Camino de Santiago Day Five: Gabas Rest Day: We Put Our Feet Up

It's been raining since early morning, so glad we're not walking today. We had breakfast, the usual croissants, jam and coffee, but also a generous slice of Basque tart. I'm not used to a sweet breakfast but it's still good.

With the drizzle still falling we spent most of the rest of the day in bed, reading after going through the usual clothes washing ritual. Later we ventured out for lunch to the second of the three restaurants in town. The only other patrons inside was a group of French country folk who were digging into plates loaded with meat and chips. They were a jolly lot, exchanging banter with the waitress, who also seemed to be the cook, bar tender and cashier.

We ordered, and it wasn't long before we heard our trouts sizzling in the kitchen, no doubt in a deep pan laden with butter sauce. The radio was playing Edith Piaf and the cook was singing along. The fish, no doubt born and raised in the Ossau river a few yards from the kitchen, were indeed grilled to perfection and we finished with them off with two more slices of Basque tarte.

Our requests for Café Americano was met with a mute response - nothing but espressos in the menu here. Before returning to our cosy room with a scenic view on the green valley pastures we purchased a generous slice of local cheese to take with tomorrow, as there'll be no towns before Sallent de Gallego. Don't know how we're going to stop ourselves from devouring if before then.

Yes, all's well in this corner of the French Pyrenees.

Camino de Santiago Day Four: Laruns - Gabas: We Get Lost. Badly.

Had a restless night, confirming my suspicion that a tiny, windowless room with six stacked beds and no en-suite is not my favourite accommodation. We had our usual latish start, and headed out of pretty Laruns around nine. There's going to be no rushing out the door on this Camino...

We soon picked up a hiking trail that formed a contour path along the valley slope above the Ossau river. Lots of trees had fallen across the trail so the going was slow. At one point we had to cross a crevice in which lay a massive ice flow, unfamiliar terrain for us South Africans, not used to snow. Most of the time the amber green forest we passed through was all hobbit and fairy scenery - tall, hulking trees covered in moss, exotic ferns and cute little mountain streams. All first class hiking fare.

We walked through the small, elegant-looking hamlet of Eaux Chaud - hot water, in French - just before lunch. Similar to many towns we'd passed through so far, there was hardly a soul to be seen. It's known for it's hot water spas, but right now it looked like it had been abandoned a hundred years ago. It had an eerie atmosphere that felt like a haunted asylum. I took a series of photos that I'm sure will show ghostly figures in them when I look at them later on.

As we went on the hiking trail got tougher. It became a familiar pattern - cross a bridge over the Ossau river, steep climb up, level off, downhill towards the river, cross another bridge, up again, etc, etc. When we finally reconnected with the road for the last kilometer into Gabas, we'd covered more than twenty kilometers of tough but very enjoyable hiking.

Gabas is a typical almanac picture town, all green pastures, snow covered peaks overhead and cutesy mountain architecture. According go the information board near the town entrance it's an ages-old (like, REALLY old, try a thousand years) pilgrim stay-over town that featured a long-disappeared pilgrim refuge established to take care of sore feet and aching muscles, and probably wounds from the odd skirmish with wild bears and other forest creatures.

We booked into the small but homely Chez Vignes hotel (darn, no foot rubbing service here), had a tasty dinner (do the French ever NOT make tasty food?) and that was the day for us. Today we really missed all our hiking friends back home.

Camino de Santiago Day Three: Arudy - Laruns: Know What You Eat

We walked out of Arudy along a quiet street next to the Ossau river, then  a short stretch along the busy main road and finally picked up a dirt track almost all the way to Bielle, which was the capital of the Ossau valleu in ancient times.

It's a remarkably well-preserved viilage where I first noticed the typical 'barn door' entrances of older houses that is a tradition in the region. A keystone above the door carried either the family crescent or a religious motif meant to protect the home and its inhabitants. I took a series of  photos of these doors here and in Larudy, hope I can turn them into a poster or something later.

We had a quick packed lunch in a small park replete with antique fountain in Bielle before continuing.

We followed a very quiet secondary tarred road running through open farmland. Twice we came across Pyrenees Shepherd dogs guarding sheep in fields. While they look extremely cuddly they kicked up a massive fuss when we gave them any attention. A sign we'd seen in Mitagad the previous day cautioned walkers not to look at 'Patou', or bother them at all. They have a job to do!

Once in Laruns we looked up the Albergue L'Embaradere, only to be told we could only check in at five. Strange, since the place was deserted anyway. So we sat down at a sweet-looking creperie on the town square for an hour or two before returning.

