Autumn is my favorite season. To confirm this, I would like to give you a brief tour of my random autumn memories. As a child in Slovakia, I was instructed to collect colorful maple leaves on the way to school and press them inside of books. This pointless process did not preserve the color pattern and the leaves were too fragile to be used as bookmarks. I loved doing it anyway. As an exchange student in Denmark, I used to follow park trails and random deers on my bike. However, I tried to avoid wet leaves on the ground. A few years later, I spent my autumn in Japan running away from deers. They usually follow people around a famous park in Nara to get their favorite snack – a paper map. Japanese ladies taught me how to sculpt small maple leaves into a colorful rice dough.
October 2020, El Bierzo valley, Spain. I am following Camino de Santiago and the autumn is about to blow my mind. Juan and I just left Molinaseca and continued along a road towards Ponferrada. Just to be clear, we walked. You might think this is an obvious statement, but somehow walking the Camino started feeling more and more special. Many pilgrims quit or moved forward by taxis. Taxigrinos (as we named them) rarely stayed in albergues with walkers and bikers. If they can afford to pay for taxis, they can afford to pay a bit more for accommodation. Or… were they afraid to be judged? The road signs were covered by stickers with phone numbers of taxi services. They certainly made it easier to give in to the temptation. It’s one of those things – once you see it, you cannot unsee it.
What an irony – in order to spread taxi stickers, one has to actually walk the Camino.
Shortly before Ponferrada we were approached by a young Italian guy Marco, who was looking for the tree Buddha. He was devastated to learn that he passed it already. The town Ponferrada was considering a lockdown, so the official Camino webpage recommended pilgrims to quickly walk through and do not stop to eat in restaurants. Our Camino Papá Santiago recommended us not to follow the official Camino signs in Ponferrada. For some reason that I don’t remember now, the official Camino path is unnecessarily long. Perhaps some neighborhoods needed the pilgrims’ money. Santiago gave us instructions how to cross the town. We just had to find one road and follow it, quite simple. The road is even called Calle Camino de Santiago! We told Marco about this shortcut and he asked if he could join us. Yes, welcome!
We met Marco before, somewhere in La Meseta.
He caught my attention because of impressive tattoos covering his arms. I saw horses, chess boards and religious images.
What a combination, there must be a crazy story linked to the tattoos! Indeed there is. Marco comes from a north Italian town, Marostica, famous for its live chess event. Marco is now growing out his hair and wants to be/play one of the figures on the chessboard. He used to work for a company making light switches. The job was not making him happy, so he quit and decided to walk to Santiago.
The walk through Ponferrada seemed endless. We agreed to take a long break outside of the town, but I couldn’t make it much further with a full bladder. I desperately checked Google maps to find the nearest green patch of land. In reality, the green patch was a tiny empty lot of overgrown grass next to a car wash station, not very pee-friendly and right next to a busy road. The station looked a bit abandoned, so I embarked on a mission to find a better pee shelter. I aimed towards the back side of the building and then, to my big surprise, I discovered public toilets. One of them was unlocked! Every time I finally pee after a long struggle, I think of my friend Diana. She’s an expert at finding free toilets anywhere she goes. One time she returned from a bathroom with a happy face and she said: “Nič mi nebolo, ale je mi lepšie (I didn’t feel bad, but now I feel better).”
All we needed now was a long break. A little brick wall next to the car wash station turned out to be a great spot for lunch. Juan correctly adjusted Marco’s backpack straps and explained how they work. It made a huge difference! And he walked happily ever after. I really enjoyed having Marco around. The communication between the three of us was quite interesting. We don’t speak one common language, but it was never a problem. Juan spoke Spanish, Marco Italian and I, for the first time ever, could speak a mixture of both languages! This must be a polyglot’s dream. I wondered how pilgrims communicated in the past. Did everyone know Latin? I guess not. Even nowadays, pilgrims understand each other with a few words in any language.
The sun came out in the afternoon, illuminating low hills of the Bierzo valley. The hills were covered by vineyards dressed in autumn colors.
The waves of intense red, orange, yellow, green and brown filled us with pure happiness and peace.
Listening to our favorite Camino music, I got emotional and shed a few tears. Everything was too beautiful to be real. I didn’t share my feelings with the guys, they were dance-walking in front of me. We passed a photographer and his two male models. The men were dressed in suits and they were enjoying a glass of wine. Well, they picked a glorious background to do so! We started taking pictures as well. The men smiled and pointed at the road: “Más abajo es más bonito (It’s more beautiful further down)!” Down there we found a little white chapel drowning in the sea of colors. Now Juan’s eyes got wet from emotions. The nature was so stunning! The nature made a perfect product based on human design.
We arrived to Villafranca del Bierzo dead tired. We walked 32 km today! This was our longest Camino stage and we were so blinded by the beauty that we did not even care. We also expected to save some kilometers by taking the shortcut in Ponferrada, but in the end we saved only one or two. Marco changed his plans and walked with us until Villafranca. We had a dinner together and a bottle of Bierzo wine. The locals in the restaurant did not seem very friendly. As soon we walked in, people stared and stopped talking. We rather sat in the back where we were “watched” by live-size paper models of Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un.
Juan and I paid a bit more for a private room in a hostel. We were disappointed – the room barely fit a double bed and it was far from the center. However, in the end, we didn’t need a big room, we spent most of the time completely paralyzed on the bed. Juan jokingly suggested: “Let’s have sex!” I replied: “Well, one of us has to do something.” We both agreed on “Not me”. Even after such an incredible day, good sleep remained the greatest pleasure on the Camino.
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