Frustration - can we re-learn trust in the church, please???

Call me naive, but I just hate church politics, and I hate all the labels we use - yes, all of them. And I particularly hate it when politics either masquerades in another guise, or the people involved are blind to it.

Last spring, I had the profound privilege of serving on the Crown Nominations Commission as one of Durham Diocese's representatives. I am bound by the confidentiality that surrounds that process. I have no desire to break the confidentiality. By instinct I am someone who is 100% for total transparency, and I am frustrated by processes that are secretive, but that is not how I feel about that process. Too often egos are fed by being in an inner circle. Too often secrecy about processes works against making the right decision. Too often it leads to silo thinking. I didn't experience any of that as a member of the Durham CNC.

What I did come respectfully to recognise was that the confidentiality we observed protected the people who were under consideration. It protected their families. It protected the communities they were serving in at the time. It protected the diocesan reps from too much inappropriate lobbying. It protected the diocese from unhelpful speculation. It also reminded us that this was a process entrusted to us by the church under God.

Serving on that CNC was a privilege from another point of view as well. It may well have been a very task-focused group, and it is a pretty tall order for any newly formed group to reach a high level of functioning so fast from a standing start, but it was a deep bonding experience. I came away from it with a deep admiration and fondness for every single member of the group - laity, clergy, archbishops, secretaries.

I know that the group of us from Durham came to it from our various traditions and theological positions with a deep sense of unity in diversity. I cannot recall any discussion of 'party issues' or 'party positions', and while I might infer what some of the standing members views might be on some of those issues, they were never even close to the surface, and the discussions we had transcended them.

If saying all that is a breach of confidentiality, I can live with it. I hope it is not. I wish the church as a whole could function in such a healthy way! Sadly, that's not what I see.

A few weeks ago, we had the announcement of ++Rowan's move, followed by extensive discussion of his numerous 'failures' in the press, and on blogs. We even heard admiration poured out for "the woman priest who saw off Archbishop’s ‘horrifying’ legacy". My experience of ++Rowan is of a warm, funny, wise, thoughtful and open-minded man, with a deep humility, profound courage, complete integrity, and a far wider and richer view of issues than any of those columnists or bloggers.

This past seven days I have seen Professor Glynn Harrison's membership of the CNC questioned, in many cases with little regard for what he actually thinks or what sort of person he is. Again, my experience of Glynn is of a warm, funny, wise, thoughtful, open-minded man of integrity.

And today Facebook keeps telling me how many of my friends, and their friends, have read the letter in the Guardian about confidentiality (or rather failures of confidentiality) in relation to the Southwark CNC. I assume that the Southwark CNC experience must have been very different from ours, but I don't know. I could have asked some of the people who had been through it, and also took part in Durham's CNC. However, it never occurred to me to ask, and quite rightly I don't think anyone would have given me an answer if I had.

The reporting of both issues, mutliplied by the attention drawn to them on Thinking Anglicans and other blogs, is spawning all sorts of comments which are leaving me with a bitter, bitter, taste in my mouth. I am profoundly uncomfortable - even depressed, and distressed - and I am really trying to get to the bottom of why that is.

If I were a suspicious type, I think I would probably be seeing a conspiracy here: a conspiracy to influence the appointment of the next Archbishop of Canterbury in a particular direction. Certainly conspiracy language is being bandied about by those who were so bitterly opposed to the Anglican Covenant, and by those commenting on the Southwark CNC. Might there be a 'specks and logs' problem here? I'd prefer to think not, but time will tell.

The bottom line is that I am fed up with people and parties who think they know the only right answer to all these problems. Sick to the back teeth. Had it up to there (gesture indicating a level just below the top of my cranium). And I am especially fed up with those people and parties self-righteously promoting those right answers in the name of 'integrity' (or 'an integrity' in some cases, whatever that means).

Transparency isn't going to fix these problems. It needs something different. I'm not willing to add my own wild diagnosis to all the other ones out there. Like weight loss, I basically think it comes down to diet and exercise. So, my prescription for the patient's woes are a heavy dose of good listening to replace all the hasty proclamations, painful self examination to replace the finger pointing, and genuine openness to replace the narrowness - all under-pinned by a basic attitude of trust to replace the 'conspiracy' mindset, and humility to replace the pride. That would be a good start towards some genuine integrity.

I love my church, and I love the people who make it up - some of the ones you might think I am angriest with today are the very ones I love most. I hope I haven't just become guilty of the same things I'm so upset about, and if you think I'm getting at you personally, I suggest you don't make any assumptions!

I also suggest you don't make any assumptions about what I think about any of the presenting issues. This isn't about my beliefs, or anyone else's, my feelings or anyone else's feelings. It is an appeal to learn to trust each other again, under God, as part of his church.

There it is, I've got it off my chest, and I've got better things to do than dwell on the subject. Don't disappoint me, Church of England.

