bag to look at the stars again and instead found the sun rising and Joe and Justin packed and ready to go. I walked through lovely forests to Casanova that day, meeting with Florian and Johann again on the way. Stopping in Palace do Rei Florian and I encountered one of the Irish women who I had met in O Ceibrero when they had started just before Sarria, and he and I felt very uncomfortable with the heaps of praise that she lay at our feet for the distance we had walked. I tried to explain that all pilgrims have made great accomplishments, that distance was all relative, and that starting places in today's world have become fairly arbitrary, but she insisted on calling us her heros and on taking our picture without standing with us. People walking only the last 100 km responded after asking where I had started walking with "why in God's name did you start in TOULOUSE?!" and, although I could explain the logistical, symbolic, historical and geographical reasons, I tried to explain that it really doesn't matter where we start from because we all start from our home and the Camino guides us from there. There was no food when we arrived in Casanova, so Daniel, Nathan (Texas), Geena (Australia), Gordon (Scotland), Johann and I strolled back through the last kilometer of lovely forest without our backpacks to buy sandwiches at the bar for everyone back at the albergue, and the bartender kept us delighted with free tapas while we waited for the huge order. The next day we walked through the scortching heat until we reached the river crossed by a medieval bridge with the original pilgrim hostal which had been renovated on the other side, and we could walk no further. We checked in then jumped in the cold flowing river for the afternoon. The day before Santiago in Arca O Pino the next evening I was just walking up from the albergue when I saw Joe and Justin, who we all thought had already arrived in Santiago ahead of us, walking into town. Justin had been sick, and Mario had wanted to walk ahead, so they had walked a short day and fallen behind us. "You saw Justin?" Florian said when he heard, "and Joe? You've been eating mushrooms." The whole crew of us had dinner together, Miguel subtly cheering for Portugal as the football game played on the TV in the restaurant full of Spainish as the two countries played eachother to go to the finals. That night Florian, Daniel, Nathan, Geena, Justin, Joe and I got up at 2 am to begin our last 20 km into Santiago. We walked through the dark forest by the light of our headlamps, startled once by the bright green eyes of what turned out to be a friendly dog, until the sky paled into the morning at Monte de Gozo. I let the others go ahead and walked slowly into the loud suburbs, feeling the aches of 1200 km, tired and flea-bitten from the blanket I had used in the last albergue, but calm as well, with the whole trip scrolling through my mind. I entered the Old Town and the crosses on top of the cathedral spires came into view above the rooftops and I was overwhelmed with emotion. I walked slowly, feeling my heart pounding as I held my staff to my chest, and followed the scallop shells through the winding streets. As I emerged into the plaza in front of the cathedral I realized that I was arriving in the place that I had been focusing on for years, and that my life had led to this moment, and I was literally brought to my knees on the cobbels. The bells of the cathedral struck 8, and they had struck 8:15 before I could even raise my head from my fetal kneel and be humbled again by the utter magnificence of the Baroque fascade and the unbelievability of being before it. Eventually I walked slowly to the back of the plaza where my friends waited and hugged them, seeing the God that is in each one. We entered into the Romanesque interior, empty in the morning, and the stark and austere huge barrel vault of the aisle inspired more awe than the magnificence of Burgos and Leon combined. I descended into the crypt bellow the altar and encountered an apostle of Christ, the ultimate focal point of over 1000 years of prayer and pilgrimage in a little box of radiant silver. I then climbed into the huge Baroque altarpiece and embraced the central figure of the apostle, his robe of silver studded with gems... We then arrived in the pilgrim office and waited in line for about five minutes to receive our Compostellae, the latin certificate confirming that we had completed the pilgrimage, and by the time we had got it the lineup filled the courtyard. We then all sat together in the main aisle of the cathedral - Florian, Joe, Justin, Geena, Nathan, Daniel, Gordon, Johann, Miguel - and Mario, who had arrived the day before, greeted us before going to don his priests robes for the pilgrim mass. The organs blared their magnificent song above us, intwined with the perfect voice of a nun and a thousand pilgrims, and Mario read the gospel. Amazed at our good fortune, a pilgrim having paid for it to be swung each day of the week, the Botafumeiro which was usually only used on significant feast days was lowered and lit. The organ played gloriously as the cloud of white smoke rose from the huge incense burner and it lept into the air and began swinging. Back and forth it swung until it seemed to be in danger of coliding with the ceiling of the vault, trailing smoke like a silver comet. When it finally came to rest above the altar and a priest caught it in mid-flight and spun to break its momentum and the organ blasted a grand finalle we burst into aplause. I caught a glimpse of one Englishman I'd met who'd been complaining that he haden't had any very powerful experiences on the Camino, and he had tears streaming down his cheeks. We all went out for tapas for lunch, and that evening met for drinks to celebrate the 50th birthday of Dave, from England. Justin, Joe and I sat in the park near our albergue and watched the setting sun illuminate the facade of the cathedral which dominated the entire city, and every time I looked up at the spires I could not help but to shake my head in disbelief... I fell asleep, still watching the lit spires from my bedside window in the albergue, but rose to the unpleasant news that there were bedbugs there. We put everything that had been in contact with the beds through the dryer and sprayed our backpacks until we were fairly sure we were safe. I went to the pilgrim mass again, then got lunch and headed out of town again toward Finisterre, the ultimate end of the road. I topped the first big rise and bid farewell to the cathedral then walked on. It felt like my first day out of Toulouse, walking almost alone with a new goal on a new path - my feet even began hurting the same, even after 1200 km - but I knew now that Santiago was the true end and the goal. The next two days were the two longest of the camino, 33 and 34 km, and I was limping with wounds that I had never had in my previous fifty days of walking, but the land was beautiful, the company was wonderful, and as I neared the coast I anticipated the sight of the sea. Yesterday, July 1st, three days out of Santiago, I saw it, misty and obscured, and I adorned my backpack, staff, hat and necklace with wildflowers as I descended down towards it. The road descended steeply and I arrived finally at the beach of white fine sand. I removed my boots and rolled up my pants and walked the rest of the way, the Atlantic bathing my wounded and wary feet, and I picked up scallop shells from the sand. After checking into an albergue and eating a seafood paella I began the 4 km walk out to the tip of the cape, the furthest West point in Europe, the Celtic End of the Earth. I reached the waymarker reading 0,0 km at the lighthouse as the sun descended into the veiling mist. I descended the ragged cliff-face, amongst the harths where pilgrims had burned their travel-worn clothes, toward the roaring sea, and the wall of sharp black rock hid me from the rest of the Earth, leaving me alone with the vast Atlantic... When I climbed back up to where Aaron, Joe, Florian and Justin were perched on a rockey pinacle we set our socks on fire, gagging at the sweat-smoke. "That's the pilgrim menu for you," I said, getting everyone laughing. We held hands in a circle around the flames which symbolized the end of our pilgrimage and each said a prayer, thanking our Gods for the love and friendship that we had found, the protection and perfection that we had been granted, for the questions that we had answered and those that we had come to ask, and we hugged eachother, our new lifelong friends. Today Joe caught the bus to Madrid, and tomorrow I will continue walking north along the coast to Muxia to end my pilgrimage alone and contimplate it in solitude. I will then return by bus to Santiago, from where I will fly on the evening of the 5th to Barcelona to see Gaudi's architecture, then to Madrid for my flight back to Montreal and bus to Ottawa. Mom has recently been chosen to work in Beijing for a month, and I will be looking for work in Ottawa for the next months. Leaving this lifestyle will be strange. I am accustomed to waking in a dormatory of bustling pilgrims, sitting up in bed and packing my stuff, walking, stopping, showering, living out of a backpack, cooking, eating communally, and sleeping. I don't know what lays ahead, but I know it will be a continuing adventure. ¡Buen Camino! Bradley Finisterre, Galacia, Spain

