Spending nine days in a hotel just outside Pamplona, recovering from the gnarliest bronchitis definitely wasn’t on my 2023 vision board. But there I was, propped up on the bed with pillows, sweaty, snotty and coughing up horrid things.
Back it up a few days.
I had caught the bus from Pamplona to Roncesvalles, literally a two horse town nestled in the foothills of the Spanish Pyrenees, with France being on the other side of the mountains. In the past, I would have started my camino on the French side of the Pyrenees, in Saint Jean Pied de Port, but for logistic’s sake I decided to start walking from Roncesvalles.
There was still snow on the ground when I set out the next morning, with spitting rain in the forecast. I felt wholly unprepared, as I was grossly out of shape and strangely still jet lagged. But also I just felt fragmented, not on my game. Honestly I never come to the camino on my game, but this time around I didn’t have “it”. Something in me felt permanently sapped and I was here to try and reclaim something. Walking the camino feels like going through a spiritual, mental and physical carwash. It purifies, cleanses and buffs you out. But for me, it’s a brutal process. For some folks it’s '“just a fun walk” but I call bs. It’s a pilgrimage and it works you over until you give into its energy.
I’m down for that deep work, however this time around I was extra fragile, extra tender, and unsure of what lay ahead. Ok I knew what lay ahead I just wasn’t sure how it would look.
My last camino in 2019, I started from Le Puy France and ended in Santiago, Spain. Towards the end of that pilgrimage I was easily pulling 27-31 km days. I was in no shape to even walk 10 km this time around, but silly ass me decided 21 km in rain would be doable.
Let’s just say I bit off more than I could chew that day. I walked up and down the foothills, it rained on and off, and….ok so, there’s a section on this stage going downhill that’s bananas. The rocks jut up diagonally all the way down the ravine, resembling a dragon’s scaled back if that makes sense. If you don’t have sticks (hi it’s me) and you fall down you could very well lose a tooth.
The day progressed. But the more I moved and walked, the more bubbled up. Moving this much all at once was stirring my proverbial pot. Remember the shower? How the only time emotion flowed through my body was when I stepped into a shower, only to receded when I turned off the water. Walking continuously jostled that anger, and as the day wore on, so did the angry conversations. I walked and walked, raging in my head, blood boiling.
The rain had stopped. The sun came out finally and I found myself blessedly alone in a forest. Most of the pilgrims who I had started with that day were way ahead of me. I decided this was a great place to cry, loudly.
So I did.
I cried SO LOUD. All that anger, the grief, the FUCKYOOUUUUU energy I had been carrying for so long came out in wails. I leaned over with my backpack on and heaved sobs, really hoping no one would see me.
After crying, and looking around to see if I was still alone (thank god I was) I shakily begin the final rocky descent, muddy from the day’s rain. I came across two fallen trees, one of which I delicately tried to climb over, but quickly gave up as I didn’t want to take off my rain poncho and my backpack. So I decided to climb around the massive trunk, which ended even less delicately, as I slipped and fell right into the mud.
I arrived at the pilgrim hostel, or albergue, at 5pm. All I wanted a hot shower, carbs and a glass of wine. All three wishes were granted. The albergue was run by a kindly old gentleman who checked me in and showed me to my bank. There was a roaring fire in the kitchen with other pilgrims gathered around making dinner. I prepared myself a simple pasta dish, someone poured me a glass of vino tinto…I think I remember a hunk of chorizo making an appearance.
The next morning I woke up feeling weird. Not “I walked 21 km the day before” kind of weird, but slightly feverish, chest-heavy weird. I decided to take an easy day and walk only 10 km. That evening things quickly took a turn for the worse. The fever swooped in just as I was finishing dinner. By the next morning, my voice was gone and my throat burned.
My vision board was not visioning like I wanted it to vision…