The accommodation was in a smallish room stuffed with three bunk beds, our first encounter with Camino-style living. I hadn't slept like this since my long-gone days in the Army. Oh well. This is the Camino, not a package holiday.

So we washed up and walked to a nearby restaurant, Le Arrègalet, that looked like it served local fare.

Adeline can't wait for the restaurant to open...

Here's how the ordering went. 

The owner-chef, who looks totally like Gerard Depardieu, comes round to take our order. Adeline looks at the menu, which is all in French. She decides on "La Dios" something-something.

He looks at her doubtfully. 

"You know what 'La Dios' is?"

She doesn't of course.

He points vaguely to his head.

"Pig's cheek, nose, ear".

She had it anyway, and loved it. My trout with mushrooms was the best I'd ever eaten.

The Camino is being good to these two foodies.


All the photos of the Camino are on Flickr..

Camino de Santiago Day Two: Asson to Arudy:

The Asson town church bell awoke us around six, shortly before sunrise. It was still raining. With no bistro or boulangerie in the immediate area we settled for bowls of Futurelife we'd brought from home for breakfast. We did the morning packing ritual, which we'd perfected during 25 years of backpack hiking back home. No worries there.

When we poked our noses out the door at eight, lo and behold, the sun had broken through! So we set off cheerfully on a few kilometers of farm roads until we got to the village of Bruges where we paused on the town square to buy a baguette, a tin of anchovies and two tangerines.

By now it had heated up enough for us to pack away our jackets and fish out the suntan lotion from our backpacks. Mitaget was the next town on the list, a pretty, historic town that apparently was an important pilgrim town nine hundred years ago. As we walk along I spend a lot of time imagining how it must've been for those brave enough to make the trek to Santiago back in the 12th century. Just think of all the stories tied up in that history! I'm surprised no Hollywood director has yet made a big budget epic drama against the background of the Camino of the time. 

We make a point of going inside each church we pass, and it was no different in Mitaget. I love the musty smell of the older churches, love examining the worn floor tiles for markings. The folks of years gone by were fond of leaving graffiti in churches behind....

We paused for lunch just before the road started climbing steeply towards the town of Saint Colome, and we caught a glimpse of the first snow-capped peaks. We were now entering the Ossau valley that will take us into Spain. Between here and the border at Portalet lay 1500m of uphill! We were now tackling the first of those metres.

We reached Arudy around 6pm, after a relatively easy 15km walk. We seem to fill the day with walking, no matter the distance. There's just so much along the way to take in, it's a shame to rush by. 

After last night's hunger games and mattress-on-the-floor bed we were in the mood for something comfy so booked into the Hotel France on the town square. Rugby fever permeated the town, and everywhere blue and yellow banners were spurring the local team on.

We settled in the largely empty bar for beers, had an average dinner at the hotel, and off to bed. A nice, easy day of pleasant walking.

(See all the Camino photos here...)

Camino de Santiago Day One: Lourdes to Asson: Wet, wet, wet.

Before today I had various romantic visions for our departure on the Camino de Santiago from Lourdes - a quiet moment, a taste of holy water, a last peek into the splendid cathedral to wish us well on our way. Au contraire, there myself and Adeline stood in the pouring rain like drenched rats as a passing Frenchman cracked a joke about us looking like hunch-backs in our bright red ponchos. We were surrounded by a milling crowd of plastic covered wheel chairs and umbrella wielding nuns, while we desperately tried to take the obligatory selfie, me hoping my iPhone is water-proof. To the uninitiated this must've all seemed very Monty Python.

 

And then we were off.

That's the Lourdes cathedral in die background.

 

Actually, walking while it rains cats and dogs is quite enjoyable if you're geared well, so we took it in our stride. After following the river for a kilometer or two we switched to a lush forested path. A small deer darted shyly among the trees, and every now and than we'd stop to look at a lizard or insect that looked strange to our South African eyes. It was great to be solitary and surrounded by nature.

 

After about 15km of walking along largely deserted farm roads we reached Betharram, the first main town on our route. We lunched at a hotel restaurant where we briefly noticed the only other pilgrims for the day. Next we set off for a steep climb on a path leading 200m up a forested hill to a small, intriguing cemetery with three full-size crosses towering overhead.

 

All along the way and at the top we saw beautifully designed religious shrines, I wish I knew the history behind them. Was it the legacy of a rich aristocrat from the previous century? It certainly looked that way...