Where in the world are David and Kate today? Enjoying Sunday in Santiago de Compostela

Today was our third day (well, two and a half-th day) in Santiago de Compostela, and we're now packing and preparing to take a taxi to the airport at about 9.30am tomorrow. My bike has been prepared (handlebars turned, pedals removed, front wheel taped to the back, saddle lowered, etc...) and packed in a bike bag with as many heavy bits as possible fastened to it (tools and spares in the water bottles, and so on. Seeing it standing in the hallway in its cover confirms that this bit of my Camino and this bit of my sabbatical are over, but trying to talk about some of the things that have emerged with Kate today it is obvious I have a lot more processing to do.

However, the last three days have been a wonderful 'buffer' between finishing the ride and coming back to my normal environment, if not my normal way of life. We have barely been outside a square half mile, and we have wandered the same streets repeatedly, but I have enjoyed it without reservation. Perhaps there is a bit of disappointment that we didn't take a bus to the coast, but I can live with that. There has been a lot of adventure in the last few weeks, and slowing down has been good. Just taking things slowly, taking siesta time, having two baths in one day just for the fun of it - all these things have been good. One or two souvenirs have been bought - the Santiago cake won't last long - but we worked hard not to buy anything tacky! A plaque, a fridge magnet, a plain shell, some beautiful coral earrings for Kate, but no stick, no gourd, no tacky t-shirts.

We got moving quite quickly this morning anticipating that there would be queues for the cathedral both for mass and the shrine of St James. We were right on both counts. We queued for the shrine first, and for ages the queue didn't move at all, even though opening time had passed, but when it moved it moved reasonably quickly. It was hard to know what to make of it. For many pilgrims this is the high point - to climb up behind the altar to the back of the statue of St James and embrace and kiss it. Some people put their hat and coat on the statue briefly, even. Kate didn't know what to make of it at all. I found that I wanted to rest my head for a moment and simply let go of the fact that the journey was finished. After that, you climbed back down again and descended into the crypt to file past a silver reliquary containing the supposedly twice-found bones of St James plus two of his disciples, perhaps stopping to pray before it. That, for me, was a non-event, I confess.

We emerged from all of that just in time to walk round to the other end of the cathedral - again - and for Kate to have her bag searched for a third time before going in for mass. Sadly we didn't get a seat, so we had to sit on the floor. Sadly, also, the botafumeiro wasn't in use, so there was none of the high drama of some of the pilgrim masses. Instead, we had a simple, straightforward service with a full sermon that I was sorry not to understand properly. On the other hand, the liturgy was easy to follow and so close to what we are used to that the differences were negligible. What was really wonderful was the singing of the cantor who led much of it - a delicious, sensitive, flowing, deep operatic voice - filled with emotion and meaning - everything a cantor should be. Lovely too was the way the bishop celebrated, very simply. I found that very moving, but the constant flow of tourist pilgrims through the church during the service very difficult. That service, much more than visiting the shrine, rounded the pilgrimage off beautifully.

Then, as we searched for somewhere to have lunch, we came upon the Municipal Band of Santiago de Compostela playing a concert in Rua do Vilar. It is hard to say whether they were a professional band or an amateur band, but whichever they were, the standard was excellent, and they play there twice a week from June to September without repeating a single piece of repertoire. It was a wind band of the type that I used to play in as a teenager when I was in the Durham County Wind Band - some would call it a military band, I suppose, but that makes it sound like a repertoire of marches, which is far from the case. What a wonderful hour that was, and actually quite emotional. I was suddenly taken right back into the sabbatical purpose of revisiting bits of my life, and I realised (Kate too) how much I miss real music making for the joy of it. That thought has been tucked away, and we'll have to see what can be done about it. In fact, music has been a bit of a theme today - the cantor at mass, the band, and then a balalaika and accordion trio this evening. Magic!

Today has been a beautiful way to end this phase of my sabbatical - it will be good to fly home tomorrow. I am looking forward to flying out and looking down on this country, and then flying in to Stansted looking down at my own. I am looking forward to the drive north, as I used to enjoy it on trips home when we lived in Japan. I am looking forward to wandering round the garden, seeing the cats and the chickens, sleeping in my own bed, knowing where everything is and not having to think about how to find the loo in the night, lunch with my parents on Tuesday, dancing at Lindy Jazz tomorrow night, having the bike serviced on Thursday! I'm looking forward to getting my hair cut, phoning friends, attending the ordinations in Durham at the weekend, going to a birthday party, seeing colleagues and friends at the Clergy Summer Gathering next week. And I am looking forward to discovering what is different because of these last few weeks.

Where in the world are David and Kate today? Exploring Santiago de Compostela

Oh what a lovely 36 hours it has been. And so lacking in pressure. It is quite hard to express how I feel at this stage in the Camino. Satisfied is probably quite a good word! The Hotel San Nicolas has been an excellent choice. It is outside the hustle and bustle of the city centre, so it is quiet. There is a lovely bar across the street, where we had 'breakfast' of hot chocolate this morning and a glass of wine which came with a free tiny plate of seafood concoction this evening. And the walk into the centre of Santiago takes only 10 minutes (though it is quite steeply uphill, it has to be said).

