May 13//14/15/16/17
If you're just joining (hopefully a few friends and family members of students on the trip), my name is Kellie and I'm one of the faculty members leading the 2024 Camino de Santiago trip, along with my colleagues Jeff (History professor) and Deya (Spanish professor). I teach Outdoor Education and Leadership (OEL). We are traveling with 24 Westminster students/alums and will be completing el Camino Frances (the French route) over the next several weeks. While Deya and Jeff have both done the Camino multiple times, I'm a first-timer, as are most of our students. Worth noting is that for the first time ever, I am backpacking with a laptop specifically so I can blog about this experience, but so far, I've been dropping the ball!
Apologies in advance--this first post has a lot to cover, so it's gonna be a lot of who, what, when, where and probably not a lot of puns or obscure Rick and Morty references. Try and contain your devastation. What I'm trying to say is that it's not my most well written post, but what it lacks in style, form, and substance, it makes up for in--I have no idea, but I spent way too much time trying to come up with something witty, so we're just going to move on!
I was gonna do a post about our travel day (May 13-14), but I'll skip that to say that we all made it to Spain safely and heavily sleep deprived.
May 14 - Madrid
We arrived in Madrid around 8:15am and collected a few more students who had different flight itineraries. Once our group was complete, we met Alejandro, our guide, who gave us a combo bus/walking tour of some of Madrid's major sites of interest. We checked out the Plaza de Toros (bullfighting arena) and Santiago Bernabéu, a.k.a. the home of Real Madrid. Real Madrid will be playing Dortmund in the final of the UEFA Champions League while we are in country, so our group is excited to watch the game on June first when we're in Portomarin (Galicia). Alejandro was a fantastic guide with tons of knowledge and charisma. I will say that at this point, I hadn't slept **at all** for two days straight, so some of the morning was a little...foggy for me.
In front of La Plaza de Toros.
Santiago Bernabéu
After the tour, we said goodbye to Alejandro and dropped our bags off at Hotel Mediodia, our lodging for the next two nights. We weren't able to check into our rooms for a few more hours, so we turned the group lose to get some lunch in Madrid. And this is where I made the BIGGEST NEWBIE TRAVELER MISTAKE OF MY ENTIRE LIFE.
Y'all. I have been leading study abroad programs for 10+ years. I am borderline obnoxious about "the safety talk:" don't flash cash around, walk in groups, carry your backpack on your front, keep things zipped, don't keep things in your pocket, keep your head on a swivel, etc. Well, I was served a very, very large dose of humble pie this day. While waiting on folks to make a decision re: where to eat, Jeff and I sat down at a local cafe. After reuniting with the rest of our group, we decided to relocate to this super cute restaurant that was a 3 minute walk away from our original location. Upon sitting down at the new restaurant, I realized I didn't have my phone and my fanny pack (situated on my front) was totally unzipped. I tried pinging it using my Apple watch--no dice. No naturally, I concluded that I had been a victim of petty theft and it was my own fault. This was especially annoying as I had just spent $480 on phone repairs the week before to make sure I had a functioning phone for the trip. Also, after spending this money, I was informed that we did, in fact, have cell phone insurance <beats forehead on table repeatedly>. Anyway, back to Madrid.
Deya offers to accompany me back to the orignal restaurant (although I had already walked over there to check the table and of course didn't see my phone). In true amazing Deya form, she starts interviewing all the other tables to ask if anyone had seen a cell phone. At this point, I have reached radical acceptance that my phone is forever lost, I'm going to have to buy a burner phone in country in order to communicate with our group, and that I'm out $480 on a cell phone repair that served me less than half a week. Not great. Lo and behold, one of the restaurant managers comes out and, in Spanish, basically says to Deya (and I'm paraphrasing slightly but not by that much: "is your friend's head attached to her body? She acted like a total tourist. We could tell she was a tourist by her hat (note: I was wearing a fedora, not a baseball cap!). She needs to be more mindful of her belongings. When we saw her phone on the table, we collected it because it would have been stolen immediately." And all of this is true. I was deeply, deeply shamed and also very appreciative. Everyone gets one major tourist flub up per trip. I just happened to use mine ON THE FIRST DAY OF THE TRIP. Total amateur. Lesson learned. Phone returned.
Spain posts will have a lot of food photos. Anchovies in tomato sauce.
Ceviche. One of my favorites.
After lunch, we checked into the hotel and had a few hours of free time before walking the group to La Plaza Mayor, where there was a huge concert and community gathering going on as part of the
Fiestas de San Isidro. Super fun atmosphere for all ages. Lots of food and dancing and general good-time-having. Jeff, Deya, and I found a place to grab some tapas and people watch before calling it an early evening.
Festival stage at La Plaza Mayor
Westminster Camino faculty
May 15 - Madrid & ToledoOn Wednesday, we had breakfast at the hotel and hopped aboard a bus for a 50 minute ride to Toledo. I'd love to give you a history of Toledo in my own words, but I am pressed for time and not that smart, so I'm going to borrow this brief description from UNESCO:
Successively a Roman municipium, the capital of the Visigothic Kingdom, a fortress of the Emirate of Cordoba, an outpost of the Christian kingdoms fighting the Moors and, in the 16th century, the temporary seat of supreme power under Charles V, Toledo is the repository of more than 2,000 years of history. Its masterpieces are the product of heterogeneous civilizations in an environment where the existence of three major religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – was a major factor.
The group outside of Toledo
Toledo--what a beautiful city!Outdoor Education and Leadership (OEL) and Outdoor Program (OP) students representing!