Learning How To Walk: Santo Domingo de la Calzada to Sarria

Caminante Caminante, son tus huellas el camino, y nada más; caminante, no hay camino, se hace camino al andar. Al andar se hace camino, y al volver la vista atrás se ve la senda que nunca se ha de pisar. Caminante, no hay camino, sino estelas en la mar. Walker, the way is your tracks And nothing more. Walker, there is no way The way is made by walking. By walking you make a path And turning, you look back At a way you will never tread again Walker, there is no road Only wakes upon the sea. Antonio Marciado ¡Hola! After writing to you last from Santo Domingo de la Calzada Mario, Joe, Justin, Florian, Jurgen and I continued on with Bijan and Isabel from the US to the little town of Belorado. We passed the first albergue with the atmosphere of a tourist resort to the place run by a kind volunteer hospitalero. He was skeptical that the ruins on the hill above the village were those of a castle, as guidebooks liked to claim, and upon learning that I had studied archaeology he sent me up to investigate for him. I climbed up the hill behind the old church with huge stork nests in the belfrey with Kyle, from Arkansas, to have a look at the site. It was very interesting, constructed of the vernacular style of round cobbles embedded in mortar and encorperated into the natural rock formation. I figured it might have been a defensive feature as it appeared to have a human dug moat on the side that lacked a natural slope and a 180 degree view of the countryside, but it was neither large nor well engineered or situated and had nothing strategic to defend. That evening I worked around a group of five Portuguese bikers who eminated an aura of agression and disrespect, as I attempted to make pasta for Florian, Joe and I, but after I had convinced them to let me use the only pot after they were finished cooking we had a nice meal in the garden. The next morning the same bikers got up before dawn and talked, laughed and farted loudly and turned on the bright lights, waking up everyone else. We were all somewhat resentful of them, but they taught us to be conscious of our interactions with our fellow pilgrims, and I wished them a buen camino as they sped past us on the road. We walked up and down hills, through forest, and past lines of windmills, and the presence of the highway not far away got Florian thinking and discussing with me. The highway, he proposed, was a symbol of modern society, fast, loud, invasive, unobserving, and unconscious, while the camino that we walked upon represented an alternative based on faith, generosity, flexibility and connectedness with the world around us. He observed that of our group of friends we had walked the longest, and yet we trailed the furthest in the rear, walking the slowest. We paused at San Juan de Ortega to visit the cathedral with the relic of another Saint who had worked in the 11th Century to improve the Way for pilgrims, then, enjoying the walk, continued on to Ages. Seeing that the others were getting tired I stopped with them there, but I lay in my bed in the little town and cursed my stupidity for not having continued the short distance to Atapuerca, perhaps the most important archaeological and biological anthropology site in Europe. The next morning my heart broke a little as I walked past the closed information centre and up the rugged and ancient slope past the barbed wire of the military zone which barred my entry to the shrubbed landscape which enshrined the site, only 3 km away. Dark and bruding clouds raced across the sky, like in a paleontology documentary, and a feirce wind tore against me, carrying heavy raindrops. I dug a stone from the ancient ground and laid it at the foot of the cross at the summit and descended into Burgos´ industrial area with Isabel and Bijan, the saintly catholics resciting the rosary into the gale. We walked past the airport and along the six-lane highway through Burgos´ industrial area and commercial suburbs, sickened after the tranquility of the rural countryside, and were releaved to finally arrive in the old town. We lined up with the other pilgrims to check into the albergue in the renovated 18th Century building, and I was stunned as I turned around and was caught off guard by the sight of the cathedral. I stood transfixed by the stone lace of the crowning spires, alive with carvings. When I entered the cathedral after it re-opened after siesta I was as dumbfounded as Mario and Jurgen who I saw inside, their jaws hanging. I walked through the medieval Gothic, Renaissance, Rococo, Baroque, and Classic ambulatory chapels adorned with tombs, paintings, carvings and decoration of as many eras. The transcept spire was a vision of heaven, the distant crystal skylight exploding light down upon the carvings that circled up towards it. My jaw hanging and neck aching from staring upward, I continued into the apse chapel, known as the cathedral within the cathedral, to find the floral crystal skylight there which was as achingly beautiful as the transcept one was awe-inspiring. My stunned senses were somewhat soothed in the cloister, softly illuminated in stained glass. After leaving the cathedral, feeling like I´d been beaten into a state of tranquility, I joined the others for drinks and paella to bid farewell to Jurgen, the pleasant German IT law professional who had been walking with us for some time but now had to catch a train to return to Starsburg the next evening. He had not initially intended to finish the Camino in the one time, but now he was sad to be leaving and we were sad to be loosing him. Afterward Mario, Joe and I went to the pilgrims blessing in a chapel of the cathedral before bed. I was awoken, probably around 3 am, by loud revelry in the streets on the morning of Corpus Christi, and the next morning as Jurgen and I prominaded the town waiting for the Museum of Human Evolution to open the entire city was dead silent and abandoned apart from ourselves and the pidgeons. The Museum never did open: when we, along with several others waiting outside, pointed to the sign which stated that it was open on fiestas the woman inside promptly removed it. Instead I bid a last farewell to Jurgen and headed to the monastary where a crowd was gathering and huge manikins of warriors and queens were waiting for the procession. I heard mass with the archbishop, crammed in the standing room behind the choir, and was rather surprized that there was not enough bread and wine to give everyone communion, leaving some very disappointed faces on the day of remembering Christ´s body. The procession left the monastery, with the huge manikins in the vanguard followed by dancing boys and knights in Renaissance garb, the clergy in their white robes, a military band, and the rear was taken up by a show of martial force by a regiment of goose-stepping soldiers. I found Isabel and Bijan as I waded through the crowd toward the park where the festivities were continuing, and we wandered around enjoying tapas, ice cream, traditional dancing, and tortillas baked in ovens and paella stirred with oar-like spoons in massive dishes. Eventually, as the days pilgrims were arriving, we fled the haze of cottontree dust and cooking smoke and set out on the Camino. The road was beautiful with flowers, flattening into the meseta, and after