We have been in town much of the day, exploring, even buying a few souvenirs and finally visiting the cathedral. More of that in a moment, but first something else. Yesterday in our hunt for the Pilgrim Office, which was very hard to locate, we stumbled across a photographic exhibition about Coptic Christianity, and filed that away on our to-do list for today, and later on yesterday we came across a second photographic exhibition (with two different exhibits), which we looked at there and then. All three exhibits were extremely powerful and moving. Whatever the level of commercialisation of Santigo the city, there is a real effort being made to have a strong cultural programme going on, and these were part of it. (Alongside that, there are plenty of street musicians providing an alternative cultural programme! The picture shows a bagpipe/clarinet duo - that worked really well - and we've seen lutenists, guitarists, and all sorts.)

The first exhibit we looked at yesterday was about pilgrimage to Jewish, Muslim and Christian sites, and followed an unusual path from Jerusalem, through Jordan and Turkey, then the devastated Balkan states, through Italy to Rome, before turning through France and Spain to Santiago. There were some extremely powerful images there. In the same building, the Mosteiro de San Martino Pinario, was an exhbition mainly of huge portraits of people from isolated villages in Italy and Spain where the local culture is in the process of dying. Those were quite astounding - from a distance, some looked drawn, or painted, but close up the level of detail in the images was fantastic. The eyes were frequently the most arresting feature. The question in our minds was "What have they seen?" Today's exhibit about Coptic Christians in Ethiopia was incredible too - large black and white pictures - extremely striking and expressive. The books accompanying the exhibitions were enticing, but large, expensive and heavy, and we have plenty of luggage already with all my stuff to drag home. What a pity. Those will be some of the things we remember most.

The cathedral was 'interesting'. We skipped it for the morning because there were huge queues. We hadn't taken account of the crowds there would be on a Saturday. Instead we went and had an earlyish lunch, calculating that the queues might die down when proper Spanish lunchtime (i.e. 2-4pm) arrived. We were right, so when we finally went in it wasn't too crowded, though it was astonishing how many people (mainly Spaniards) were wandering round in groups talking at the tops of their voices. There were plenty of people obviously at prayer in the place, but it was very odd from my point of view. A beautiful, simple structure, with garish ornamentation jammed in, producing a strange disharmony, and a slightly grimy feel. Looking up into the cupola was incredible in one way - the size, the mechanism for the botafumeiro, the light. But the windows up there were full of cobwebs, just as the exterior stonework is covered in weeds - yes, weeds - even at very high levels on the building. Holy water stoops converted into offering boxes struck the wrong note too.

When we emerged today the queues had built up again, and so I didn't spend ages waiting to visit the shrine of St James. That can wait for tomorrow. My cultural book rates the cathedral as being worth a great deal of time to absorb, equating it to Burgos in that sense, but my reaction to it was similar to Burgos - at least today I didn't feel a desire to linger, but tomorrow we will go to mass. Hopefully that will feel different. Don't get me wrong, we have enjoyed the city, in spite of the commercialism and in spite of a somewhat indifferent reaction to the cathedral interior. It is architecturally unique, and full of rich and interesting things to see. I am enjoying not being on the move, and it is proving a really good wind down. We had a lovely siesta time today, and I feel extremely relaxed. Sleep is calling now, and then tomorrow is another new day - as it always is.

Where in the world are David and Kate today? In a comfortable hotel in Santiago de Compostela

OK, so this really will be short, and there really will be no picture. Maybe some tomorrow. I am here. Kate is safely here (Ryanair proudly on time). Hotel is nice. Weather is nice. We have been into the centre of Santiago and eaten a light lunch, and I have collected my Compostela. So, I am now an official completed pilgrim. We're back at the hotel now, taking a rest and a long soak. I think that will be all for now. Happy, peaceful and thoughtful.

Where in the world is David today? The outskirts of Santiago de Compostela

As promised, today’s entry is to be shorter and with fewer pictures – and I have sadly had to go out and find a cafe with WiFi to post it while drinking a glass of their Rioja! Meanwhile Argentina are shredding Korea in the World Cup on TV.

There was still plenty of up and down in today’s ride – the first 17km were definitely hilly, and the last 12km still held their surprises – but it was basically straightforward, uneventful and enjoyable after all that gone before. Certainly one of those days when I was the fastest cyclist on the road rather than wishing I had mountain bike gears. I was in no rush to leave Melide because I didn’t want to arrive outside Santiago de Compostela ridiculously early, and because it had not been easy to get to sleep last night. The downside of the temporary albergue arrangement in Melide was that the remainder of the exhibition hall that housed it was basically empty except for some tables and chairs, and therefore very reverberant. A very sizeable and very excitable group of mainly Spanish youngsters gathered there and made a lot of noise until very late – obviously they weren’t celebrating Spain’s defeat by Switzerland earlier in the day, but they don’t seem to need much excuse for making a din, and they don't need vuvuzelas to achieve it. The acoustic of the hall meant that it bounced loudly around. There was then quite a lot of noise in the dormitory when they finally decided to go to bed. At least it wasn’t an albergue where they chased you out early.

