How Did It End?

Well, that was an anticlimactic ending to a blog, wasn’t it?

The last I wrote, I had just glimpsed the Pyrenees and was joyfully happy that the flat forest of Les Landes was behind me.  A couple of days after that I arrived in St. Jean Pied-de-Port to an overwhelming amount of pilgrims and tourists, and the start of a new kind of adventure, abruptly transitioning from a solitary journey to a shared one.

I’d like to say walking the Camino Frances exceeded my expectations, but it didn’t.  I enjoyed it, I met wonderful people, I sighed dreamily over the Spanish landscape; but I had already experienced months of beauty and tranquility, without the Pilgrim-littered trash behind every bush.  My meditative days were over, and I was just another in the crowd.  A different journey, a nice one, but different.

The reason I didn’t update my blog again wasn’t because I had nothing to write, but because I was having back problems and I sent my netbook home to La Coruña.  Without my tent, sleeping pad, and netbook life became much easier, although my sciatica left me struggling through Spain for the rest of the month.  (Even now, I cannot get back to running because my back is too messed up).

As for the month of September, most of that I’ll keep private.  I love writing about my travels, but keeping some things only for me is nice as well.

I hope you enjoyed reading something about my adventure, and I hope that it showed some hesitant travelers that crazy-sounding ideas really aren’t that crazy at all.  Doing something outside the box brings great rewards.  Sleeping in a tent every night should be seen as a blessing, not a struggle.  Sometimes all you need to be happy are some good walking shoes and a block of cheddar cheese (my main food source in England).  That cool things happen when you walk for a long time alone, like someone picking you up on a motorcycle to give you a private chateau tour.

In closing, I want to thank everyone who donated to the Trailblazer Foundation.  Traveling is an integral part of my life, and my happiness, and it means a lot to me to be able to give back to a place which I have traveled through.  I hope by donating you also felt connected to the world, wherever you may be reading from.  We are all a lot closer than you think.