Finally, in Santiago

My friends,
Finally, I arrived in Santiago and got a Compostella in my hand.
I´ve walked alone again but met another good company, a Spanish girl Anna for the morning and it was good to keep steps with her.
I entered the town around 11 o´clock and went to the cathedral for a welcoming ceremony for pilgrims, not realising the end of the road. However, I burst out my tears as soon as I saw Edgar, one of my pilgrim friends, in a distance in the cathedral and hugged each other. It was hard last few days, feeling sick and being alone. Afterwards, Sabine and Alain came to me and gave me warm hugs, Tiago, a Brazilian guy and his father, Alban, Victor Hugo, and so on...
It was a grand welcoming with lots of people and preachers.

I got a room in a cheap hotel in the centre to have a hot bath and it was great to have a bathroom only for myself after 2months travel. I´ll continue my way to Finisterre on foot for another 2-3days and coming back to Santiago by bus. Then, I can have a rest for a couple of days and then plan where to go.
I still feel sick but hopefully better tomorrow. It was good good to see all pilgrim friends and get messages from people who walked faster than me and sent messages to Sabine before they left for home.
Well, well, well...
I should pack things to keep them in a pilgrms office before having a dinner with my friends.
Time to go...

Thank you for your cheering and concern for last 60days.
My travel starts again now.


Missing you a lot a lot,
Saintiago, Spain
Sejin

D-day

Dear my friends,

I´m now 20km away to Santiago and it´ll be the last day of the pilgrimage tomorrow. Well, there´ll be still 80km to go to Finisterre, the end of West Spain from Santiago but... it´s a differnt story.

After the night, feeling sick and being alone, I slept quite good and long so felt a bit better in the morning. However, I was still not sure if I could walk long distance so just walked without a plan, swearing a lot : ¨What the hell is this? I feel sick, bad, get more and more sturbbon, sceptical and nasty, complain about everything... What the hell does holly pilgrimage give me at the end of the road? Yes, life is being alone, at the end... Thanks God for telling me what it is... ¨. blar blar blar... cough and cough...
It was anyway so bad so I´ve never stopped for a break for 6hrs as I was not sure if I could still go on after a break. It was crazy morning. However, after 24km walk, I met a nice company from Mexico who I just said hello before in an albergue and I kept my steps with him, talking about life. Oh, it´s much better to walk with somebody than alone even though I was still coughing badly.
What´s more, I met Sabine and Alain soon after I passed a town which I though I should stop if I was not well. At last, I made it to walk 40km from Protomarin to Melide, feeling ok.
I had a nice octupus dinner, something local special and met Alban, another pilgrim friend from France, again in a cafe.

So...
I feel now ok again. It was a little tiring day, walking long distance in a row but it´s the night before Santiago... feeling strange and still don´t realise it´s getting to the end.
It´ll be the 60th day on the road tomorrow and about 1,600km I´d have walked.
I just now realise... how crazy I was and my friends were...
I lost 3 toe nails so far on the road... as there´re blisters underneath toe nails and this bloody allergic reaction to insect bites... Damn... don´t want to thinkg about it again... lost an English guidebook of Camino Frances in Leon and looking for any guidebook in English for whole evening... etc, etc,....

I can´t imagine how it´d be tomorrow when I really enter the city, Santiago de Compostella.
I´ll tell you later...

Missing you all a lot a lot a lot,
Sejin

Feeling so sick and bad

Ok, folks...
I´ve got a bad bad cold after climbing Mt. Leon near Ponferrada. It´s so so bad as I cough a lot, have fever, runny nose, headache... damn.
I´ve walked alone for last 3days and arrived in Portmarin alone; feeling terrible as there is no my friends at all in the albergue and I´m sick...
I started my walk 6 o´clock in the morning today and it was quite hard at the beginning on the asphalt for about 2 and 1/2 hrs and finally walked 33km to get here, coughing a lot. I feel pain in my chest but hope it´s not lung infection at least.

I met Sabine and Alain here again after walking 3days alone but they went further so said goodbye: it´s so hard to do it , pretending to be no problem at all. We´ve walked together about a month, even on Camino del Norte and shared many many things; one thing I feel really sorry is to share the bed bugs with her also. Anyhow, I guess I can´t see them again with my bad condition and they want to walk quite a long distance everyday to get to Santiago early.

My knees are sore and lots of pain is on my soles...
It´s not easy to be alone, feeling sick sick sick.
I can´t eat even though I´m hungry as I can´t taste food...
I hope to be better tomorrow and still keep my pace to get closer to Santiago as others.
What´s more, I hope to see my pilgrim friends again when I get there to celebrate together!
I´m getting to my physical limit everyday so it´s time to finish...
It´s about 90km away from Santiago so it´ll be soon finished but my condition should be ok till the end.

wish me good luck, my friends.
I´m now nealy worn out...

Missing you a lot a lot,
Sejin

300km to go

I´ve walked along Camino del Norte for 4days from Santander to Llanes and then took a bus to come down to Camino Frances yesterday. I stayed 1 night in Leon and walked 33km today to Hospital de Orbigo. The road today was just flat but too flat for whole distance so all the same muscle were used and tensed... not really good... near the national road with lots of big trucks with noises... not good...
However, I´m happy to be back to Camino Frances again as I realised I left too many things behind here to join Camino del Norte, talking about it and many people I met on the road to pilgrims up there, Camino del Norte.
It was great to walk along the coast with lots of different landscapes with high high mountains with snow and beautiful beaches... it was just like short holiday even though I was still walking about 30km everyday.

