If you are going to busk across Spain, first learn an instrument
Adventurer and author Alastair Humphreys recounts how he pushed himself to his limits to follow in the footsteps of his hero Laurie Lee
Laurie Lee and
I first met as teenagers, though he was 63 years older than me. Laurie lived in a lush valley in Gloucestershire where, emboldened by booze, he was busy getting his leg over with half the girls in the village. I was studying Cider with Rosie for English GCSE, avoiding eye contact with the teacher and
willing the lunch bell to save me. Not for the final time, I envied Laurie.
The next time Laurie and I met, in our twenties, we were both looking for adventure. I was in my final year at university when I picked up a copy of As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning, the sequel to Cider with Rosie, in a charity shop.
“You’ll enjoy that,” remarked Ziggy, the friend I was browsing with. “It’s about a guy wandering around Spain, half drunk with wine, and a bunch of dark-eyed beauties.”
Ziggy and I headed to a café with our small pile of books. I ordered mugs of tea while Ziggy found a table in the corner. He cleared a circle in the steamed-up window with his sleeve, then peered out. I took a slurp of tea and opened my new book. I have the same copy beside me today, faded and torn. It falls open to wellthumbed passages for I reread it almost every year.
Fifteen years ago, As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning sang me a siren song in that Oxford café. I have been smitten by Spain ever since. I love the evening light laden with citrus blossom and the rook-like chatter of old women, dark-eyed and kinder than they let on. I fell, too, for Laurie’s style of travel. He walked slowly and lived frugally. He camped on hilltops, bathed in rivers and enjoyed his encounters with the characters he met on the road.
Now, one flippant email had set something in motion. A dream became a decision. I was going to follow Laurie into Spain, and do it properly: with
Beads of sweat ran down my flank. There was no crowd of fawning fans. No cascade of coins. Not even a round of applause
a violin and without money.
I knuckled down to make the best of the time I had available, with a weekly violin lesson and an hour’s practice every evening. I was atrocious at the violin and needed to improve quickly if the plan was to become even vaguely viable. But I also discovered that repetitive rehearsal and incremental improvement had an allure of its own. As a compulsive multi-tasker, I found this forced focus calming. Late at night in my shed, my worries faded away for a while. But despite my dedication through winter and spring, as the days lengthened I could still play only a handful of tunes.
As my planned departure day approached, I acknowledged, reluctantly, that trying to survive in Spain with no money was unrealistic. Everyone had been telling me this for months. The only sensible option was to postpone the trip for a year until I became competent, or at least travel with my own money and just do a bit of busking for a lark.
But fortunately in life, the only sensible option is not the only option. I booked my ticket to Spain.
Into Spain I sat on the harbour wall, gritty and warm, with my face tilted to the sun. Sea salt and engine diesel in the air. Halyards clanking and gulls circling. Back in 1935, Laurie’s ship docked in Vigo, a quiet corner
of northwest Spain. Now I was here, too, at last. I envied how vivid this arrival must have been for Laurie, setting eyes on abroad for the very first time. “I landed in a town submerged by wet green sunlight and smelling of the waste of the sea. People lay sleeping in doorways, or sprawled on the ground, like bodies washed up by the tide.”
I picked up my rucksack and set off to explore Vigo. Graceful buildings flanked broad shopping streets, wrought-iron balconies on every storey. Meandering narrow alleys were hewn from rougher blocks of stone. A pail of water sloshed like mercury across the cobbles from a café opening for business, and I breathed the scent of geraniums. Even after 20 years of travelling, I still cherish first mornings in a new place when every detail is fresh.
It was mid-morning, but Spain still slept. The streets were so quiet that I said ‘Buenos días’ to each person I passed. It was time to busk for the very first time. The sun was high as I stooped to drink and splash my face in the fountain. The bleary drunks prodded each other and watched with bloodshot eyes. The fountain commemorated the Reconquista of 1809 when Vigo became the first town in Spain to expel Napoleon’s army. Trees lined the square and on three sides there were stately 19th-century buildings. The fourth side lay open, leading towards a shopping street. The pensioners on the bench shuffled expectantly and the man in the Panama hat mopped his brow. I mumbled an apology for the disappointment that awaited them. I flicked through my music sheets to find the tune I was most comfortable with, a nostalgic old folk tune called ‘Long, Long Ago’.
The ghoulish screech ripped the silence and my daydreams apart. I had hoped, somehow, that I might have become miraculously skilful since the last time I had practised. In fact, I was even worse than usual. My finger positions were all wrong and the bow trembled across the strings. Everyone turned in surprise. Screech, screech, screech! A sweat of shame and selfridicule trickled down my face. Each note sounded jagged and raw. I lost my place in the music and had to begin again.
I stood in the middle of the Praza da Princesa playing ‘Long, Long Ago’ over and over. Beads of sweat ran down my flank. There was no crowd of fawning fans. No cascade of coins. Not even a round of applause. Just indifferent Spaniards accelerating past. I had known this would happen. But I had not known how it would feel.
The timid averted their gaze and lengthened their stride. The stoical reacted by not reacting. A businessman glanced up from his phone but didn’t flatter me with a second look. A young woman in a leather jacket wrinkled her nose as though I stank. I was a visitor in her town behaving like a tedious fool.
I faced two options. Both were simple but neither was easy. I could stop playing, melt back into the streets and regain my blissful anonymity. It was so tempting. Or I could stick it out here in the plaza, daring myself to keep failing. If I quit now, the whole journey was over before I had walked a single step. I did not know how to catch rabbits, and I am more accomplished at foraging in supermarkets than forests. I had to earn money. I could not hide behind any excuses. I had no Plan B.
But what I did have was clarity. I had only one job to do. And I must do it with all my might. It was not easy, but it was simple. My legs shook. Half my head begged me to stop. But the rest of me, fists clenched, knuckles white, said no. Just finish this song. You can always ride one more mile, row one more minute, walk one more step, play one more song. ● My Midsummer Morning: Rediscovering a Life of Adventure by Alastair Humphreys is out now published by William
Collins at
£14.99.