7th June Transient


Bilbao has been the first real point of transition on the journey. For some that I started the walk with back in Irun just seven days ago, although it feels like a lifetime has passed, Bilbao was as far as they ever intended to walk due to time commitments. For others the city offered the chance to rest, do some sightseeing and off course "party”. And of course because everyone walks at different paces with different agendas and sometimes have to adapt those plans i.e. me taking the Metro yesterday, it’s easy to fall out of sync.

 

The transient nature of the Camino is an integral part of its nature. Friendships are made that can last the entire length of the Camino and indeed far beyond. Ernesto and Stefano, two Italians that I walked with into Bilbao, met on the very first day of walking the Camino Frances last year and are now walking the Camino Del Norte together. This despite one of them living just outside Milan and the other near Palermo in Sicily. 

Other "friendships" can last just a day or maybe even an hour. So far I have walked with people from Germany, Holland, Romania, Poland, Switzerland, Italy and today for the last 7km of the walk, Ian from Crosby on Merseyside. 

I might bump into them again at an albergue, a roadside cafe or on the actual trail. Who knows in might even be in Cathedral Square in Santiago in 23 days time. Or I might never see them again but because of the moment we shared, we will be inexplicably linked long after we have forgotten each other's names. 

Today's walk from Portugalete to the little hamlet of Santillun has been a mix of cycle paths, coastal walkways and alongside busy roads. The feet were better, the energy levels higher., the water fountains more abundant and the weather less "scorchio" as the late Caroline Ahern might have said on "The Fast Show" 

Fast is one thing I certainly wasn't today but with another 7am start, by 2pm on a lovely overcast but warm day, to paraphrase St Paul, my race had been run and I had claimed the prize; my prize  being a bed for the night, a scalding shower, a coffee in hand and a chance to put my feet up. Smashing!

 


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