about 20 km the ground dropped away suddenly into a bowl which held the little town of Hornillos del Camino. There Isabel and Bijan continued on and I remained, sitting in the dying rays of the sun at the foot of the church wall with all the other pilgrims, including Florian, Ned - a UVic prof! - and a classical guitar-playing German. I slept in the village gymnasium, the albergue being full, and although it was a large space with few sleepers it also had good acoustics and one snorer. The next day Florian and I walked with Flavia, an Italian, to the ruins of the convent of San Anton. The ancient gothic ribs rose broken toward the sky, home to birds and a little albergue that had been built into the side of one of the walls. We wandered, astounded by the mystical fantasy of the place, and Florian found a guitar sitting on the albergue table and asked me to play songs that I had written. We played together a bit, and the hospitalero came over and offered us wine and began to play Spanish songs. The pilgrims from Barcelona, Belas and Mariam, arrived with their guitar and shakers and soon a crowd began to grow, singing and clapping along. One could not have imagined a better setting for a concert! After a great time we filtered away, and I remained to draw the ruins in my journal before continuing on. I entered the town of Castrojeritz, approaching the Romanesque church which stood by the road overlooked by the ruins of a castle which was perched on a steep hill that jutted up from the flat valley. I cooked dinner for Florian, Kyle and I that night, and the next morning Florian and I climbed out of the little valley and along the plateau, a flat table of land that rose to meet the flat table of cloud above. The earth plunged away bellow us as we reached the edge of the plateau where the wind slammed into our chests as hard as the sight of the view... The meseta, the flat plain of northern Spain, stretched before us, the horison fading into the depths of the distance, and the wind raced across it from the Atlantic to meet us. We cried "Ultreia!" and descended into the flatness singing Every Valley from Handel´s Messiah. We held out our arms and let the wind carress them, as though we were flying, and leaned into the unrelenting gale. We spent the night in Fromista, playing guitar in the albergue garden with Belas, Mariam, Ned, Flavia, and Leana, and visited the Romanesque church which sparked some anger by charging an entry fee which is common in Spain but which we felt was wrong. The following day we continued to Carrion de los Condes where Flavia cooked Italian pasta, Ned a great potato dish and greek salad, and we played guitar and sang long into the evening. The next day was a long expanse of unbroken meseta, and I sat down on the road, the distant pilgrims disapearing behind my lowered horison, and meditated upon the flat place where red earth met blue sky. I sat there, like the many beetles upon the flowers, until Belas passed and said "He must have run out of chocolate" (I had explained my chocolate addiction to him, saying that it was the fuel that allowed me to walk) and I burst out laughing. We parted ways in the next town as Florian and I continued on to Terradillos de los Templarios, an old Templar stronghold where there was one bed remaining in the albergue and I happily slept on the floor. I walked out of the village the next morning as the sun rose over it, gilding the fields, and Florian caught up with me as I explored the next village of subterranean hill-homes and adobe buildings. We meditated together, and I continued to meditate as I walked into Sahagun. There the bull pens were errected in the streets for the evening´s fiesta, and a very kind hostess served us deliscious pastries at the cafe. I crossed the busy highway to take an alternate route along the route of the 2000 year old Roman road, and caught up with Gordon, Geena, Daniel, Nathan and Kyle with whom I walked and discussed politics, anthropology and our society´s fate. In Calzadilla de los Hermanillos the cheerful service of the dwarf at the store more than made up for the quality of his bread, which Florian the Frenchman rapped with his knuckle and said "Oh no......" We had a great dinner, cooked by Zeb and Lindsay, a couple from Chicago on honeymoon, and were joined by our very jubilant hospitalero. The following day was 25 km of flat nothingness, uninterupted by villages or any other distractions and I walked through all of it in meditation, saving me the boring slog that other pilgrims reported to have experienced. In Mansilla de los Mulas, a little town still protected by a deteriorating 11th Century wall with Arab crenelations, Gordon from Scotland made a big spicy chili for Nathan and Daniel of Texas, Geena of Australia, and Florian and I. Afterward we sat in the courtyard, calmed by minimalist guitar and singing from three Japanese women, and shared drawings, poems, music and writing. I walked onto Leon the next morning, while many took the bus to avoid the walk along the highway and through suburbs of warehouses... Releaved to be arriving in the Old City, out of the noise and commercialism of the new town surrounding it, I checked into the Benedictine convent where I met Florian, Justin and other friends. Florian and I ate a great reunion lunch with Justin, who had continued walking with Joe and Mario when they had gone on ahead from Burgos and was now taking a rest day while they were up north where Mario was performing a wedding. After the meal of calamarie with its ink on rice, cod with peas and asperagus, and cheesecake I went to the great cathedral of Leon. Although the aisle of piercing pillars of stained glass did not inspire the same awe in me as Burgos' cathedral had, the relative purity of the Gothic form held an elegance second to none. After a day of prominading the town I went to the nun's evening prayer, before which a kindly old sister prepped us. "¿Todos peregrinos?" ("Is everyone here a pilgrim?") she asked us all. "Si," ("Yes") everyone replied. "¿Caminantes?" ("Walkers?") "Si." "¿Turismos?" ("Tourists?") Gordon was the only one who said "Si," and everyone else laughed. When the sisters blessed us after the evening of prayer, telling us with staggering heartfelt sincerity, as they did every single evening of the year, that their community was praying for us, we were all humbled by their care and dedication. The following morning I stayed in Leon to visit the pantheon of the basilica of San Isidoro, the Romanesque tomb whose low vaulted ceilings were vibrant with frescos sheltering the sarcophogi of dozens of kings, queens, princes and princesses of Leon, the 11th to 13th Century Emporors of Christian Spain. I then continued back into the plains beyond the suburbs of Leon to Vilar de Manzarife where I stayed at the Refugio del Jesus, a place with messages and drawings left by pilgrims on all the walls, and played guitar with Florian and Aaron of Australia (who put Florian and I to shame with his skill and knowledge) for Geena, Gordon, Daniel and Nathan. The next day Aaron and I walked across the plain until we encountered Florian walking with Miguel and Emmanual of Portugal who were singing movie soundtracks and possing their long shaddows with broad-brimmed hats on the earth path like cowboys from The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. Pausing by a cross in the shade we met a German woman whose calm reminded me of the purpose of the Camino. We walked with her for a distance until we met Gordon resting under a contorted tree, and the woman took a thumbpiano mounted on a rawhide-stretched frame from her bag and began to play. Her pure voice soothed the crystaline notes as they drifted up into the wind-rippled trees, and we were all astounded. The last notes had faded away and the trees had murmured a long conversation before we rose and continued on our way. We climbed up to a windy and barren plateau where a barefoot man sat behind a windbreak next to a lone compound and offered us organic food and drink, and he was anticipating the German woman's coming. She went with him behind the wind break and sang for him. We strained to hear the music through the wind, but recognized that it was not for our ears and continued on, the mysterious wind-swept notes beautifying the bleak plain... We tired quickly as we finally decended into Astorga, and we