After walking more than 1,000km for 50days, I found it walking on the road is just like a life.
Some people hurried to go further and further but I finally meet them again at a certain point, keeping my pace. I am sometimes lost but find my way at last by myself either by somebody else´s help. Lots of ups and downs and changeble weather... Nobody knows what happens tomorrow but still walks and get to their destination, somehow.
I thought if the road is flat, it´d be much easier but it was not so easy to walk flat flat road, either. Life also... if it goes just flat and plain... it could be very safe and stable but... it doesn´t mean it´s easy easy...

Well, it´s very difficult to keep a diary on the road so my diary is nearly empty at the moment, however, very important and necessary to write what I feel and who I met and so on in a right time before I forget this moment.
Ok, folks...
time to do some massage for poor and sore my legs and feet. Lots of pain on my soles after walking flat flat road today.

Missing you a lot!
Hospital de Orbigo(33km away from Leon), Spain
Sejin

Santander, Spain

Hey, folks.
I´m now in Santander, Northern city of Spain near the sea.
There´re too many people and Meseta plateau from Burgos is a little infamous among lots of pilgrims so I´ve decided to move and walk along El Camino del Norte, another route of Camino.

Keep in touch, guys.
Missing you a lot.

Sejin

From Burgos, Spain

I´ve arrived in Burgos, Spain this afternoon.
My body condition is of course, getting collapsed after 1,000km walk but still able to walk.
Walk in Spain is not so exciting with too many people on the road and the road is just next to National road with a lot of speedy traffic... it´s tiring... and sometimes stressful.
So, I´ll take a bus to Stander, near the ocean in Northern city of Spain to walk along Camino de Norte but not sure if I walk along the way to Santiago de Compostella either to come back to Camino de Frances yet. I´ll see when I get there and walk for a few days.
One of my friend who I met on the road went to Camino de Norte and walked for a couple of days and sent me email : there´re definately less people but beautiful with the ocean and mountains together. So, I´ll decide what to do over there in a few days.

Oh, God...
It´s been 6weeks on the road... unbelievable...
I kept telling me and my friend, another pilgrim, ¨You´re crazy. How can you walk that long distance with pain everyday?¨ Well, I´m still walking, though.
I pulled out my left baby toe nail in France and should do it for my right baby toe nail in Spain again. What´s more, the left big toe also has a big blister underneath of the toe nail so I guess this one also needs a self operation.
I can hear you... ¨Crazy girl!¨
Yeah, I know.
However, what can I do?
I´ll finish the walk...

Cross your fingers, my friends.

Sejin from Spain

Walking under the burning sun in Spain

I´ve walked 40km to get to Pamplona to see a doctor days ago and hopefully the problem with insect bites and allegic reaction is gone now. However, this fxcking fleas are so restant so I still keep my eyes on the condition. It was damn hard to keep walking with this for last 3weeks.
I´m now in Viana near the town called St. Domingo, walking under the burning sun.
The weather in Spain is completely different from France so it kills me everyday.
I´ve walked 33km today and tomorrow will be short distance, about 27km.
There is pain everywhere everyday and some problems all the time but I´m still walking.
Wish me good luck.
I´ll probably go up to Camino de Norte when I get to Burgos and walk about 1 week and then decide what to do : keep walking Camino de Norte either come down to Camino de Frances.

Chao¡

Sejin

First the half way done(June 1)

I,m now in St. Jean Pied Port, France!
I,ve just arrived in the town this afternoon.
Well, as you,ve checked I couldnt use the internet for last a couple of days in very very small towns and my tiring routine didnt let me have some time for writing journals, postcards either looking for a place to be connected to civilization.

I,m so happy to be in this town as it means I finished the French part of the pilgrimage today and start the other half, the Spanish part from here.
I met a lot of nice people but mostly old retired people but of course found nice young souls to walk together. I,m now with Sabine from Paris and Thilo from Germany. The other friend, Alban went further today from this town after he met us again this afternoon.

There are a lot a lot of new pilgrims in clean clothes and new gears here and a quite a few young people and even some Koreans. However, we, the old pilgrims look dirty, tired and smell bad and tast salty! Oh, one surprise is we look a little fat even though the walk was hard; we eat a lot a lot a lot everyday to walk. I expected to lose some weights on the way but it didn,t work by now but maybe in Spain with burning Sun? We,ll see what happens.

I,ve been too busy since I got here ; to pick up my post in the post office, to buy new guide book and socks, to help my friend to solve out problems, to find a place to stay and so on. Crazy!!
It,s been too long to see this many people and this makes old pilgrms tired and crazy.
I and my friends decided to stay 1 more night here tomorrow before we start a new step to the Spanish part so I can have some time to relax and prepare for the other half way to go.

I didnt expect this many people want to walk the pilgrimage in this season but there are so many and we worry about the place to stay in Spain as it,s not possible to book in advance. We are already tired to start early in the morning at 4 or 5 which the new pilgrims plan. So, we are thinking to turn our way to the North along the coastal line through a different route from Pamplone. However, nobody knows what happens tomorrow on the road so I,ll see the situation and decide what to do later.

Oh, shit!
It,s already 6.10 pm; I didnt take a shower so have to go the the Gite as we planned to have a small party to finish the French part together this evening.

Ok, folks!
I,ll keep posting as many as I can on the way but not sure.
But keep in touch by this page or e-mail.
Missing you!!!


Love
XXXX
Sejin