A little history lesson while I sit on the train to Madrid

It was familiar to wake up, pack our stuff, and set off in the quiet dark of the city's early morning (6:40) to walk to the train station. Cafe con leche and a bit of apple cake, ran into friends Mikal and MariAnn from Sweden and wished each other safe travels home. It has been amazing who we've run into, yesterday we chatted with an Australian couple we had met in the train station in Madrid five weeks ago - we'd never seen them since!

It occurs to me that for those of you who are not familiar with the Camino I should give you a short "why" of the thing. Long story short, the city of Santiago de Compostela would not exist as it is today if it weren't for a couple of legends (and miracles)!

James the greater, one of Jesus' closest friends and apostles, is said to have preached in Spain after Jesus' death and resurrection. Spain was an outlying part of the Roman Empire at the time. He returned to Jerusalem and was beheaded by the Romans; two of his followers and James' remains set out in a boat and were miraculously brought around the Iberian peninsula to Finisterre. The reigning local queen at Finisterre didn't want to deal with having a Christian martyr's relics making trouble with the Romans or her local holy men, she unsuccessfully tried to thwart the burial of the Apostle. His remains, and those of the two followers, were eventually entombed at Muxia, about 10km from Finisterre.
In the 800's, as the Christians had been losing ground steadily to the Moors and were holding the line in the northern part of the Iberian peninsula, a hermit saw a strange light in the forest, which led him to the tomb of the Apostle. He told the local bishop at the nearby seat of the Church, who verified that the bones in the tomb were absolutely those of the Apostle, buried 800 years earlier. Well! This was big news for the Christian cause! King Alfonso II built a small basilica to honor the relics, and suddenly Santiago (St. James) was making appearances in battle, such as at Clavijo, helping to slay the Moors and win back Christian territory.






AAACCK! After less than an hour's ride, occasionally at more than 200 km/hr, we have suddenly been shepherded off the train and onto buses. No one seems to know what exactly is happening, but I'm really glad we aren't trying to catch a flight out of Madrid this afternoon because I suspect the bus is going to take a LOT longer than the train..........

So, the presence of such significant relics started the trickle of pilgrims journeying to Santiago, which soon became a flood. By 1000 - 1100 there were monasteries and convents serving as and building new hospitals (pilgrim refuges) all along the Way, which followed traditional Roman travel routes. There were already folks making pilgrimage to Rome due to the relics of Peter and Paul, and of course pilgrims to Jerusalem. There were, and are, many routes to Santiago, the one we walked is the most popular, the Camino Frances.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, it is difficult to imagine, but apparently the same number of pilgrims were on the Way daily in 1150 as are on the Way today. What I would give for a glimpse of that!!!!

So, back to our trip - started the day at the Santiago de Compostela station -


And after we got put into the bus at Ourense we saw this unique bridge and what appears to be an incredibly steep walkway!


So a little update on our bus trip - we turned off the Autopista (big multi lane freeway) about a half an hour ago, now about 2 hours into our bus ride. We are looking out the window at Sergio Leone film-esque scenery and humming to ourselves "do ee do ee dooo, dum DUM dum.. ", repeat as necessary, visualizing Clint Eastwood in serape riding across the scene.


After nearly 3 hours on the bus we got back on a high speed train at Zamorza, and amazingly, we arrived at Madrid Chamartin station at 1:50, about 40 minutes later than scheduled! We never did find out what the deal was, I think it's just Spain!!
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