had a meal in the Plaza Mayor with Florian, Justin, Miguel, Emmanuel, Danial, Nathan and Geena, entertained by Miguel's torrents of Portuguese swear words as Portugal played Holland in the football game on the restaurant TV. For breakfast the next morning in the chocolate-manufacturing city I had chocolate con churros and a neopolitan: stunning! Justin's boots had been stolen and he was running around in borrowed shoes trying to find the culprit, and Florian had the worst blisters and the poorest moral he had had since Lyon. I left the little city past the Episcopal Palace, Gaudi's masterpiece of gothic-influenced architecture next to the romanesque/gothic/baroque cathedral. The German woman arrived in a little village as I was finishing snacking on some tapas there, and I steepeled my hands before her and said "Thank you for your music yesterday. It helped me to see God." The power of her uncontrolled weeping upon hearing the last words continued to stun me as I walked on, and I stopped only to write a short poem about the road and the feelings of that day. Today two roads ran together One white, one red Unintwined. There is a scripture inscribed In the stone of the Earth, Unremembered. Un-noticed, but remaining, Indecipherable, but on the verge Of being Understood With time. The albergue in Rabinal del Camino was a beautifully renovated old building next to a Benedictine monastery, run by the English Confraternity of Saint James. We were welcomed in perfect English - and Florian in perfect French - and tea and biscuits. Mario and Joe arrived to excited greetings, and they shared stories of the great time they'd had at the wedding. We all ate a meal together before going to evening prayer in the austere church where the German woman sang again. Afterward I meditated on the spectacular sky - pink and purple in the setting sun with a distant vertical rainbow - and upon the quartz stone, smooth and round from rolling upon the BC beach where I had found it, which I would lay at the foot of the Cruz de Ferro the next day. When I arrived there, silent amid the crowds of loud pilgrims and bikers and the refreshment vans which had come to commercialize the place, I sat and waited for all of the other pilgrims to clear. When they finally did I climbed the huge cairn, walking upon the prayers of one thousand years of pilgrims, and lay my stone touching the wooden pillar of the iron cross continued on without a backward glance. Suddenly I was in the mountains, descending through the beautiful landscape without ever having climbed into it, marvelling at every view... In Monlinaseca I checked into the albergue - a church that had been converted with a nautical design - and had dinner next to the Roman bridge with Dave, Andy, Florian, Justin, Joe and Mario. The following day I walked through Ponferada, past its Templar castle, through a little village where a man gave me a handful of some of the best cherries I've ever eaten, and found Joe, Mario, Florian and Justin just as they and I were about to stop in a park for lunch. We reached the albergue where we hoped to stay just as it began raining, but it was all reserved so we continued walking. Finally we arrived in Villafranca at the end of a 31 km day, its ancient monuments misty in the mountain valley. The mountain views were stunning the next morning as we climbed through forests to La Faba where Aaron, Justin, Florian and I stayed, and arriving in the little stone albergue next to the church in the tiny village felt like coming home. I made a pasta for dinner which all of the guys were very happy with, and Florian, the Lyonese from the gastronomic capital of France, gave me the ultimate cooking compliment: "I am sure," he said, thumb to forefinger, "that in a past life you were French!" As I sat playing guitar after eating the German hospitalera came running over and told me to come to play in the church for the evening prayer. The priest told me in a panic that it was his first day in the parish and he had come on a moment´s notice as the regular priest was dealing with a medical emergency. I told him I was glad I wasn't the only one improvising. I played the music for the prayers, and afterward one of my own songs. The next day I continued the climb into the province of Galacia and the town of O Cebriero as a mountain mist crawled over the crest and was discipated by the morning sun. I encountered the priest again, standing on the Camino in his black Franciscan robes chatting with the pilgrims in each of his eight languages, and he greeted me jubilently. "My musician!" After the gorgeous walk through forest and little stone towns I arrvied in Triacastela in time to get the second to last bed in the town which marked my 43rd day and 1010th kilometer of walking since Toulouse. Today, June 23rd, I walked through the forest and tiny slate villages to Sarria, via Samos, one of Spain's oldest monasteries. I planned to avoid this town where hundreds of pilgrims begin for the sake of obtaining the Compostellae in Santiago - a document prooving that a pilgrim has walked 100 km - but there is a fiesta here this evening so I have compromised. It is difficult to comprehend that there are only five days left to Santiago de Compostela, followed by another five to Muxia and Finisterra. I am enjoying the walk so thoroughly that I have slowed to a crawl and am taking all of the long-cuts that I can find, but I think I am also at peace with the idea of completion. I am still - kind of - contemplating plans for my return after the pilgrimage involving flying out from Madrid on July 9th and the posibility of a visit to Barcelona or Toledo, but that will largely wait until my return from Finisterra... I hope that you are all very well! Ultreia! Bradley Sarria, Galacia, Spain

Learning How To Walk: St.-Jean Pied de Port to Santo Domingo de la Calzada

¡Hola! Today I have reached my half-way point, kilometer wise, from Toulouse to Santiago (554 km, which means a lot of things, but most importantly that I have to buy drinks for the other pilgrims tonight...)! Since I last wrote to you the Camino has changed drastically as I have entered Spain and joined the much more populous Camino Frances. I spent a rest day in St.-Jean Pied de Port, chatting with Alaxandre the Basque philosopher as we meandered around the citadel, sat in little coffee shops, and ate lunch in his 500 year-old home (next to the 600 year-old cathedral) which had been in his family for nearly as long. It was an interesting experience sitting and watching all of the pilgrims leave the town in the cloudy morning, leaving me behind. St.-Jean was a bit of a shocking experience: hundreds of pilgrims milled through the little town which was filled with a commercialism of pilgrim pariphinalia and romanticism that was quite at odds with the experience that I had been having on the Chemin d´Arles and the Voie Piemont. Giles, the French man that I had walked the Voie Piemont with, bid me farewell and got on a train to continue on the Camino del Norte on the northern coast of Spain to flee the pilgrim crowds. I was skeptical for the first time that so many people were propelled by deep motivation, and didn´t know how to react to so many people of so many ages and nationalities when for the past two weeks I had gotten used to walking virtually alone or with French people in their 60's. The next morning I set off early in the morning, passing masses of fellow pilgrims, and the route almost immediately began slopping upward towards the Pass of Roncanvaux over the Pyrenees. The day was clear and the views were breathtaking. Although the way was steadily steep and arduous, it was much easier than I had expected following four days on the hilly Voie Piemont. The majority of the other pilgrims, however, were walking this long and difficult step as their first day from St.