 

We'd estimated the road to Asson where we're staying over to be about 20km but the farm roads stretched into a distance of 29km according to my gps - quite a distance, but still immensely enjoyable for the first day on Camino. We arrived in Asson around six, hunted for the parish refuge, were taken to an upstairs, bare basics room. We were looking forward to having a celebratory dinner at a cosy little French bistro, but were rather abruptly told all shops and restaurants in town close at five. A quick scouting walk around the village confirmed that - all we could find was a croissant vending machine (where else in the world do you find that??) but after punching in a Euro, turns out it was empty.

 

Which meant our minimalistic dinner before we nodded off for the day consisted of an energy bar for each of us and two sachets of cuppacino that kind souls back home had donated to us. Such are the blessings of friends...

All the photos of the Camino are on Flickr..

 

W

 

This Camino Thing

I didn't think I could do it.

Well, I sort of did believe I could. I'm reasonably fit, and the doc says the old ticker is in fine condition. But still.

And yet, I've just finished walking ONE THOUSAND KILOMETERS, all in one go. Yes, I've walked the Camino de Compostela.

We'd been planning this Camino thing for just on a year, after returning triumphantly from that mother of southern African hikes, the Naukluft Hiking Trail in central Namibia. When we started thinking about the Camino, doing another walk that would add a zero to the 120km of the Naukluft seemed like a logical progression. After surviving on rations and clambering over rocks the size of houses for more than a week in the bone-dry, desolate Namibian mountains, the Camino's congenial albergues, and user-friendly pathways seemed like a cinch.

Which is why I hardly did any physical preparation before I tackled the Camino de Santiago. Me and Adeline did a few five kilometer walks in a local park, climbed the five storey staircase at Sandton Gautrain station, that sort of thing. But no stretches, sit-ups, push-ups, or any other ups of any kind. I hate physical exercise. I was the baby who refused to kick a ball, or later on, was the one hiding in the washroom when it was sport time at school. Sport, gyms, that sort of sweaty stuff, ain't me.

Rather, I'm an information junkie and Adeline a compulsive planner. That is why by the time we were at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg in late April 2015, ready to leave for Spain, our backpacks and their contents were so optimally optimised for the Camino you can travel to Mars with  them. I had an iPhone filled with every app, map, and notes-to-take-note-of to ensure we don't  get lost, or, god forbid, have to roll out our sleeping back inners under a bridge somewhere because we can't find a decent bed for the night.

We were carrying slightly more than the recommended backpack weight. The check-in weight digital display showed Adeline's  backpack barely touching on 10kg and mine at about 12kg, both without water, which would add another kilo or two. A tad on the heavy side, but hardly overloaded.

The plan was fairly elaborate, as the Camino de Santiago goes. We would start in Lourdes, a modern-day pilgrim destination. We'd visited the town a few years ago, and the religious tourism in its finest form we saw there fascinated me, perhaps more so because I'm a lapsed Calvinist Protestant who grew up with fire-and-brimstone warnings against Catholicism. I bought a mid-sized plastic madonna holy water bottle from one of the countless souvenir shops that line the streets of Lourdes and promised myself I'd return someday to investigate further. Little did I know my return would be to start walking the Camino, on a pilgrimage away from Saint Bernadette's statue in front of the cathedral.

The route we were to follow took us high up the Ossau valley, on a pilgrim route to Santiago that fell out of favour after the opening of the Somport pass to pilgrim traffic during the Middle Ages. We would cross into Spain at Portalet, via a footpath route over the Pyrenees,  then take about four days to walk to Jaca, from where we embark on the seven-day Camino de Aragonés, which in turn joins the Camino Frances at Puente la Reina. Here we would be joining about twenty thousand other pilgrims on their way to Santiago. From there it's a seven hundred kilometer trundle to Santiago on what seems to be, judging by the photos on Pinterest, a very well-trodden path. The envisaged total distance came to about 960km, but with variations it'll probably reach four figures.

We would stay at a mix of albergues, casa rurals and hotels, and give ourselves one rest day per week. We did a few bookings at strategic places, but for most of the way, we'd just be winging it.

Why do we do it?

There's nothing dramatic about us doing the Camino. I'm not weighed down by anything heavy, like Martin Sheen carrying his son's ashes in his Hollywoodified Camino Road trip movie. I've no big decisions to make, no emotional baggage to deal with. The Camino is simply an adventure, an opportunity to take in medieval architecture and history, and hopefully discover a few good places to eat and drink at (rumours say that's nigh impossible on the Camino, but we'll see. We have a talent for sniffing out gourmet food in unlikely places).