I had decided to fast till I arrived at my destination (unless riding conditions dictated otherwise), but decided that didn’t preclude me having a thick and sticky hot chocolate in a bar and sitting and reading for a couple of hours before setting off. So, I didn’t actually leave till well after 10.00am in the end, by which time the skies were clearing to a beautiful (but cloudy) blue, and it was warming up. This was the first reading I had done for entertainment on the trip, and the first time I had read a novel using Amazon’s Kindle software on my netbook. It was surprisingly easy and I found I had read almost 80% of the book by the time I left (admittedly I had started the night before). If you’re interested, it was Donna Leon’s ‘A Question of Belief’, one of her Commissario Brunetti Venetian crime novels, which I love.

Before leaving Melide I called in at the museum next to the church to get my credencial stamped, which I had failed to do yesterday, and then I was on my way. Up and down the road went, as I say, and the vegetation gradually began to change, with more pines, and then – as promised by ‘the book’ – eucalyptus (the birdsong was different too). The temperature never got too silly, and in fact I arrived here having hardly broken a sweat, in spite of the climbing. I rode right past the airport where Kate will arrive tomorrow, and stopped to photograph the statue of St James on the airport roundabout – he seems to greet even airborne pilgrims. Twenty minutes later I was at Monte de Gozo, and deciding not to stop there after all. It really didn’t look the kind of place to spend the last night of my pilgrimage. It was more like a holiday village. I had consulted the list of albergues given to me at St Jean Pied de Port, and there was another lone listed 3.5km on at the edge of Santiago, so I made for that.

It was difficult to find, to say the least. It was named after San Lazaro, so I knew it would be linked with one of the old hospices that used to look after pilgrims with leprosy, and I was looking out carefully for signs. I saw the pilgrim church/sanctuary of San Lazaro, but spotted no albergue, so I pressed on. That took me to MacDonald’s where I broke my fast, replaced a spoke which had just gone (I have that down to a fine art now), checked email, and tried to work out where to look next. My email there contained what I hoped it would – an update on our friend and former vicar when we were in Bovingdon, Tim Marshall, who was recently diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I had feared that he wouldn’t even survive till my return, but there is both good news and bad news. The good news is that he is in remarkable spirits and has even managed to preach in the last week or two. The bad news is that the cancer is inoperable, it is in his liver as well, and the prognosis is that he has a maximum of a year. What he wrote is both devastating and inspiring, and I hope it will be possible to see him or talk to him when I am back. In the meantime we can continue to pray and keep faith.

The albergue proved difficult to find. I found a private one first, but that was full, and three sets of instructions later I found the one I was looking for – a few hundred metres further back even than the little pilgrim chapel of San Lazaro, tucked behind a museum, with no sign near the roadside or visible from it! Unsurprisingly, although it had a lot of advance bookings, that one wasn’t full. Probably other people have just as much trouble finding it, or they prefer to march on and stay in town. Today’s parade of pilgrims contained an even greater proportion of the ‘tourist’ variety, marching along cheerily with either a day sack, or even just a water bottle. I managed to suppress my irritation, but of course none of them are staying here. The good news is that it is spacious, modern and clean. It even provides you with a secure locker for your stuff, and there’s no pressure to be out quickly in the morning. It is also less than two miles from my rendezvous with Kate at the hotel. Unless the weather dictates otherwise, I think I will even cycle over there in day clothes, the distance is so short. Perfect.

I was aware today that I was missing an Area Deans’ meeting – the last with Bishop Tom before he moves on to pastures new at St Andrew’s University, so I made today a day to pray for the Diocese of Durham, Bishops Tom and Mark, my fellow area deans and Stockton Deanery. For a change, there was nothing about the weather or the ride to make that impossible as I rode. I have spent much of the afternoon simply resting and reading. My first book is finished and another well under way, and I am letting my feelings about arriving simmer in the background. There is a slight sense of anti-climax, but maybe that is because the climax is still to come tomorrow and I am playing for time. There is still a sense of anticipation. There is a sense of disappointment that the burgeoning building development meant that I couldn’t glimpse the cathedral as I came downhill from Monte de Gozo. Perhaps there is also a sense that there ought to be a thrilling finish to the ride, when actually I just have to keep pressing on upwards slowly into the city.

