This fountain was built for the Holy Year of 1999. There is some question in my head over the question of how one actually renders 1999 into Roman numerals. Tonight we’re gonna party like it’s MCMXCIX… or is that MIM?


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We’ve posted many, many photos of the memorials to fallen pilgrims on the Camino. They seem to come in waves, and these last 30 or 40 kilometers have more than their share. Pilgrims will often leave stones at these memorials in tribute to the fallen. I long ago lost count of the number of these memorials.


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After Calzada, we started running into some old friends we hadn’t seen for awhile. Here’s the three musketeers with just two of them. From left to right we have Rebecca, Alicia, Stijn, Francine, and Billy.


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The Camino is littered with various cafés and bars, and they’re especially thick on the ground for the final 40 or 50 kilometers. I think we’ve stopped at this one in Calzada on each of our three Caminos. I think it’s because you become extremely conscious of the approaching end, and you want to make this glorious experience last. It’s true for me ( Read more... )

Galicia contains many abandoned buildings and even whole villages. Folks left the rural countryside to find work in the cities, and many of these abandoned properties can be had at an absurdly low price. I remember seeing a village for sale that was less than we paid for Pistachio House. With the spread of the Internet and work-from-home culture, ( Read more... )

Our determined pilgrims walk the forests beyond Arzúa, which are beautiful in the morning light. Some day I’ll learn to take these kinds of photos without shadowbombing them.


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After a week off due to being hit by a car and my subsequent body aches and brain fog, the Camino Photo of the Day triumphantly returns to Arzúa. In today’s photo, it’s just after eight o’clock on the morning of May 1, 2016, the Feast of Saint Joseph the Worker. We pass this marker on our way out of town. There are a number of similar markers along ( Read more... )

You may have noticed that we haven’t had a “Camino Photo of the Day” in the past few days. There’s a story about that.

On Friday, February 1st, at about 12:35 in the afternoon or so, while crossing 11th in downtown Tacoma in a driving rain, I was hit by a car that ran a light. I rolled over the hood and onto the pavement.


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Thanks to Rebecca’s German-language Pilgrim Guide, we found a lovely albergue just down this little alley, the Rúa Hippocrates. She also found us a fantastic place to eat, with more locals than pilgrims. Recently this guide has been published in English, and I will certainly purchase a copy prior to our next Spanish adventure.


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This is the interior of the Iglesia de Santiago de Arzúa, which features a devotion to Santiago in two different guises. On the high altar, if you look closely, you can see images of him as a pilgrim (Santiago Peregrino) and as the Moor-slayer (Santiago Matamoros). This is reinforced on the low altar, where what initially appears to be a saltire, ( Read more... )