After a few more trains and a lot of running in very heavy boots I arrived in the town of St Jean Pied a Port. St Jean is the traditional starting place of The Camino de Santiago. Here travelers check in at the local Pilgrim’s Office to get their credentials, which are stamped at each hostel along the way, and secure room and board for the night. The town is built on a hill with a grand citadel set as a crown upon the top. This was the main defense of the ex-Basque capital and still remains intact to this day. I arrived on a beautiful late summer Saturday and after taking care of the official Pilgrim business I joined my travel buddy Gene and we started out to explore.

 We met other Pilgrims while roaming about including, a now dear friend, Katherine. How did we meet? She overheard Gene and I speaking English and trying to find an open restaurant for dinner. Our American appetite said it was 8:00pm and it was time to eat. Katherine’s British stomach was clearly saying the same thing. Eating early in Spain is almost impossible as most places won’t open for business until after 10:00pm and by that time we must already be back in the hostels before the doors are locked. We managed though and found a table at an empty cafe which happened to serve a Pilgrims Menu; A cheap menu designed for the poorest of travelers.

Gene, Katherine, and I ate our dinners and before retiring for the night we hiked to the top of the Citadel. As the sun sank low over the mountains in front of us we all stood in silence contemplating our next days journey in which we would ascend the very peaks we looked upon in the twilight of the evening.

By mid morning on the first day of walking my blood sugar was already low and I was starting to feel the effects. I was shaky, cold, and not in the best of moods. Hiking those switchbacks up the mountains with the stress of fifty pounds on my back was taking its toll. I go to the gym but this kind of expulsion of energy was not something I was ready for. I sat down in the thick cloud cover for a moment and found some leftover miniature white bread slices in my pack. I scarfed those down chased by water. It didn’t help much but it did give me carbs to keep moving. A few miles more and I find myself navigating the windy, twisted roads through the tallest peaks and crags that rarely see travelers who aren’t pilgrims. The landscape was a dichotomy of soaring peaks and bottomed out grassy enclaves. The bells of free range sheep, horses, and cattle echoed around me unseen in the thick mist. Peering through the haze I thought I saw something out of place. A few yards away from me a savior was parked in the form

of a white van giving out warm drinks and food to passing pilgrims. I saw this type of pop-up cafe a few more times on the trip but this first encounter was by far the most special and the most needed. I made my way to the van where a wonderful Swiss gentleman gave me hot chocolate and a protein bar. I was beginning to feel like a human being again. Before continuing on my way the Swiss Savior offered Gene and I a black marker for us to write our name and nationality on his van. So far we were the first Americans to pass him that day. Gene and I walked together for a while and he remembered the bottle of whiskey we had bought back in Paris. Mixing that with a Coke he got from the van we created a source of much needed sugar and carbs. It was not an ideal combination but it kept me from passing out. We walked on. And on. And On. Almost ten hours after we took our first steps we began to descend, carefully, in to the valley holding the monastery of Roncavelles. 

Sitting at an altitude a little more than 2,952 feet this small village is a godsend for worn out pilgrims after the first days grueling climb. Gene and I made our way to the hostel, or albuerge, to find one giant room lined with bunkbeds to accommodate 110 people. Dropping our packs we moved to the dining area for our pilgrims meal before settling outside with several glasses of beer. Beer and wine are usually given to pilgrims for free. Not only does this give you a substantial amount of calories, but the beer and wine is also supposed to help with the swelling of joins. It at least helped the pain, and my mood. So, for those of you keeping score, I made it though my first day surviving on white bread, a protein bar, whiskey, beer, and wine. That’s one hell of a way to start a spiritual journey.

When it was time for us to be locked in to our hostel Gene and I had rejoined Katherine and added two more to our little Pack of Pilgrims. Lars the Dutchman and Vanessa, our

Lebanese princess. Seriously this trip was so spur of the moment for her she packed high heels “just in case”. We mailed those right back home, among other things, as soon as we got to Pamplona. We passed the night on creaky bunks enduring the cacophony of a thousand different tones of snoring and before we knew it, it was time to walk again.

To be continued…