For the moment I’ll let those thoughts and feelings simmer. Tomorrow will unfold, and we will see what it holds. The good news is that Kate got the car she’s using to come down to Stansted started, the chicken and cat care is all sorted, and she seems to have defeated the Ryanair online check-in system at last. Roll on Friday 18th June 2010! As that arrives, other things come into view – seeing friends and family at home, being able to talk to Dan's fiancee, Kitty, and congratulate her on becoming Dr Evans, the ordinations next weekend and more besides. Tomorrow may be an important day, but it isn’t the end of the bigger Camino.

Where in the world is David today? Melide

Before I say too much about today (and obviously it must have gone OK), I hope you saw I added the picture of the man with Jesus on his back (which doesn't sound right to me) and a couple of P.S. to yesterday's blog. I also thought I would write down some of the things that stuck out when I did my catch-up read through my cultural guide to the Camino yesterday. Here we go, in no particular order.

You might remember a picture of a fabulous silver cart in Burgos Cathedral. I didn’t know what it was for at the time. Apparently, it is used on the feast of Corpus Christi (when I was in Leon, in other words) to carry the consecrated host around the city after high mass, accompanied by famous giant puppets – as high as a two-storey house – and street dancing. The silver for the cart was brought back from America by Columbus. The puppets make a second appearance on the feast of St Peter and St Paul (June 29th) but the cart only gets one outing a year. Another little thing in Burgos – I think I added a witty caption to my picture of the statue of El Cid to the effect that he looked like he was flying. Apparently the statue is nicknamed ‘el murcielago’ – the bat – locally. Finally, I commented in my captions on a statue of a horseman high on the cathedral. It is, of course, King Alfonso XI – one of many features on the cathedral attempting to link royal power with divine power.

I had not thought before about the remarkable fact of buildings like the church in Fromista being made entirely of stone. There is a real shortage of building stone on the meseta, hence the adobe houses, and all the stone had to be imported from elsewhere, at great cost. Fromista’s name probably comes from the Latin frumentum, or cereals, because of the sort of crop that has always been grown locally, but at times the area has been prone to locusts, and people would go out at night to kill them with clubs when they came down to ground level because of the cold. I also commented in Fromista on a statue of San Telmo, a saint I thought I hadn’t heard of, but lo and behold it is actually the same saint as St Elmo, as in St Elmo’s fire – the electrical discharge from the top of a ship’s masts in a storm. Pedro Gonzalez Telmo, the saint, was born in Fromista in 1190.

Clearly there is much more I could have seen and enjoyed in Leon. I had not realised that it was a major Roman base, though I did see some Roman remains. The name Leon is probably actually a contraction of Legion, as the Roman Seventh Legion was based there for several hundred years from AD70. Leon had a significant Jewish population, and in the late 13th century, its most famous Jewish citizen, Moses ben Sem Tov wrote the Zohar, the main text of the Jewish mystic Kabbalah in Leon. Moving on to the cathedral, the present building is actually probably the fourth church on the site, though Leon was the seat of a bishop long before any of them – in fact, 200 years before Christianity became the state religion of the Roman empire.

The third, Romanesque, cathedral was begun in 1175, and was quite a showpiece in itself. The present, Gothic, cathedral was already being built by 1205 and was completed in record time – mostly within 100 years. It is consciously in the French style, and is basically a 2/3 sized copy of Rheims. Why so fast? Royal and papal involvement, and a lot of favours owed. Finally for Leon, I made a joke of the statue of San Isidoro, but I should have spent time in the basilica if I had some to spare. It is apparently magnificent, and although San Isidoro was unkown to me, he is very significant. He was Archbishop of Iberia for 36 years, was a key figure in the squashing of the Arian heresy, and wrote the world’s first encyclopaedia. That’s probably what the large scroll that looked like a stick of dynamite was in the statue.

Moving on, the town names have often been significant. Villafranca (as in Villafranca del Bierzo) means the town of foreigners. By the mid 12th century, half the inhabitants were foreigners: French, Italian, German, English, Catalan, Jewish, Portuguese, Flemish and even Scandinavian. However, the English have not always been very welcome there. In 1809, the English drove out the French, who had already ransacked the place, and some English troops then went on the rampage. General John Moore had to have the leaders of the spree shot, but not before they had wrecked the castle, robbed the churches and burned the archives. My funny Albergue Fenix in Villafranca is apparently very well known, and a landmark in itself. The head of the family who run it, Jesus Jato started it in the 1980s when it was a kind of plastic tent affair. It got the name Fenix (Phoenix) because it burned down twice before the present albergue was built in 1998. The family are totally committed to the mediaeval tradition of selfless hospitality to pilgrims.

OK, so let’s move on, but before covering today I should say a little bit more about yesterday. I did my blogging yesterday before even eating lunch, and lunch (at the albergue) was a linguistic adventure. The menu was in four languages, which helped, so ordering wasn’t a problem. However, the owner was doing the cooking (and a very good cook he was too), and loved to come out and talk with his customers in very Galician-tinged Spanish. That makes communication even harder. The other two people eating lunch were Spanish, so they were fine, but the owner kept including me in the conversation, and if I understood bits that just encouraged him.

