Camino de Santiago Day Twenty to Twenty-two

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Sahagún to Reliegos to León

In Sahagún we celebrated the halfway city of the Camino. We are the blue dot in this map. 




The last few days were really challenging and long along the meseta. As I wrote in my last blog, there are very few churches and very few masses, or pilgrims blessings, in this section of the Camino. But the hostel in Sahagún was a great surprise.

Our four French friends told us there was a pilgrim mass at the Monasterio de Santa Cruz, so we decided to stay the night at the Santa Cruz albergue. 

Father Andres is a Marist priest from Rome and he is leading his team in new ministry in this Benedictine monastery of nuns. Apparently, the ministry of the nuns in prayer and work—ora et labora—doesn’t lend itself to a ministry of hospitality or evangelism in the albergue. Andres and Daniel, from Madrid, invited us to small group sharing. We all picked a card that reflected our experience so far on the Camino. Their hope is to invite pilgrims to consider the inner spiritual journey of the Camino as they are experiencing the physical Camino.

I chose a picture of a rope in a knot to illustrate how pilgrims are bound together by our stories regardless of nationality, language or faith. And the knot is a symbol of Amy and I growing together on the Camino. In our circle was a retired Brit living in Shanghai on his second Camino, a marine transitioning from deployment to civilian life, a newlywed from Iran walking with her husband, a man who lives in Naples (Florida) and Biarritz and has been walking the Camino since his adult daughter committed suicide, a Slovakian young adult figuring out the next career move, Daniel, Amy and me. 

Amazing how much we learned about each other in such a short time. 





Before our community dinner (the hostel prepared a main course and we all brought sides, wine, etc.), we went to the mass and blessing. It was pretty special...the mother superior gave each of us pilgrims the sign of the cross on our foreheads, and the priest laid his hands on our heads and said “may God be your companion on the journey.” We took it all in and felt the warmth of God’s spirit with us. Finally, they passed out scripture verses on rolled up pieces of colored paper and said the Camino may be good or bad, but God’s word is always good. (Andres is behind the priest.)



Two more blessings. The first, was running into our four French friends and having a drink on the Plaza Mayor. They welcomed us and we enjoyed their company. They were very kind to speak English to us as best they could and share more about their families and their friendship with each other. We shared with them our motivation for the Camino—sabbatical, detaching from work, growing our marriage, experiencing God’s leading rather than always leading others. They sent us this picture from León when they arrived to let us know where they were.



The next day, we met this beautiful family from Italy living and working in England. This is the second phase of the Camino they have walked together. It is an unusual to see a family walking together, and the smiles say a lot about how much fun they were having together. We thought about our time traveling in Spain with our boys 21 years ago.



We decided to walk 30 km that day to Reliegos. We were the only ones staying in the hostel, so Amy and I slept in two of the six twin beds, all by ourselves. This morning we walked as the sun was rising, and storm clouds threatening. It’s the best weather to walk 25 km in. And it never rain today!



 We followed the local men to coffee.



And stopped by the river to care for our feet. 













I stopped to ask this man what he was growing.

¿Cebollas?
No, ajo.
Las cebollas están aquí (behind him). Son de verano. 
¿Más pequeños?
Sí. Crecen hasta julio. Y patatas aquí. (To the far right.) ¿No tienes papas en California?
Sí, los tenemos. 
Gracias y buenos días.
Buen Camino.



Life lesson: along the meseta of life, it’s important to stop and pay attention, and discover the gifts God has given to us.

Which is a great lesson to remember because the walk into León was longer and harder than we anticipated. A “provisional” Camino took us up and over a busy road and then down a steep hill. It was hard to stay positive and grateful. 

We checked into our room, napped and then enjoyed worship in the Cathedral and wrote this post eating free tapas.









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