Pilgrims on the Way

In contrast to the late Guillermo Watt, who died on Camino just a day short of Santiago, the late Myra Brennan passed away in Santiago, having just completed her second pilgrimage. Her first is registered by the Confraternity of Saint James as having been completed in June of 2002, and she never got the chance to register her second in […]

This is most of the tiny village of Santa Irene. I think the building on the left is a lovely albergue that claims to be one of the oldest continuously operating private albergues on the Camino. We stayed here in 2016 and 2018, but for our 2013 Camino when this photo was taken, it was barely a passing thought. Date: […]

Just across a busy intersection from O Ceadoiro, a pretty decent restaurant in Arca, we find… this. Whatever it is, this was the mascot of the Jacobean Holy Year of 1993, and his name is Pelegrín, which just means “pilgrim” in the Galician language. While this is by far the largest version of him I’ve seen, at one time his […]

Based on an old marker we passed about four minutes previous, this is the village of Brea, or at least part of it. Given just how close all of these little villages are to each other – they really do blend one into the other as you walk the Camino – it could just as easily be someplace entirely different. […]

Back in the land of the living, this is a typical pilgrims’ walk in Galicia. It’s a little blurry, but I think that’s Francine with fellow Peregrina Patty, the Irish-living American. Or possibly not. Date: 01 May 2013 Place: between Salceda and Santa Irene (Province of A Coruña, Galicia, Spain) Today started: Arzúa (Province of A Coruña, Galicia, Spain)

Over the years, I’ve posted many, many photos of the memorials to fallen pilgrims on the Camino. Pilgrims will often leave stones at these memorials in tribute to the fallen. Of all of them, this is the one that I think affects me the most. Guillermo Watt died on Camino about 27 kilometers from his goal at Santiago. That’s a […]

Pilgrims are funny people. You’ll often find that somebody has placed some sort of token atop the Camino markers. Mostly, it’s rocks. Here, however, we have acorns sorted by size and how much of the acorn is actually present. Is it the life of the acorn? The evolution of the acorn people as a species? Acorn hats for chipmunks sorted […]

Five minutes down the road from our previous wheels, we come to more wheels! These are a bit larger than the previous wheels we looked at. As recently as the 1990s, the carts formerly attached to these wheels were ubiquitous throughout rural Galicia. Farmers used them to haul… well, everything, really. Nowadays, it’s cheaper – not to mention faster – […]

This photo was taken in the same yard as yesterday’s photo. You can, perhaps, see where the top of the gate came from. This wheel, however, remains a wheel for the moment. These sorts of cart wheels – sometimes with the cart still attached – may be found throughout rural Galicia, though they are usually considerably larger than this specimen. […]