Random pictures from The Camino.

We would walk with these heavy packs, down a regular country road. Sometimes we had our own path. It was the Way of St. James, an old Catholic pilgrimage. A village every half hour sometimes, or every couple hours. One or two bigger towns each day.

Before

dawn, we could see our breath, even in early August. Our warmest clothes were our pajamas

and fleece vests. Everything else was shorts and

tank tops. So we moved quickly past sleeping farms as the air stung our bare arms.

Crunch, crunch our feet went on the gravel in the dark. Or, on pavement, quiet footsteps mixed with the clattering

of our walking sticks. Street lights. Then dawn would come, the sun would rise, gilding everything ahead of us clear gold. The air would warm. We'd stop for breakfast, nibbling a bit of granola or eating a cereal bar.

The

path wound curiously up and down

hills, between bluffs overlooking pastureland before joining

the country road again. Here and there we'd come to a

magnificent tree which must surely have a story. How many thousands of travelers had rested in that shade, thinking holy and unholy thoughts? And simple thoughts of pure praise and pleasure in the great outdoors.

Many travelers carried cell phones. I'm glad we didn't have that option. Being completely severed from the electronic world of communication was a retreat that fewer and fewer people get to experience. Initially, you wonder if anything's happening online. Then you realize you are glad you don't have to check it. With joy you realize what a meaningless thing all that time consumption is.

Here, here in the

eucalyptus forest--

here, in the highlands of Galicia with a piper in the distance helping you along--here, sitting beside the path exhausted-- is what matters--pressing along in a community of strangers unified by a goal--a city we're striving for--or even just a shower & bed at the end of the day.

Call me weird, but my most earthily-memorable part was the shower & bed part. Sleeping in the public hostels. The alberges; refugious. Hostels can be crazy places I hear, and I wouldn't mind experiencing even a more typical European hostel someday. These were tame compared to so

me stories I've heard. You paid for a bed space, you got your shower. You assessed your luggage and rearranged it and packed it again.

You rested for a while and then went out for supper, then you came back and pretty much

went to sleep around dark. Sometimes you saw things you didn't mean to see, but you didn't mean to see and everyone understood that and cloaked themselves in the modesty of ignoring.

There's something wonderfully cozy about being surrounded by snoring people. People whom you've chosen to trust, because you've all committed at some level to this journey, even if some people seem suspicious in nature. I think I find the hostel experience so memorable because 1) it did not plague my conscience/morals 2) I know it would bother a lot people that I wish I could share the experience with. The discrepancy between 1) and 2) intrigue me. For some reason I've never been bothered by the idea of sleeping in the same room as a mixed group of people. Maybe most people feel the same deep inside, but I don't want to assume. And a lot of people just like their privacy, regardless of their convictions. I like my privacy in everyday life, but when I'm in adventure mode, I just thrive on the chaos of people being in each others' way.

And then before you know it people are whispering in the dark and shouldering their bags. The room is almost empty before we know it, so we turn the light on and adjust the bandaids on our blisters and decide which pair of dirty socks to put on before we fill up our water containers and head out. Who needs the ace bandage most today? I'm putting some lemonade powder in my camelback today. Remarkably, after being dead-dog-tired the night before, we're once again ready to march ahead into the new day.