I showed appreciation of the food, and when the time came where I stood up to pay, he motioned me to sit down and produced a tall, square, long-necked, and unlabelled bottle containing a thick liqeur of some sort. This was obviously a freebie for being a grateful customer. What was it, I asked? A very interesting explanation followed, which involved repeated references to ‘my cows’ (I never understood that bit), production of a bottle of clear liquid, and a glass with herbs standing in it. Apparently the clear liquid was the base, and the herbs (four herbs and some peppers) had been steeped in it to give the characteristic flavour. I am not using characteristic as a euphemism, by the way, because I liked it very much! The explanation he gave of which herbs were used was something along the lines of ‘they grow up a mountain’ (which will make Kate laugh, but the joke is too long to explain). A carafe of wine, and two glasses of that was enough to make me really quite sleepy, but I did manage to do my cultural background reading, as you have already seen.

Anyway, I had looked at the weather forecast and was more hopeful for today, but there was more blustery and foggy weather today, and it didn’t brighten up till lunchtime. There was low cloud all morning – but as I meant to comment yesterday when the visibility was at its worst, even then (and perhaps more then) you can hear all kinds of sounds – yesterday it was the almost constant sound of running water and of birdsong. It had never before occurred to me that birds sing in the fog. I always seem to be entombed in a car when it is foggy. You miss so much! Anyway, with fog again, there aren’t many pictures, but there are one or two interesting ones, and it was still a beautiful ride with interesting features (the picture at right is the first Galician-style family grain store I spotted).

The book warned that today’s ride was ‘probably the hardest of the whole pilgrimage and not to be taken lightly’. It didn’t really explain why properly, but 1144m of climbing, a lot of it in short nasty hills goes a long way to explaining why. The fact that today was the only day on which there have been 10-12% gradients of any length at all also helps clarify the matter. It is most confusing that the book will sometimes describe a hill as long and steep when it turns out to be only about 1km and moderate, and on the other hand fails to mention sizeable climbs (in length and gradient) or especially steep ones.

Just saying that the road ‘switchbacks over delightful countryside’ is no good as code for ‘there are many vicious little hills’. Nor is it any good to talk about ‘rolling countryside’ when you mean hills of 1-2 miles length and at 6-8% grade. That’s needs to be taken nearly as seriously as some of the major climbing on the ride, especially if you keep overtaking and then being overtaken by a smelly dustcart. Whinge over. It was a nice day really, and I still had time and energy to notice the quaint Galician place names, which felt like they had come from Homer Simpson’s Scrabble rack – names like Toxibo. Do you remember Homer trying to play Quijibo to use all seven letters?

My major stop en route was at Portomarin – at the bottom of a lovely long descent (the book was right about that) to the shores of a very long reservoir in a flooded valley. Portomarin was going to be destroyed by the flooding, so some of the historic buildings were moved, block by numbered block to a new site – on a steep hill, of course – next to the reservoir. The church is one of those buildings, and the numbers can still be seen on some of the stones (see photostream). It is an unusual church – a fortress-like box-shaped building. Portomarin was also a good place to have some breakfast (hot chocolate and croissant) since there hadn’t been any at the albergue in Sarria and I had burned quite a lot of energy by then. Happily, I found it in a cafe where three Dutchmen I had met with in Sarria were currently having a break. I was also able to lay in some provisions for supper, and perhaps tomorrow’s lunch.

I had already encountered two sets of roadworks with lights just before Portomarin, each literally about a mile long, so the cycle of the lights took ages. There were two more after Portomarin, both on long, steep hills. That meant enforced breaks, but also lost rhythm, and concern about the fact that as a bicycle there was no way of getting through in one cycle of the lights. However, there was so little traffic it barely mattered. Even so, I found myself wondering why they were resurfacing one of the silkiest smooth surfaces I have met since leaving Redmarshall. EU money?? A little further on I was on roads that ‘the book’ described as having wheel-killer potholes, but I didn’t see anything to be concerned about on that stretch, and that hadn’t been resurfaced.

About that time, I suddenly noticed a huge increase in the number of walking pilgrims, wandering all over the road in undisciplined groups, and I suddenly realised that I was under the magic 100km distance to Santiago. That’s the distance which must be walked (officially unaided) on foot in order to qualify for a Compostela – a certificate of completion. Lots of ‘tourist pilgrims’ do much of the tour by bus, then walk just the last 100km (and even then the bus carries their main bags). That was what I was now encountering. I confess I felt (still feel) somewhat irritated. They weren’t particularly old, or infirm, and they were wearing all the right gear and carrying very touristy sticks. Grr. As they increased in number even more after passing through Palas do Rei, I wondered whether there would be so many that I couldn’t find a place in the auberge, but then I realised they probably had pre-booked places in pensions or hotels, so I stopped worrying.