Y'all. I had done no research on Toledo prior to our arrival, so I had no expectations, but I gotta say, this place is RAD. For example, I didn't know that Toledo was once the sword making capital of the world. We got to watch a blacksmith work on a blade.
From
Artesenia Morales:
"After the Reconquista, Toledo emerged as the greatest sword-making centre in the world. The technique used for the Toledo sword had a “soul of iron”, consisting of a steel blade that concealed a wrought iron strip inside it, thus preventing the steel from bending or cracking."
Sword-making demonstration
Such a cool experience to witness firsthand. After the sword making demonstration, we got to see a damascene jewelry-making demonstration. Learn more about it and see examples
here.
Once our group had finished the sword and jewelry making demonstrations, we met up with Luis (I think that was his name?) for a walking tour of the historic city. I would love love love to be able to recall all of the fascinating history that Luis shared with us, but there was too much to be able to list and contextualize effectively. I'll say that the mixture of Muslim, Christian, and Jewish influence on the city and especially the architecture was fascinating. One of the most interesting parts of the tour was la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, which is a modern university that has several programs housed in restored historic buildings--it was super cool to see the mix of old and new.
Walking tour of the city
Inside the university
More views of the city
We also got to see The Burial of the Count of Orgaz (Spanish: El Entierro del Conde de Orgaz) is a 1586 painting by El Greco--WHOA!! It was especially fascinating because this painting was painted for this specific site--it hasn't been moved. I'm sorry to direct you to
Wikipedia (shame, Gerbers, SHAME!) for more context for the painting, but it is definitely worth the extra context.
El Entierro del Conde de Orgaz
Let's see...what happened next...lunch at a cute little cafe, back on the bus, back to Madrid.
More food porn.
We ended our evening at Tablao de la Villa, a lovely restaurant and flamenco theater. The flamenco show was fantastic--it's a style I can really get behind. Lots of fast, powerful movements and some stomping. Because who doesn't like a well-timed stomp?
Flamenco dance and music
Spanish Potato Salad (Ensaladilla Rusa)
May 16 - Madrid to Pamplona to Roncesvalles & St. Jean Pied-de-Port
1) Happy birthday to my partner, Kjarsten!
Today felt like a day of planes, trains, and automobiles, but it was actually just: train, bus, another bus, another bus.
We took a high speed train from Madrid to Pamplona, from which we boarded a bus to Roncesvalles, a super cute little Spanish town near the Spain/France border and our home for the evening. After dropping all of our bags off at a hostel, we boarded another bus to St. Jean-Pied-de-Port, a super cute little French town just over the border and the place where we would become "official peregrinos" (Pilgrims) by virtue of registering our trek on the Camino. While waiting for the pilgrim office to open, Jeff, Deya, and I stopped at a cafe to have some lunch--I mention this because I am going to LOVE every lunch on this trip. Bread. Meat. Cheese. The three main food groups. It's the best.
Walking around St. Jean
Jeff and me
View of river in St. Jean
Other side of the river
Students waitng outside the office to get their pilgrim passport
More students waiting for their pilgrim passport
Getting the passport--it's official!
Got our passports, took another bus, and returned to Roncesvalles to settle in for the evening. We had dinner together in the hostel and then about half the group (myself included) stayed the night in our first Albergue. It's kind of like hostel except that it is only open to peregrinos. Lodging was pod-style; one large open room with bunk bed pods (4 people to a pod) and community bathrooms at the end of the hall. It was fun, and folks are noisy. Before going to bed, we all attended the Pilgrims Mass, where priests (Catholic) blessed us and other pilgrims about to start their journey.
The church where the pilgrim mass was held
Pod-style bunks in the albergue
Exterior of the albergue. I think it was a historic monastery?
May 17 - WALK 1 - Roncesvalles to Zubiri (Albergue Zaldiko) - Mileage ~14m
Oh man, if I can get through today, I'll be caught up!
Early wakeup at 6:15am courtesy of the albergue staff. We met the rest of the group at 7am for breakfast in the hostel, put on our rain jackets and ponchos, and got ready to officially start our walk to Santiago de Compostella. Everyone took their packing very seriously and had great footwear, good rain protection, and good backpacks. Well done, team! After making a few minor pack adjustments and taking a group photo, we were off on our first walk with Zubiri as our final destination of the day.
Deya briefing the students before we walk
Look good, feel good
The entire group ready to walkStudents walking the trail
Students walking the trail
We all sort of clumped together over the first mile or so, but eventually folks settled into walking groups that matched their preferred pace. Today, Jeff and I decided to opt for the "Chris-Cline-Send-It!" pace, so we averaged about 3 miles an hour, which is a pretty good clip for backpacking with elevation change and some muddy and rocky terrain. We had a group of student athletes cruise by us at one point and we both had to check our egos and remember that we are not 20 years old anymore (by a lot). :)
We stopped in Viscarret-Guerendiain for a cup of coffee and a chorizo sandwich.
3 major food groups
It rained off and on throughout the day, but honestly, it felt pretty good and the overcast light made for really good photo taking. The trail was so lush and green today. And we had many, many good views of the Spanish countryside. Lots of sheep!
Look closely. Lots of sheep!
Walking the trail
Walking the trail
The last mile was a little spicy getting down muddy rocks when we were feeling pretty tired, but we made it to Zubiri in one piece and felt very fulfilled and content with the day. After getting checked in at Albergue Zaldiko, folks were free to explore Zubiri before meeting back for dinner. Which is in ten minutes, so off I go!
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