AN ANCIENT CAMINO SHOWS THE WAY
In a world short on perspective and high on grievances,
Why, I ask myself more than once, am I devoutly following bright yellow arrows and shells — walking alone, hiking poles in hand, too-heavy survival pack on my back — into unknown woodlands, farmlands and storybook villages for some 100 miles, from a Portuguese border-town to Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain?
I come up with no clear answer other than the possibility of a mental and physical reset, aided by my addiction to discovery as motivation. This adventure tests me like no other. I’m energized by leaving
Florida behind, even when strenuous daily walks demand I bandage ankles, feet and knees. It was time to separate, at least temporarily, from a world short on perspective and convulsed by grievances, violence and dueling narratives.
Like millions of pilgrims through the centuries searching for solace and enlightenment, I’m on one of the paths of the legendary Camino de Santiago, engaged by everything along the way: breathtaking nature, friendly people, animals who bark, crow and baa when they see me coming.
People come to the pilgrimage, a record-breaking
446,035 in 2023, with intention and burdens to leave behind. I’m not so sure what mine are. I’m a free woman who, for the first time in her adult life, isn’t taking care of anyone but herself. I’ve brought with me for inspiration a shell from St. Augustine
Beach to leave behind at a designated place for offerings and a small wooden heart inscribed with my late mother’s
Leaving the border town of Tui behind, pilgrims come upon this quintessential site of the central Portuguese Camino, the medieval bridge of over the river Louro, Ponte da Veiga, and turn left to enter the ancient Via Romana XIX.