Camino day 20--León and beyond

Finally on the downhill slope of things. As of tomorrow I will have been walking for three weeks straight, which is really a crazy thought when you think about it. You can peg numbers and distances onto it--788 kilometers, 488 miles, 30 days--but even after having walked all of those kilometers (500 as of today) and spent so much time on the Camino it's still incredibly difficult to grasp and understand in your head. Yesterday I was in León, and I looked at a map in the albergue I stayed at, and discovered I've basically walked two-thirds of the way across Spain. There is so much experience and memory and so many fellow pilgrims that I've met in those 500 kilometers (not to mention a hell of a lot of walking), it's really just incredible. Puts you in a reverent state of mind when you realize the power and scale of it all.

León turned out to be really nice. I've found I'm not a big fan of the large cities on the Camino. Sure, they're big, they've got more going on than the smaller little villages along the way, and there's more to see, but they also have such a different atmosphere. The walking for one is much less pleasant. The approaches into cities like Burgos and León and even Pamplona have all been really nasty and ugly, full of car dealerships and suburbs and sixteen wheelers, and the Camino is always either right alongside a highway or on the highway itself, which is never fun. Plus finding accommodation in a big city has proved to be a challenge for me. The first time I encountered a full albergue was in Burgos. After having walked 40 kilometers into Burgos in the first place it was just so depressing to get turned away and think that I had to sling my backpack on once again and go out into the city to hunt for another place (fortunately I found an albergue with rooms on my second try).

León turned out to be even worse. The walking wasn't as bad or as long, and beforehand I had actually planned to have a fellow pilgrim reserve me a spot in the municipal albergue in León. Of course, when I got there the place was full, and turns out you can't even make reservations there. Right as I was leaving the second albergue in town called the front desk to let the lady know that they were full as well. I was pretty pissed to say the least, and made my way to the tourist information office to see if there were hostels in town that I could stay at. After trying three in a row and getting turned down three times, I was ready to walk out of town to the next village, but fortunately ended up running into my friend again at a cafe. She had had problems at the municipal as well, and just made the reservations at the second place in town. If only my cell phone hadn't gotten broken when it was raining in Roncesvalles this situation could have been avoided...

Anyway, like I was saying, León was a beautiful city. Streets with apartment balconies on both sides exploding with purple, red and pink flowers, one of the largest and most beautiful cathedrals I've ever seen, winding alleyways full of restaurants and ice cream shops and bars with tables spilling out into the streets, it had a fantastic atmosphere. Not really a city you go to to see the sites, but it would be a great place just to relax for a few days and go cafe hopping with a book and a journal. If I had to choose three places to return to (if I ever come back to Spain) it would be Pamplona, Viana and León. And, as has been the case in every big city, pretty much everyone who I've met on the Camino ended up convening all in the same spot, so it was great to see pilgrims who I'd met in the first few days of the trip and hadn't seen again for a while.

These next few days will be really interesting. Most people who do the Camino don't do the whole thing from St. Jean Pied de Port, but start later down the trail, usually in the last 100 kilometers so they can get their compostela (essentially a certificate of completion) from the cathedral in Santiago de Compostela. People have been telling me horror stories about the last 100 kilometers, and I fear they may prove to be true. By 7:00 in the morning I was one of the last 10 pilgrims to leave the albergue, and I saw so many damn people just burning their way out of León this morning, really booking it down the Camino just so they wouldn't get locked out of a place to sleep for the night. I hope the atmosphere doesn't get too competitive. The best thing about the Camino so far has been the amazing communal atmosphere on the trail and the people you meet along the way, and I don't want to feel like I have to get up at four in the morning just to beat everyone to the next village, which would be the exact opposite philosophy I think you should treat it with. We'll see though. Staying optimistic for the time being anyway, which isn't hard when you're surrounded by so many warm, friendly people.