For days in Galicia the road goes through little villages with a population of less than twenty. Internet is not available and the few albergues that did have access were charging too much for too little time on very slow machines.

I made it here for the big festival and saw the fireworks and the parades.

Today I will get my compostella which is a certificate of completion of the pilgrimage. This past weekend the line for compostellas was a four hour wait. I'm lucky to have the time to do it today when the whole city is calmer. The King and Queen of Spain were here for the fireworks and the mass on Sunday and not only were the crowds intense the security was  what you would expect. I was still pulling my harp through all this and the police kept rerouting me.

I was in the newspaper La Voz de Galicia on the 16th of July and that gave me a lot of goodwill as I walked. Also, a camera crew from a television show called Informe Semanal did a piece on me as I was walking. The program aired this past weekend and gave me my fifteen minutes of fame as I wandered Santiago. I’m hoping someone can find it online. At first I could not figure out why people were stopping me and saying such nice things and knowing my story and then some pilgrims told me they had seen me on TV. The web for the show is www.informesemanal@rtve.es and here's a link so you can watch the video.

link to video

The next stage of the walk is to Finnestere which I will do in a few days and while I am recouperating from the walk to Santiago I'll update you on the camino from Villasirga.

You can understand that I was excited to be there.I spent some time on the church and found Alfonso's Virgen and was quite moved.

That evening there was to be a concert after the pilgrims blessing and before the service  I went to the church and heard the guitarist warming up.I introduced myself and asked if he was going to play any cantigas and he admitted that he really did not know any.He then did a very generous thing and invited me to join him and play my harp in his concert.So,after traveling many miles I finally am playing for THE Virgen that inspired the book.

This mesa is not as big  as the one before Hontanas and sooner than I expected there was the steep path down. Now the road goes through a flat and treeless landscape and the heat is an issue.Stopped in the town of Boadilla about three worried about the harp and the harpist.

The albergue was an oasis with a swimming pool and a green and shady garden full of art.Ran into a number of pilgrims I knew who also stopped because of the heat.Without intending to I ended up playing for my supper.After a shower and a dip I felt inspired to play in the garden and the owner,who is a musician with a degree in flute,refused my money for a meal.

So, the next day the trip to Fromista was a snap. I arrived by ten in the morning and sat in a cafe watching the pilgrim parade until the albergue opened. As I was checking in a woman from San Francisco made a fuss over me and said she had been hoping to catch up with me and hear me. This impressed the lady checking us in and I had to give a time for my concert!

I then went to San Martin a famous 12th c. church. It is beautiful but no longer a church and though lovingly restored is rather souless.

Playing for the pilgrims at the albergue became a much better idea. I did a twenty minute presentation and I am getting better at my Spanish then English explanation of the cantigas and their connection to the Camino. It is a treat to share this with the Spanish many of whom have heard of Alfonso from school but know nothing of the cantigas. When I tell them that a least thirty of the cantigas tell of miracles that happened to pilgrims on the camino it really hits home. More friends made and the next day was an easy walk to Villasirga.

The ruins are what is left of a monastery and hospital for pilgrims that was founded by Alfonso VII in 1146. What remains are arches and three walls of the church and the gateway and more walls of the complex. One archway spans the road itself.

The place is called San Anton and was famous for curing and healing. There is an albergue within the ruins that is open to the elements and looked like a cool place but it was early in the day and after wandering and taking photos I decided to walk on to Castrojeriz- only three more kilometers and within two I could see the town in the distance.

There is a tall hill above the town and on top the ruins of a castle and as I approached there was the church of Santa Maria del Manzano. Cantigas 242,249,252 and 266 have to do with the construction of this church and the miracles performed by the Virgen del Manzano.

She is still there and if possible I wished to play for her.

Right across from the church is a bar and restaurant called the Meson Manzano and I stopped there and got permission to leave my gear while I scoped out the church.

Most of the church is a museum now but one chapel is still consecrated and in the middle of a golden retablo is the 13th c. statue. The lady who takes the money for the museum was willing to turn off the canned music and let me play. It was a very special moment to play for a statue that Alfonso himself knew and to be with one of the Santa Marias of the book.

When people ask me why I am doing this I tell them that I am thankful for thirty years of being a musician and that I want to play the cantigas in the land they come from. Quite a few people came in to hear me as word had spread and it was a big day for me.