-Jean, and many were having difficulty. The skepticism that I had felt earlier in the day which - I hate to admit it now - had even led me to hope that the climb would filter out the less passionate ones, quickly transformed into compassion as I saw the pain and dispair on the faces of my fellow pilgrims, and I began the next stage of my journey which has been a communal one. Walking alone or with more experienced pilgrims in France I had prayed a lot for myself - something which I generally don't like to do - but now I was compelled to pray for and think of my fellow pilgrims and pay much less mind to my own hopes and needs. I paused at a rock outcrop topped by a Marian shrine over a cliff of magnificent views, continued past a herd of cattle being directed by a fast-running little boy with a long stick, drank from the fountain of Roland where Charlemagne's finest cavalier was killed by the Basques, crossed the boarder into Navarre - Spain - marked by a stone stele, and reached the summit of the pass at over 1700 m above sea level. Near there I met a group of French pilgrims who had walked the Chemin de Puy with a 23 year-old named Florien who had not seen any other youths since he had walked from his home in Lyon and readily befriended me. We descended through the cathedral-like beech trees into Spain singing pilgrim songs and soon reached the ancient pilgrim complex of Rancesvalles. We checked into the huge hostel with 200 spaces, corraled into line to pay and have our credencials stamped before going up to the huge modern dormitories - completely different from the soothing hospitality of France - before going to have a drink and getting harrassed by Florien's companions for not having gone to the cathedral first. The cathedral was stunning in its darkness slashed by stained glass, and as I knelt alone before the statue of Santiago his soft eyes stared firmly but gently into my own, completely understanding of all that I had been through to visit him, and calmly expectant that I would continue. I played cards with other pilgrims outside before being called back to the cathedral by a clarion of bells to recieve the pilgrim's blessing. Upon entering the church the organ blasted out its glorious song and the priests marched down the aisle, singing. My senses were stunned by the music, the architecture, the incense, the rythmic Spanish of the mass, and the comraderie of shaking hands with the people which I had previously been skeptical of, even if I was one of the several who did not go up to recieve communion. Afterward I went for dinner with Florian, Jurgen (from Germany), and Justin (from Nova Scotia, Canada). The next morning I continued on to Larrasoña, having been woken at 5:40 am by bustling bodieas, passing the road sign reading "Santiago de Compostella: 790 km," and several pilgrim crosses through the forest. In the little village Florian and I cooked a vegetarian dinner while the others ate at the restaurant. The next day Florien and I walked with Geena, a young woman from Australia, to the city of Pamplona. We parted with her on a medieval bridge and continued to the 16th Century fortifications and into the beautiful city, its narrow allys walled by colourful 4 to 6 story buildings. As Florien, Justin, Dave (a British pilgrim) and I sat in the grand plaza, resting from our walk, a police helecopter began hovering overhead, a sound like an explosion was heard, and protestors streamed into the plaza. It was a protest against what I understand to be significant cuts to public education, although I have not seen any media since I've been here, and I was shocked by the heavy police presence at a protest filled with little children. After checking into the modern refugio in the huge Classical building next to the cathedral I prommenaded the fortifications, the Bull Ring with its bust of Earnest Hemingway, and the amazing streets and plazas vibrant with people. Mario, the generous Mexican Jesuit priest, treated Florien and I to lunch with him and his companion, Joe from Boston and friends Paco and Paco from Valencia, Spain; Sergi from Barcelona, Samuel from Bilbao, and Justin. We had a great meal, laughing at the large owner of the restaurant whose body language and manner was hilarious until I heard the translation of his racist and sexist jokes... That evening I visited the cathderal and citadel, enjoyed amazing tapas, and marvelled at the vibrancy of the beautiful public space. Streets were filled with people, standing and sitting everywhere and laughing, playing and eating from the variety of surrounding businesses. I hypothesized on the spot that this was due to a number of factors, including the fact that streets here in the inner city are for people, not cars; there is high residential density and mixed use, causing streets to become the equivalent of people's public, rather than private, backyards; the climate which promotes outdoor activities in the late afternoon and encourages shops to have siestas and stay open late; the fact that space is multigenerational and accessible by car, bike, foot or public transport; and the sheer quality of the public space. I also noticed that schools are often in the cultural centre of town or have schoolyards designed like public plazas, enculturating children and youth with the concept of public space as the primary forum to socialize. The next morning I headed out of town walking quickly up the ridge to the Alto de Pardon, having the pleasant surprise of passing three women from my home town of Victoria, a man from Toronto, and Mies, the woman from Holland and the first pilgrim that I ever met in Toulouse. I paused at the Alto de Pardon with its row of windmills and metal silouettes of passing pilgrims, and met Florian, Justin and Jurgen (whose ankles were causing him a great deal of grief) there. We watched the massive condors soar along the ridge, then continued down the other side to Puenta la Reina. There I visited the Romanesque church with quantz windows and a Y-shaped crucifix, and the Cathedral of Santiago before having a lunch of tapas with Los Pacos, Mario, Joe, Justin, Jurgen, Florien, and Sergi who informed me in great detail about the various tapas and nodded approvingly at my enjoyment. The next table over was occupied by jubilent Basques, singing and dancing to an accordion and speaking in their native language except to socialize with Sergi who they welcomed warmly as a Catalan who shared their political situation as an indigenous minority. As we strolled back toward the albergue I stopped in my tracks before rushing to greet the three men walking in the other direction: it was Jean, Rene and George, who I had walked with on the Chemin d'Arles!!! They had reached Puenta la Reina, the joining point of the Chemin d'Arles with the Camino Frances, that day! They were not continuing, however, this being the end of their annual step toward Santiago. After a lengthly conversation with them, and introducing them to my new friends, Florian - who spoke enough English for me not to use my French much with him - told me accusingly that he didn't know that I spoke so much of his language! I cooked a stir fry for our group that evening, which was rather nerve-racking because none of the people around me had ever heard of a stir fry and because I had no oil to fry with, but thanks to critical but helpful advice from three Italians it was proclaimed a success... The next day our fellowship of Spanish, Catalan, Mexican, Amarican, French and Canadian pilgrims continued to Estella, a town of magnificent cathedrals perched on rockey outcrops, and early the following morning we continued for the long step to Torres del Rio. By the end of the long day, which was over 40 degrees Celsius, we all laughed as Mario the Jesuit stumbled a few painful steps and muttered "Oh fuck." In Torres del Rio Mario celebrated mass for all of the pilgrims who sat arround the walls of the little octagonal 900 year-old Templar church. It was almost commical as we crowded around the altar to see the limping priest raise up the cookies that were all he had to improvise the eucharist with, but the power was palpabal as he transformed them into the body of Christ. We had a great dinner afterwards and laughed as the young landlords identified "Justin from Canada" as Justin Beiber, and the tall lanckey Florian with a large brown beard as Jesus! We also learned, with shock, that two pilgrims had died in the heat of that day, one cyclist who had gone over his handlebars and one athletic Korean walker with a large sack. We've passed several pilgrim memorials along the Way and they are incredibly humbling, serving as momentos of our mortality. The next day our fellowship spreadout over the road as some of us hobbled behind and I walked up ahead with Los Pacos, the oldest and fastest of our group, and chatted in broken Spanish and English with the moustached men and