At some stage in the journey, and I am not sure when it was now I come to write about it, I was passed by three wonderful vintage (or are they called veteran?) cars with GB plates. Two I didn’t recognise, and the third was an MG. Unfortunately they went past too quickly to get out a camera, and any picture would only have been of their retreating back ends in any case. That was a little moment of excitement. However, even better, when I came into the outskirts of Palas do Rei, my original destination for the day, I spotted a garage, and lo and behold, there they were. I stopped for a chat with the owners and took some pictures. I’m afraid the MG wasn’t too interesting really by comparison – the other two were both made by Alvis, so I took pictures for my father and others to enjoy! The owners were from Derbyshire (the maroon one) and Haynes in Bedfordshire (the blue one). Funnily enough, I passed through Haynes on this trip, between Bedford and Luton. They were delighted at my interest, and when they all passed me again about six miles on I got some very cheery and encouraging waves.

I described Palas do Rei as my original destination. I wasn’t at all impressed with it as a place to stop, and I still had lots of energy, so I carried on from there to Melide, which is much more interesting. This was a Roman crossroads town – of the Via Traiana and the Cantabrian road – and it has been a stopping point ever since. It is not especially distinguished, but it is a better place to stop, and the albergue is a curiosity. As Will, an English volunteer, said to me – summer is a funny time to close the permanent albergue and set up a temporary one, but that’s what they have done here. What they have failed to do is to change any of the signs, so it is incredibly hard to find. If the locals would just say to you ‘follow the signs to the place where you get your truck disinfected after carrying livestock’ that would help, but instead they try (and fail) to describe the building and its location.

In fact, the temporary albergue is the equivalent of a heap of very modern portakabins in the local Pazo de Congresos, or exhibition hall. In other words, something like a huge shed next to the cattle market. The men’s showers flood like a lake which makes getting dressed and undressed a bit interesting to say the least, but actually the comfort level is really good. The kitchen is the nicest equipped of any albergue I have stayed in, and the dormitory is even heated. It is the standard fare of bunks with disposable paper sheets, but I’m not complaining. It is clean, warm and friendly. Will was especially welcoming as he had barely seen any other English pilgrims in his time there and was dying to talk to one. His ambition is to do the pilgrimage in reverse by bicycle. I warned him that it would be hard work, but I have to remember he is 30 years younger than me, definitely much lighter, and probably much fitter!

So, an interesting day, which brings me to less than 60km from Santiago, or one Newcastle, translated using my system. That means a short hop tomorrow to Monte de Gozo, from which you can look down on Santiago de Compostela (an emotional moment for many pilgrims) and check into the holiday-camp-sized albergue (not an especially emotional moment). Then it is just a matter of waiting for the 11.15am plane on Friday, assuming no ash problems. Pray for Kate driving to Stansted for an 8.00am departure!

Sorry for such a long post - I suspect tomorrow's will be much, much shorter - lost in private thoughts - and Kate may not like me spending too much time blogging while she is here.

Where in the world is David today? Sarria

Let me start by answering a question that I was asked in a comment on the last blog entry: "How are you getting home?" The answer is, by Ryanair to Stansted with my dear wife, and then in the car! There are a few people who travel home the way they came, but they are few and far between and they have much too much time on my hands and far steelier thighs than I do. There are a few bits of this route that I really would NOT want to do in reverse, and one of them - 12km of rapid descent at 7% - was today. Perhaps there is some real significance to the return from pilgrimage being done in the same way, but I am quite happy to use modern means on this occasion. I hope nobody is disappointed by that!

Let me give an account of today then, starting with the report that it was a wild night. I closed the shutters but left my window open just a crack so I could hear it, and when the window blew wide open I felt it too. Nevertheless, I got a pretty good night's sleep, as I had been hoping, and woke reasonably refreshed and with my cough in a less annoying phase even if my chest was feeling ropey. However, with the wind still blowing, and the rain still coming down, and thick fog shrouding the place, I felt less than enthusiastic about starting the journey. Obviously others felt the same, and even breakfast was served an hour late. I have to say that Spanish breakfasts don't do any more to set me up for the day than French ones: I need more of a carb input ready for the ride. Toasted Galician style bread is even harder work than some other kinds, too, and I am not really a cafe con leche kind of person, though I need more volume than you get with a cafe solo.

It was nearly a quarter to eight by the time I left - really late by the standards of this pilgrimage, and I was plunged into a real pea-souper. I had put on my reflective waterproof gear and all the lights I had brought, so at least there was a good chance of being seen, but it wasn't a good way to start the journey. The rain had stopped falling, but I reckon visibility was well below 25 yards. Thankfully there was very little traffic, and any cars I did meet were being equally careful and considerate. The first 8km were largely climbing, with occasional descents, and I am sure (though I couldn't see) that from time to time that took me over those little 'nicks' where the wind whistles through. The slower you are going, the less stable the bike is, and the more susceptible to sudden gusts. That isn't very nice when you can't see far, and what you can see is hard to interpret. At one point I dropped far enough to glimpse through the cloud to sunny areas below and to the south, but the road went straight back up again to 1337m (the bike computer was under reading again) and I am sure the cloud base was lower to the north, where I was heading.