I am now in a place called Foncebadon and tomorrow I climb to the highest point on the Camino. Soon I will be leaving Castilla y Leon and crossing into Galicia. I will fill you in on Fromista and Villalcazar de Sirga the latter having the Virgen Blanca who inspired Alfonso to commission the cantigas. I played for her too.

Just then, a voice behind me says "I think it's a harp." I say yes it is and a man appears beside me declares he is Irish and that he and his companion were debating as to what I was pulling. He and his companion were part of a group of fifteen Irish doing the trek. Well, they made me laugh to the point that I completely forgot the trail ahead. They all blessed me as they passed me by and I was moved by their sincerity and thankful for the laughter. Then they all went off the trail to look a cross that is at the base of the scary bit and I kept trudging on. I was only a little way up the bad part when I was suddenly surrounded by the Irish again and saying that I looked to need a bit of help - I was lifted up to the top of the trail! There I was at the top and the ground level before me. It happened so fast I could hardly believe where I was.

The man who first spoke to me walked with me a little ways and I learned his name to be Tommy. As I thanked him he just said to play him an Irish tune when I got to Roncesvalles. He then disappeared on ahead and I walked on alone.

Well, here’s the thing. No group of Irish appeared at Roncesvalles. Nobody else saw them. There were people waiting for me and concerned as to how I managed the pass and they had been looking for me for some time. They all swear they would have noticed fifteen Irish pilgrims.

All I am certain of is that it took fifteen Irish angels to get me over the pass for what else could they have been? Fifteen may have been a few more than I needed but I will be forever grateful. Twice now I have encountered Irish who have asked for a tune and I do it with pleasure thinking that Tommy can hear me.

There were some Irish folks on the mountain the day I climbed the pass and they took my picture and one claimed to be from in the press but I took that with a grain of salt.  Later a lady told me she had read it and that there was a picture of me..  

I've just spent some time looking but no success. If anybody has time to search the web and find it I would love to see it! 

I'm half way to Santiago!

Martha

The next day I began my ascent of the first mesa,  After a steep road up I found myself in a different world.  Flat and dry with windmills and sparse fields and off in the distance other mesas with the land between invisible. I trudged on and up and eventually into Hornillios, a village little changed by the last few centuries. It was only mid afternoon so decided to push onward over the pass to Hontana.

This is truly lonely country and as I walked alone I seemed surrounded by silence. I could only hear birdsong whenever I paused to rest. I became concerned as dark clouds were gathering to the west - the direction I was walking - and I really hoped to be able to reach Hontana before the storm hit. Although I was walking in full sun, chilly breezes began gusting in from the dark weather ahead and soon the wind was strong and cold and I was glad for my cloak. I had to hurry and I was getting really tired out

I just made it to the point on the trail when the church tower was just peeking over the horizon when the rain started. Luckily it was not a hard rain and so I made the albergue just in time and hardly wet at all.

Only beat.

I crashed and then stayed the next day and mostly slept. Eventually I recovered enough strength to come out on the patio and played my harp and made some more friends.

Martha

This was a day I did not play.

The next day was an easy one as I only went half as far to the village of Villafranca.  I made more friends by playing there in the evening. From Villafranca I took the bus to Burgos to avoid a steep bit and also missed having to walk through the suburbs of Burgos for an hour.

Burgos has the most impressive cathedral yet on my trip and the albergue is right behind it. I arrived about two hours before they opened so I pulled out my harp and played to pass the time in a park by the albergue.  There are places around the cathedral with benches so you can sit and admire the beautiful spires and carvings. I attracted a small crowd of other pilgrims waiting for the albergue to open and saw some familiar faces from as long ago as Zubiri.

Met a girl from Switzerland who had heard of me who is doing the Camino on her Andalusian horse. Her name is Mara and she had been hoping to meet the other crazy lady on the road. That afternoon I spent in the cathedral and it alone is worth the trip to Spain.

  The Cathedral of Santa Maria in Burgos is stunning with its soaring spires that seem to be made of lace rather than stone and every surface is covered with intricate decoration. This sounds busy but the scale of the building is so grand that it all works. The gargoyles and faces on the facade alone would take hours to see.

 When you walk into the South portal it almost gives one vertigo when you look up! The arches are at least three stories above and the stonework tracery is of such exquisite delicacy it seems to be made of lace. There are fifteen side chapels! each one from a different period and all full of art. This is so hard to describe and everyone who takes the time to go agrees that words and pictures cannot do the experience justice.

 The cathedral was started in the 12th and finished in the 14th century. The finest artisans in stone, wood and marble worked for two centuries to make this a masterpiece.

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