whistled arias from Carmen all the way to Logroño. The city was full of bachlor partiers, and all of the several cathedrals were alive with loud weddings. This was the final stop on Francisco Paco's annual pilgrimage, and we all went out for lunch with him to bid him farewell. From Logroño we continued to the little village of Ventosa where we stayed in a private albergue with calligraphy on the walls and Corelli violin concerti on the radio, and I cooked omlettes for our fellowship for dinner. Being Sunday, Mario held a service of discussion and prayer in the dinning room of the albergue. The next day, today, we have walked the 31 km here to Santo Domingo de la Calzada, where the tomb of Santo Domingo who built infrastructure for the Camino in the 11th Century is located in the cathedral. Tomorrow I intend to continue to Belorado and onward. I am certainly learning community on this part of the Camino, to give and accept from others gracefully and to care for eachother, but I will have to remember flexibility at the same time. I am having a very different, but still marvellous experience, and thinking of you all lots. Internet is expensive here so, again, don't worry if you don't hear from me for awhile. All the best!!! Ultreia! Bradley Santo Domingo de la Calzada, La Rioja, Spain

Learning How To Walk: Toulouse to St.-Jean Pied de Port

Hello again, The old Chinese proverb says that a journey of a thousand miles (or in my case, 1200 km) begins with a single step, and my first "step", as a day's walk is called on the Chemin, was an interesting one... I followed the sign indicating "Le Chemin de St.-Jacques" across Pont Neuf, Toulouse's medieval bridge, on May 10th and followed the waymarkers for the route along a lovely path through the town, along the river, through forests, and past an 2nd Century Roman amphetheater, thoroughly enjoying the long walk. Imagine my surprise when, after many hours of walking, I topped a rise along the riverside and saw, laid out gloriously before me, the spires and bridges of the beautiful town of... Toulouse! I have no idea how, but I had somewhere joined the route into Toulouse and walked in a huge circle! I groaned, then laughed a bit at myself and went on to have lunch in the town before trying again. I walked back to the roundabout where colourfully dressed and loudly singing Roma women of all ages were washing the windshields of (unwilling) drivers at the red light and I boarded a bus to Colomiers to make up some lost time. From Colomiers I made the short walk to Pibrac to visit the imposing 20th Century structure of the Basilique Ste.-Germaine, then went to a phone booth to call the gite (pilgrim inn) in the village of Leguevin. Standing in the booth I turned around and saw two broadly grinning pilgrims festooned in symbols of St. James waving at me from outside the door. They told me they had been to Santiago and were now walking to Rome, asked me directions to the Basilica, and advised my route to Leguevin. I limped into the village with several blisters from my unexpectedly long walk and found the Maison St.-Jacques on the main street of the little village where I spent the night alone. The next day, which was very hot, I made the 30 km step to the Gite de Giscarro. I began through farmer's fields, some tilled golden and bare, some green with barley, some yellow with canola, and some fallow with the bright yellows and pastels of wildflowers, the long line of snowcapped Pyrenees crossing the horison in the distance. As the forest came near I saw an older couple sitting at the base of the waymarker with wodden walking sticks who rose and joined me as I walked. They had walked to Santiago in 2006 and were eager to share advice and chat. The forest gave way to a road which passed along the crest of a ridge with vast fields falling away on either side and bounding away over hills in the distance, the furrows glistening like Emily Carr's skies to the pinpoints of church spires marking villages on the horison. I parted with the couple, and the man thrust his hand in the air declaring "Bye bye! Buen camino! Bonne route!" and I descended the ridge into the little medieval town of L'Isle Jourdain. As I sat eating a pancetta and brie baguette sandwich in the park a man walked by and asked if I was a walker, and proudly listed off all of the places he had been, Istanbul and the like. I continued on the road which was alternately rutted tracks, paved road, ancient packed rubble paths, earth baked an cracked by the sun spangled with flower pettles like a wedding aisle, or thick with mud marked by pilgrim's boots, bike tires, horseshoes, and paws and cloven deer and wild pig hoofs. The songs of colourful birds filled the air, and that of church bells as I approached villages. A solitary figure with a large white moustache and blue-overalled belly greeted me at the corner of a field at the top of a rise, leaning on his cane and critically observing his neighbour plow his field, greeted me cheerily and told me it was 1 km to the gite and wished ma a bonne route. The gite, set back from the path amongst the fields, was a beautiful timber-framed earth and rubble house, and when I greeted the patron at work in his barn, he told me his English was better than his French. Hia name was Andreas from Germany, and he and his wife Penny, from Toulouse had met on the camino and started the beautiful little gite. After spening the night in an alcove of the dormitory I set out again, the air pleasantly cool with mist, and bought food for lunch and dinner in the tiny ridge-top medieval village of Gimont with a 14th Century church. Outside of Gimont I took a wrong turn, and returned to the misleading waymarker to stare at it until a window behind me opened an a woman popped her head out. She asked if I was a pilgrim of St.-Jacques, and directed me to go straight past the chappel of the cloister to find the route again. Further along my feet began to hurt quite bad, and I spied a long stick leaning against a cement bridge. I shortened it to length and found that it releaved a lot of strain as a walking stick, and have used it since. At last I arrived at the Gite La Motte, near an 18th Century chateau and an 11th Century church. If the previous gite was beautiful, this one was gorgeous, built of sun-baked brick and timber-frame with a cob oven, tile floors, and an enterance dome and reading alcove with a mosaic of a bare foot on the floor. As I was cooking pasta for dinner in the kitchen another pilgrim arrived, Luc from Marsaille. He took a private room and left the next morning as I was putting on my shoes. The next day I walked to the city of Auch, pausing to eat a lunch of croissaunts at the foot of the ruins of a hilltop medieval watchtower overlooking the Renaissance chateau and church spire of the minute village of Montegut. I passed through Montegut as the church bells began ringing and people of all ages poured out of it, including many old men with medals, uniforms and moustaches. Finding my way again after the route was obscured by a new highway, I walked over two hills to see the town of Auch spread out bellow me. I approached the huge gothic cathedral and medieval bridge along the river and crossed the bridge and climbed up to the cathedral through the narrow allies. It was Mother's Day, and I searched for an internet cafe or a place to buy a phone card to contact Mom, but it was Sunday and everything in town was closed. As I approached the cathedral, the gothic body worn with age but the twin turrets restored in a classical style, the sound of organ and baroque voices eminated from the stone. I entered the magnificent structure and circumambulated the aisles of stained glass windows and statues as the organist, tenor, counter-tenor and baritone rehearsed Marc-Antoine Charpentier and a contemporary piece which made the organ sound intreaguingly like a piece of industrial machinery for a concert that evening. I walked down the ally next to the cathedral of 14th Century timber-framed buildings to the Presbytery and entered through the gate and cortyard surrounded by four stories of shuttered windows. A woman sat patiently at a desk in the foyer of the 18th Century building and led me up the flights of wide spiraling stairs to the pilgrim dormatory with a breathtaking view of the Old Town and the cathedral. I attended the baroque concert that