O'Cebreiro Revisited

There's snow in northern Spain and deep snowdrifts in O'Cebreiro, the gateway to Galicia - according to Johnnie Walker who's just walked through. I remember stopping an hour or two at O'Cebreiro in December 2007 on my own pilgrimage along the Camino Francés. The weather then was frosty and piercingly cold - but a brave sun shone in blue skies, burning off the valley mists by midday. O'Cebreiro (1293 m, 4242 ft) was for me not only a physical but also a spiritual high point of the journey. Although there were more hills to climb as I walked across Galicia, I seemed to coast effortlessly from here all the way to Santiago. I saw this statuette of Saint James in the Church of Santa Maria Real in O'Cebreiro:

In a bar in O'Cebreiro I met by chance an American lady from The Confraternity of Saint James who was interested in my journey. She was doing some research on the route for the Confraternity. When she heard I lived not far from Nottingham, she urged me to go to one of the Confraternity's local pilgrim reunion meetings when I got home. But I never went. I'm sure she said the Nottingham group was run by Alison Raju, who's written various Camino guides. In fact I'll be using Raju's guide to the Vía de la Plata in a couple of weeks' time.

The Book Of Ezekiel

In the church at O'Cebreiro pilgrim Ezequiel points to his eponymous book in the Bible.

A Gift From The Gods

Well, I'm livin' in a foreign country but I'm bound to cross the line/Beauty walks a razor's edge, someday I'll make it mine... BOB DYLAN Shelter From The Storm from Blood On The Tracks

The natural world so readily accessed but so difficult to really touch in spirit... JOHN HEE from his blog Walkabout In The UK

For days now I've been pondering John Hee's line. Of course he's right. Despite the split infinitive! We can buy the right gear, the right maps. We can plan our route. We can walk to pretty places. We can even walk to desolate, wild and remote places. We can watch wildlife. But to 'touch in spirit'? That is a different order of things. Perhaps we can only hope for those occasional mystic moments which come at us from out of the blue, overwhelm us momentarily when we're least expecting it. I experienced some of those moments in Galicia. Beautiful Galicia! This was the best landscape since the Pyrenees. I 'crossed the line' just before O'Cebreiro. There was a marker stone. The seasons reversed. I walked from winter into autumn.

I suppose Galicia's a bit like Celtic Cornwall or Brittany, but bigger, hillier and more wooded. The scenery was absolutely gorgeous all the way to Tricastela and on to Sarria, Ferrerios and Portomarin. The weather continued to be good - sun on the tops and mist in the valleys. I walked in a dreamlike state. My feet followed the twisting paths and tracks easily and automatically. Climbing hills seemed effortless. My conscious mind - my rational, route-finding mind - switched off, and I absorbed the stillness, the silence, the beauty of my surroundings. By that I mean beauty in the Keatsian sense of beauty is truth.

Beauty walks a razor's edge. It's difficult to touch in spirit. But when you touch it, it's genuinely a gift from the gods.

O'Cebreiro

Time passes slowly up here in the mountains/We sit beside bridges and walk beside fountains/Catch the wild fishes that float through the streams/Time passes slowly when you're lost in a dream BOB DYLAN Time Passes Slowly from New Morning

The next 2 days, 11 and 12 December, were magical days. We climbed steeply from Ruitelán up to O'Cebreiro - Paul, Ezequiel and I. It was cold and frosty. There were blue skies. The sun illuminated distant misty valleys and fold upon fold of hills (1st pic). O'Cebreiro was a very special place, a high point of the journey both physically and emotionally. We entered the old, grey-stone church of Santa Maria Real. I had my credencial or pilgrim passport stamped. An organ softly played. We sat down for a while. I must have prayed in a vague sort of way. Unspecific thoughts and feelings hovered like ghosts on the border of my conscious and unconscious mind. Then I lit candles in memory of my mother and sister. I took a photo of a pilgrim statue (2nd pic). And outside took a photo of 2 more pilgrims (3rd pic).