Which I guess makes our big adventure slightly undramatically boring.That said, according to most records, no-one goes home after walking the Camino exactly the same person they were before. How I'll change, I didn't know.

Ready for it? This is how it went...

Almost off the map in Botswana

We got really lucky a few weekends ago.

Friends of ours recently started work at a four star game lodge on the banks of the Limpopo on the Botswana side, and invited us to come and visit, for free. We didn't need much persuasion even though we weren't planning to go anywhere before setting off for Spain to walk the Camino, but hey, who can refuse a luxury long weekend in the bush, and mahala too?

I've never been to this corner of Botswana. And I mean that quite literally, referring to the notch where South Africa, Zimbabwe and Botswana meet, known commonly as the Tuli Block. It certainly hasn't been on my travel radar. I doubt whether anyone else but a handful of super-rich hunters and wild-life lovers show up here, and then I doubt  even more whether the rich and famous venture out further than their game drive vehicles will take them.

We crossed into Botswana at the tiny Zanzibar border post, and ten minutes later we were all oohs and ahs about the lodge, which was all bespoke fittings and bush-veld chic. We relished every comfy moment in the massive bedroom with a five star view over the river and the outdoor shower that doubles as a bird watching spot, but having driven all this way we also wanted to explore the area. So after a good night's sleep we set off Saturday morning early on a 200km circular drive to explore the area. (Foreigners go on safari; South Africans take a drive).

The map we used as a guide promised several 'historical sites' and other attractions but there was no actual signage anywhere along the road pointing to them. 'Culture' here seems to be limited to the size of a warthog's teeth and a visitor's ability to tell the difference between a kudu and a waterbuck (all of which we spotted along the way). Which is a shame for a natural history junkie like me.

The dirt road we were on heading east became narrower and rougher as we continued until I was thankful that we were in the Landy and not our friend's hatchback. The landscape gradually changed from low, rocky hills to a broad river valley. Looking for clues of what lay ahead, Google maps showed that we would soon reach a bridge over the Matloutse river.

Well, to be fair, it showed we'd be crossing the Matloutse river, not how we'd be doing the crossing.

We round a sharp, forested bend in the road which then abruptly ended on a sandy bank of the Matloutse's dry riverbed that stretched out ahead of us for about 70 metres or so. On the opposite bank we could see a steep incline where the road - now little more than a washed-out track - continued. The river was a narrow, shallow stream that lazily snaked its way along the wide stretch of sand. A tall, imposing rock wall flanked the river on both edges, creating the impression that the river had at some point thousands of years ago broken through this natural barrier.

There was a strong, almost supernatural ambience here, almost like something from a Lara Croft movie, or a scene from one of those dinosaur hunting movies set in a steamy jungle. It felt like time immemorial has seen natural wonders wax and wane here, until, right now, it was a peaceful scene waiting to be discovered.

What was this incredibly beautiful, unmarked place, about?

It was only later, with the help of Wikipedia that we realised that we'd stumbled upon Solomon's Wall. The huge rock-faces with their ancient vines and the white roots (were these Namaqua fig trees?) spidering on it is called Solomon's Wall, and it once formed a dam behind which was a huge pre-historic lake. As we sauntered around the deep sand in the riverbed we each collected a handful of pretty, brightly coloured pebbles that are an alluvial leftover of the time the area was covered by the lake. There must've been a breathtakingly beautiful waterfall thundering over the wall before time, countless floods and the workings of nature eroded it, leaving the river to flow freely again.

And yet, no signage, no picnic spot, no explanatory notice board, nothing that says anything about what we saw. If not for the details preserved in Wikipedia we may as well be the first explorers to set foot here.

Well, almost. A trickle of 4x4 vehicles and intrepid mountain bikers showed up shortly before we left, just to prove that humanity has indeed reached into all hidden corners of the planet. But still, Solomon's Wall has the ambience of an ancient place where, given time to explore, one can probably dig up up a treasure trove of local legends and myths.

We had to make our way back to the lodge long before I was able to look around and take enough photos to satisfy my curiosity. So I plan to return as some point in the future, perhaps with one of my geologist friends to help lay out the rock history here.

Thinking about Solomon's Wall on the eight-hour journey back to Johannesburg reminded me of Mapungubwe, the site of an ancient civilisation that lay just across the Limpopo river in South Africa. Perhaps for them the lake was where giants and mythological beasts from that long gone era bathed before they were destroyed by a natural catastrophe, only living on in misty legends and fantastical fables.

The scientist in me laughs at that notion. But that's the magic of Africa - the stories it evokes through its amazingly beautiful natural history.