evening, had dinner with Luc, who was also staying at the Presbytery, and fell asleep in bed looking at the cathedrals illuminated turrets. The next day I walked through the ancient streets and caught up to another pilgrim at the enterence of the forest. It turned out she was not only Canadian, but a fellow British Columbian from Nelson! She was not walking to Santiago, but had come to scatter her parents' ashes in their homes of London and Paris, to visit a feudal agricultural community in the Pyrenees, and to celebrate her 60th birthday. She said her name was Clodette, and asked if we could walk together because a truck with two men in it had passed her several times giving her strange looks. We walked, and eventually descended into the moated and formerly walled village of Barran. We visited the church with its rare helictically spiralled spire, and stood in awe at the rows upon rows of white crosses of the village's dead from the First World War. The local gite was closed, but we stayed the night with a hilarious couple who had enthusiastically volunteered to host pilgrims in their 250 year-old home, Madeline and Jean-Michael, and a German pilgrim who had walked to Santiago seven times on various routes and was now stuck here with a strained tendon. In the morning I ate a large breakfast and Clodette and I bid farewell to our hosts and continued on to Montisquoiou. We accidentally took a very long, though beautiful, route and had to join the road to ensure our arrival in Montisquoiou, and Clodette hitch-hiked. Just before the village I passed one of the many gates marked "Attention au chien", this one open, and shortly after heard a loud snarling growl at my heels. I instinctively spun around, planted my feet, and leveled my staff in a pike stance, and let out a shout. Had the closer of the two big black guard dogs taken one more bound it would have had my staff down its throat, but hearing my bellow it spun around and retreated back to the gate. In Montesquiou we stayed in a hotel with a Swiss pilgrim on his second walk who had walked all the way from Montegut in the same day, what I had done in two and a half! We had a huge four course meal together and went to bed. The next day I headed off alone through the gate in the medieval fortifications and down through the village's gardens and along a beautiful trail past the ruins of a castle to Marciac meeting two pilgrims from Nice, Bruno and Jean-Luc, along the way. We stayed in an old timber frame gite next to the gothic cathedral, and I played guitar with the owner's Parisian son in the garden. Marciac is known as the Jazz capital of Europe for hosting a huge international annual festival, which our hosts are prime organizers of. The next morning I continued to Moubourget with Bruno and Jean-Luc, blessed with a magnificent view of the Pyrenees. It had been several days since I had been able to see them, and their shadowy bulk was now visible. Moubourget was the last stop of the annual steps toward Santiago that Bruno and Jean-Luc were undertaking, so they invited me for a drink and I bid them farewell as they drove back to Nice. No sooner had they left than a sudden and heavy rain shower began and I took shelter in the gite. I walked the next day to the tiny village of Anoye with Patrick, from Marsailles, and we shared a huge meal cooked on the solitary double-burner with another group of pilgrims from around France. I continued with Patrick the next day to Morlaas, then continued with George, Rene, Jean, and Claudette of the other pilgrim group. We toured the bakeries and butcheries and converged on a bus shelter to assemble and devour a very fresh lunch before visiting the cathedral, its Romanesque portal crawling with musical kings and torturing demons. We walked through the rain, turtle-like with our grey-green ponchos pulled over our backpacks, through forests and past cats nestled in deep window sills to the hippodrome of the city of Pau where we became lost and eventually found the gite. We were rewarded by a magnificent meal, beginning with a Basque patte, followed by the most exquisite of duck and ham garbures, which was in turn followed by a salad and a perfect combination of goat cheese and black cherry jam in the Basque tradition, with strawberries and cream for dessert... Manifique! The next morning we dried our shoes with hair-driers and I set out again with Jean, Rene and George, the three rough-hewn but incredibly good-natured faces which had weathered up to seven years of pilgrimage on up to three different routes. We walked to Lacommand, the medieval commanderie of the Knights Hospitaller. We stayed in the original pilgrim dormatory attached to the church and commanderie, next to the Hospitaller cemetary, with Giles, a cheerful fourty-year-old Toulousaine acupuncture doctor practicing near Carcassonne, and Meis, the Dutch woman who was the first pilgrim I had met I had met in Toulouse. The rain and the wind heavy the next day, Rene, George, Jean and I walked along the road rather than the muddy and dangerous chemin to Oloron Ste.-Marie. We topped the final hill and the city exploded magnificently bellow us: the cathedral spires, the turrets, the medieval bridges spanning the convergence of two mighty rivers, all set against a backdrop of the Pyrenees, guarding the pass of Somport into Spain. Oloron was a crossroads for me, the place where I finally had to decide whether to take the Col du Somport and continue on the Chemin d'Arles which I had been so thoroughly enjoying, or to continue west in France to St.-Jean-Pied-de-Port and cross the Pyrenees at the Pass of Roncanvaux. The wonderful time I had been having in France and the light snow that was falling in the Col du Somport convinced me to continue on the Voie du Piemont to St.-Jean and join the Camino Frances there. The next morning I bid farewell to my friends continuing over Somport, including a 21 year-old who had bicycled from his home in Belgium. Before leaving I visited the moorish-influenced gothic cathedral of Notre Dame in its shades of grey, the dark and grounded sanctuary of the Romanesque St.-Croix, its flagstones inscribed with the names of the 18th Century deceased and resonating with barely audible Gregorian chant, and the sprawling gothic magnificence of l'Eglise Ste.-Marie. In l'Eglise Ste.-Mairie, as I slowly circumambulated the side-chapels on my blistered feet, the darkness pierced by spires of stained-glass light, I was clubbed by a sense of overwhelm. I was suddenly severely humbled by what I already knew: that I know virtually nothing, that I have been virtually nowhere, that there is so much to learn, experience, do and see, so many places to go. I was overwhelmed by the desire to learn everything there was to learn, to visit every place and experience each one fully, and I was overwhelmed by the knowledge that I would never be able to satisfy that painful desire. As I slowly recovered, leaning on my staff in the darkness, I realized with horror that at some point I would have to leave the peace of that sanctuary and re-enter the city and the world. I fortified my courage and did so, like plunging into icy water, and I walked. Departing the city, I walked next to a fast-flowing stream, and I realized that we pilgrims are like the water. We run in channels dug by a thousand years of foot and hoof, we are propelled by the energy of a thousand years of prayers and dreams. We get caught in back-eddies, we encounter barriers and experience turbulence, but ultimately we continue on our way, our streams joining into rivers and infallibly reaching the sea... That day I walked to l'Hospital St.-Blaise, an 11th Century church beautiful with very heavy moorish influences, and I spent the night in the little gite with Giles and Frances and Monique, two French women in their 70s who, despite being devotedly catholic, seemed to talk about nothing but food. The next day I continued with Giles in the morning as the mist rose silently from the forested hills. "Wow!" Giles pronounced emphatically at the beautiful sight, "Superb!" I enjoyed learning a lot of French adjectives to that effect from him, and listening to his incredibly musical whistling and singing as we passed over extraordinary mountain vistas, serenaded by cow bells, (and slogging through hoof-churned muck) for the next three days. In the town of Mouleon I visited the powerful 15th Century castle, and from there we continued to St.