Our last day of walking to Santiago de Compostela. We thank the labors of the road builders for Roman Road XIX. We have a letter to their maintenance crew that needs addressing. You can see our letter to them here: Letter to the Holy Roman Emperor (warning: humorous)

Walking into Santiago, we are swept along with the convergence of all other pilgrim caminos (French, Coastal, Spritual, English etc. ). Like creeks that rush faster to a confluence, the pace pulls us forward. Through the modern streets to the medieval center of down. Back to history.

I found myself trying go slow enough to savor the last bit of the walk. The start of the path was muddy and rainy and progressed into more urban streets with a modern noise and clatter at opposition to the expected final outcome.

I’m waiting to see if an explosion of emotion or a whimper of relief would be my encounter in the square of the cathedral. When suddenly, I step into the medieval streets and then to the plaza of the Cathedral.

Pleasure. A feeling of happy satisfaction and enjoyment. That is how the noun is defined and this is how I felt in summary. Deep, quiet pleasure.

The eddies of emotions around the plaza showed in hugs and embraces of joy, pleasure and relief. Hugs of strangers passing emotions to one another. It is done. The struggle, the path, the search, the box checked at this juncture.

The next many days are spent in local joy at pilgrim meals or remote consideration. Some already planning the “next camino” and looking for the fresh joy again. I’m a bit of the group that believes you only have one “first” of an experience and that is the basis for comparison. But regardless a journey such as this has inherent joys that are for each pilgrim a gift.

My wandering along this path is done but as always, I must digest the experience. Luckily my time here is not done. I’ll remain in Portugal to dig deeper into what I would have only walked past earlier. You can see my final walking path here:

My Compostela in acknowledgment of the spiritual journey;