To be honest, it was the only time on the journey when I have been frightened. Main roads packed with trucks weren't as bad. Paris wasn't as bad. London certainly wasn't as bad. Twice I actually just had to stop. Once it was because I just couldn't trust my eyes and needed to take stock. The second time it was because of a blast of wind that nearly knocked me off. What had me really worried was that after the first 8km, a long descent of 12km began, with hairpins later on, and obviously I would be going faster without having too much choice about it. For that reason I was really glad when I reached the cloud base at about 1150m just as the hairpins were about to begin. The wind was still a bother for a couple of km, but it still wasn't raining, just damp, so the rest of the ride down to Triacastela could even be described as exciting. The book advises that you stop every 2-3km to cool down the wheel rims from all the braking, but that simply wasn't necessary with a temperature of 5C over that portion of the ride (the average today was only 8.8C). The two pictures both show the view just after emerging from the cloud, including the first of the hairpins, just in case you were thinking this was as bad as it got and wondering what the fuss was about!!

Let me pause for a couple of reflections at that point. I found myself musing (during the parts of the fog where I could think about anything at all) on the fact that the higher up I was, the less distance I could see and the harder it was to keep going. That seemed like a metaphor for life. I also reminded myself of something that had come to mind once before on the pilgrimage - the words of the Benedicite Omnia Opera, one of the canticles from Anglican Morning Prayer (also used by Roman Catholics in the Liturgy of the Hours, and by Lutherans). Let me include a few verses:

Bless the Lord all rain and dew:
sing his praise and exalt him for ever.
Bless the Lord all winds that blow:
bless the Lord you fire and heat;
bless the Lord scorching wind and bitter cold:
sing his praise and exalt him for ever.
Bless the Lord dews and falling snows:
bless the Lord you nights and days;
bless the Lord light and darkness:
sing his praise and exalt him for ever.
Bless the Lord frost and cold:
bless the Lord you ice and snow;
bless the Lord lightnings and clouds:
sing his praise and exalt him for ever.
O let the earth bless the Lord:
bless the Lord you mountains and hills...

I found myself making up verses for a second time today, and wondering whether pilgrims in times past would have done the same - either chanting the original words to hold onto a sense of God's blessing (and blessing God) or competing with each other to come up with new ones. It was a help to me today again. Another thing that has helped from time to time has been to think, not in terms of miles or km, but familiar journeys: oh, it's only another Wolviston, or oh, it's not even a Bishop Auckland to go now. That has occasionally made things feel much more achievable, and on that score, tomorrow is four Darlingtons, and the day after is about the same.

Anyway, returning to the narrative, it was, as I say, an exhilarating (if cold) swoop downhill to Triacastela and then a lovely ride along a heavily wooded valley to Samos and then Sarria. At Samos the monastery looked closed, but apparently it wasn't, so I missed out on something quite outstanding (and a very large and attractive stamp in my Credencial. Still, never mind. I was enjoying the ride. Sarria gets a pretty poor write up in 'the book' - a sad town built around a single main street. What the author fails to mention is that the albergues (he mentions only two, but there are at least eight) are clustered up in the attractive old town. The main church up there is nothing to write home about, but there are some attractive corners and a curious 'pilgrim prison' (see photostream), presumably for naughty pilgrims.

Due to some good signs, and the 'conch' rating system (rather like Michelin stars for albergues) I was able to find a two-shell-rated private albergue with WiFi, which is extremely comfortable (and still only €12), and I can smell lunch cooking now as I finish up this blog entry. I plan to spend the afternoon resting and catching up with reading my book on the cultural aspects of the Camino. Today's curiosity photo is of what I call roof tiling, crazy paving style. Today's word (we haven't had one for a while) is anticipation.

P.S. I will have another curiosity picture to post later. A second cyclist has just arrived - Nick, who has ridden from Holland - and he asked whether I had seen the man on the road with a wooden figure of Christ on his back. I hadn't. Apparently it alone weighs 21kg, so we both think he must be carrying it as some kind of penance. When he gives me the picture after lunch I will add it to this post.

P.P.S. I have been meaning to remind you that you can find more information about my ride each day by clicking on View Details on the map that I embed. I also wanted to point out that it also gets more interesting and informative without even leaving the blog by clicking on the Terrain button.

P.P.S. The sour note about today is that the ATM ate my bank card. I've noticed before how sluggish some continental ATMs are in putting the card back out. This one didn't put it out far enough to get hold of other than with pliers or tweezers (or perhaps long finger nails, but I cut mine). So, it pushed it out, took it back in, and so on for three cycles and concluded I was never going to take it, so it pulled it back in and kept it! Grrrr. Time for a new card and some online banking so I can get at money again.