-Just Ibarre, Giles stopping to chat to the Basque characters of the countryside: a farm family of which only one member spoke French, the others only Basque; a woman who gave us water, her toothless face all wrinkles, alone in a house while her family was out in the fields; a strong little man who had walked from his home to Santiago and was eager to give me plenty of advice... We were greeted by a cheerful elderly woman at the gite next to the church across the medieval bridge. As I sat outside writing my journal and watching the swallows swirl in the sunset a little boy "vroom-vroom"-ing on his bike with his dog stopped and asked me if I was writing a book, and wished me "bonne courage" after a short conversation. From St.-Just Ibarre Giles and I continued to St.-Jean Pied de Port, immediately noticing a huge increase of pilgrims as we converged with the Chemin de Puy, and entered with great gusto through the Port St.-Jacques into the medieval walled city. The pilgrim's office was churning with people, most of them just getting their new credential, while I was given my 19th stamp. I toured the medieval fortifications and the 18th Century revamped citadel, marveling at the seemingly impervious defensive engineering. The eight pilgrims and our hosts sang grace together before a wonderful dinner. After dinner three of us - Alexandre, a Basque Roman Catholic philosopher, Hans, a Dutch agnostic capitalist private equity consultant, and myself, a "spiritual" Canadian social democrat anthropology student - strolled and conversed along the riverside through the medieval town as swallows flitted about us in the magnificently setting sun. Alaxandre, our pipe-smoking guide, had received his doctorate in Toronto and was the grandson of one of the primary Basque leaders in and after the Second World War. Today I am resting in St.-Jean before crossing the Pyrenees tomorrow, so I finally have time to get you caught up on everything! Sorry this is so long and unedited... I don't know when I'll next have the chance to write, or even see a computer, but if you need to get in touch with me for something important send me an email with the word "urgent" in the subject line, or if you'd just like to be in touch put the word "camino" in the subject line and I'll hope to get back to you soon. Right now I've got over 350 unread emails, and I don't know when I'll have the chance to look at them... I hope that all is well with all of you, and I am so greatful for everyones well-wishes and support. When I feel weak I think of all of you, and all of the strangers who have wished me a "bonne route" and "bonne courage," and know that those wishes give me strength. Tomorrow: the Pyrenees and Spain! Ultreia! Bradley St.-Jean-Pied-de-Port, Pays Basque, France

Learning How to Walk: Arrival in Toulouse

Hello again! I don't know how often I will be emailing on this trip, but I am today because I know there are some of you who would appreciate knowing that I have arrived safely in Toulouse. I was so tired when I arrived last night that I could very well have been dreaming, but I didn't want to pinch myself lest I were to wake up! It is so beautiful here, I need to keep reminding myself that I have to move along or I could be happily stuck for a long time... I know it is the common experience of arrival for me, it is like teenage love, but that doesn't make it any less honest. Mom, Dad and I got up in Montreal at 7 am on May 7th and walked all over the city all day, visiting a craperie, several cathedrals including the phonomenal Oritoie St.-Joseph, climbing Mount Royal, feeding squirrels, etc. before driving to the airport at 8 pm. After a 16.5 hour flight, which left at 10pm, I had a 5 hour stop over in Heathrow and a 3 hour flight to Blagnac Airport near Toulouse. Being the centre of a huge Aeronautics industry, Blagnac Airport was small but of beautiful modern architecture of curving coloured glass and natural wood. My passport stamped, I donned my backpack and walked toward town. Immediately I knew I was somewhere amazing. Bike and walking paths followed all of the roads, cooled by trees as they passed through suburbs of wooden-shuttered houses with tile roofs. I got lost on several occasions, following the beautiful River Touche under a medieval bridge whose keystone bore the age-worn arms of Toulouse, the equal armedv pointed cross with a pearl at each point, instead of the River Garrone, and not minding the backtrack when I met a some little girls, with their mother and their terrified little dog, who told me I was going in the wrong direction. I followed the canal into town, walking under several 18th Century bridges, some carved in glorious classical reliefs, and was astounded as the city came into view on both sides of the Garrone with age-spanning architecture rising around me. Happily hopelessly lost again among the labyrinth of narrow allies, but beginning to become anxious as I knew the time I had booked to arrive at my auberge on L'Rue d'Embarthe had passed and it was getting late, I asked a young woman if she could give me directions. It turned out that she was going to visit her friend across the very street from my auberge and was able to walk me strait there! "You're very lucky," she said, switching to broken English, "L'Rue Embarthe is not a well known street. Are you going to Santiago de Compostele?" I was surprised, because I was sure she had not seen the scallop on the back of my backpack, until I realized that the only place that a sweaty foreigner was likely to be going on L'Rue Embarthe was the pilgrim auberge. "There are several people in my family who have walked to Compostele," she explained. She wished me luck and a good walk at the gate of the auberge, and I buzzed the intercom on the gate. Clements, the owner of the auberge, leaned out the window of the third and highest floor of the wall and invited me to come up and register. I appologized profusely for being so late, explaining that I had been lost, but he waved it off with his hand and a smile. Having been welcomed to my room, I walked to the nearest intersection of three allies which looked like the set for the street scene of an opera, perhaps Rigoletto, in search of food. In the middle of the inset square was a classical fountain, and it was boardered by small restaurants and cafes beneith two to three stories of appartments, whose shutters began to close as the light fadded. Being the home of France's second largest university, the city seemed to be populated with youth who sat in groups about the square laughing, smoking, playing flemenco guitar and singing mock-operatically. A bearded man, his black hair tied tightly back in a bun, pressented me with two placards of menus, pearched on unoccupied chairs for me to peruse. I ordered an oeff coconeil aux soumon, an egg baked in a shallow earthen dish over salmon and cheese, seasoned with herbs, next to a salade with a lovely vinagrette, French bread, and a wineglass of water filled from an elegant glass bottle which had once delivered milk to someone's doorstep. Today I have visited L'Basilique St.-Sernin, the huge 1000 year old Romanesque cathedral - the largest of all its type, which still houses relics of Ste. Cesilia, patron saint of music, and St. Francis, among others, and where my pilgrim's credencial was stamped by a bespecled gentleman who told me that I was the 74th pilgrim to pass his way this month, a substantial number - the 13th Century cloister of Les Jacobins - whose ribbed ceiling is held distantly aloft by a single row of mammoth columns and soaring stained glass windows, and which houses a relic of Thomas Acquinas - the Capitol of Midi-Pyrénée - where a large open market was held - and I have walked all over Old Town. I am observing the culture and beginning to understand how to behave within it. My limited French has served me much better than I had feared, and all but two of the many conversations that I have had so far have been in that language. I have my route set for the town of Léguvin for tomorrow, advised by the gentleman at the Basilique. Now my time is up on this computer and I am glad that I have been able to navigate my way around a French keyboard sufficiently to write this! We will be in touch again! Your friend, Bradley Toulouse, Midi-Pyrénée, France