10
The concept of pilgrimage may be an ancient one, but traditional pilgrimage routes are enjoying something of a renaissance in these modern times – for the spiritual and non-spiritual alike. From the BBC show Pilgrimage, which invites seven celebrities, spanning everyone from the religious to total atheists, to take on a different pilgrimage each series, to a 2021 National Geographic article that declared pilgrimage to be the next post-pandemic trend, it seems the idea of swapping a hectic and heavily digital day-to-day for the stripped-back simplicity of walking is becoming increasingly popular.1 According to the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela’s Pilgrims Reception Office, 347,578 hikers received their Compostela certificate in 2019, a year-on-year increase of 6 per cent. Meanwhile, travel company Responsible Travel reported that ‘pilgrimage bookings have risen markedly’ in recent years. ‘Lockdown has shown us that community is important,’ said Tim Williamson, the company’s director of marketing and content. ‘People want space but miss human connection. Pilgrimages tick many of these boxes.’
Disconnecting from the everyday stresses of life while embracing peace and solitude and reconnecting with the beauty of nature – and, of course, yourself – is something that holds a broad appeal that appears to transcend the Christian tradition these days; the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela team found that only 40 per cent of all pilgrims claimed religion was their sole motivation.
Now, it was my turn to get to grips with the lowest-carbon form of transport in existence. I’d talked the talk; now I was determined to, quite literally, walk the walk.
I don’t get off to the most spiritual start with my Camino de Santiago pilgrimage, unless you call drinking too many red wines in the Plaza Nueva and teaching a Dutch cyclist how to kiss properly ‘spiritual’.
After a staggeringly beautiful day arriving at Santander by ferry, walking along the promenade as the sun rose and plunging my feet into honey-coloured sand, I caught the narrow-gauge railway to Bilbao. Now that, my friend, is a fabulous train ride. It trundles through the most idyllic countryside imaginable, slicing through forests and green hillsides, with views of stately mountains, silvery lakes and tinkling streams at every turn. Arriving at the de facto capital of the Basque region already completely won over by the rugged beauty of northern Spain, I wandered along the Estuary of Bilbao, gazing up at handsome buildings, scarlet-leaved trees and the mountainscapes that encircle the city, in something of a lovesick stupor.
Sometimes I wonder if this tendency I have to fall head over heels for every new place I visit is a blessing or a curse as a travel writer – but I can’t help it. I am simply incapable of objectivity when it comes to destinations. They are all equally likely to leave me floored by a rush of chemicals more often associated with teenage crushes.
After dumping bags and spraying an extra spritz of deodorant, I was ready to grab some of the region’s famed pintxos (the Basque answer to tapas) before getting an early night in preparation for the next day, when I would start my Camino journey. This iconic walk, which has several variations all winding their way towards the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, where the remains of Saint James the Great are buried, first dates back to the eighth century. Pilgrims from all over the world have undertaken it for more than 1,000 years, and, in 1492, it was declared one of the three great pilgrimages, along with Jerusalem and Rome. It is therefore with an air of some gravitas that I wish to embark upon my journey, which will see me walk a section of Spain’s Camino del Norte route, covering more than 120km in five days. Plenty of people make the journey without any spiritual intentions whatsoever, just to experience one of Europe’s finest trails – but, as I am a Christian, the religious element has always appealed as well. Just me and the open road, with nothing to distract from communing with the Divine.
But the best-laid plans and all that. I’m sitting quietly at a table, eating insanely good pintxos comprised of toasted bread and some sort of fish – with zero Spanish, I haven’t the foggiest what it is I’m eating and have happily embraced the mystery – when a man strolls in, orders in Spanish much more proficient than mine, and immediately asks if I’m English. Slightly offended that this is quite so obvious, I soon get over the indignity after he buys me another rioja and tells me about his own flight-free journey – he’s cycled through France from his home in the Netherlands and will follow the coast westward, down through Portugal, all the way to southern Spain. Several wines later I learn that his name is Tom and he’s single, and several wines after that I’m telling him that, at thirty-nine years of age, he should really have learned to use less tongue when snogging. It’s like a far, far less sexy bargain-basement version of Eat, Pray, Love.
It is with a heavy heart and heavier head that I wrench myself out of bed the next morning, determined to see the Frank Gehry-designed Guggenheim Museum before I begin my pilgrimage in earnest. The building is a thing of wonder and I actually gasp when clouds of mist from hidden smoke machines start billowing in, giving its shining curves an ethereal quality. Sadly, the beloved giant flowery dog out front has been shorn for the season – she’s all sharp edges covered by unlovely scaffolding. Fighting the urge to either be sick or curl up in a ball on the museum steps, I know exactly how she feels.
But I’m here to walk, and a level-three hangover is not going to get in the way. With an air of some ceremony, I stand before the Cathedral of Santiago in Bilbao, the starting point, and close my eyes, waiting to feel something. And indeed I do – nauseous and dizzy. I quickly open my eyes again and take a deep breath in, noting the tang of urine in the air. Fine. I’ll just have to accept that my Damascene moment will have to wait. It is with a sense of anti-climax that I start following the route described in my notes, provided to me by the company I booked through. I have done one thing right, at least – tired and busy, I threw some money at the problem and used a company called Follow the Camino, who promptly booked all my hotels, sent me the route information and organised transport to take my bag from place to place. All I’m carrying are the essentials – water, snacks, spare socks and waterproofs (and tissues – after that first big walk in Inverness, so long ago now, I’ll never again fail to be prepared for an al fresco wee).
It turns out this section of the Camino matches my mood. I will later discover from another pilgrim I meet on the road that it is rated a measly one star for ‘landscapes/beauty’ on a website known as the Camino bible, gronze.com. Running from the centre of Bilbao, it leads out through the never-ending suburbs, surrounded by a landscape that could be kindly described as ‘industrial’. Already tired before I began, I find myself frustrated at the slow speed, at the unpicturesque surroundings, at my walking notes that don’t seem to match up with what I’m doing. Despite the fact it’s mid-October, the air is warm and I’m soon uncomfortably hot. That’s the kind of bad mood I’m in – I can’t even appreciate the fact it’s a glorious day. My goal is Portugalete, a town at the mouth of the Bilbao Estuary around 20km away, a walk that will likely take five hours.
After the first ninety minutes, things take a turn for the better. While I’m still trudging the suburban streets of the greater Bilbao metropolitan area, the way starts to become better marked, with bright yellow arrows, shells and official signs ushering me on every 100m or so. My eye starts to become more accustomed to seeking them out, and each flash of sunflower is like a tiny cheerleader shouting, ‘This way! Yeah, that’s right! You can do it!’
By the time I reach the outskirts of Portugalete, my feet are on fire but my mood is buoyant. I check in to my hotel, which happens to be a perfectly chosen four-star with trendy decor and a position right on the waterfront, smack bang next to the town’s UNESCO World Heritage-listed attraction of a transporter bridge. It shuttles people back and forth across the Nervión River in a cabin reminiscent of a ski-resort cable car. Although of a sunnier disposition, my body is just about fit for the bin, so I take a seat at the nearest open restaurant I can find and point dumbly to things on the menu, wolfing down toast with caramelised onions, goat’s cheese and honey; fries with garlic aioli; and an entire platter of pleasingly salty pimento peppers. By 8.30 p.m., I am sound asleep.
The next day brings with it a new Helen Coffey. This iteration has not drunk too much red wine and had her mouth assaulted by a Dutchman – she is fighting fit and ready for a 27km stroll to Castro Urdiales. After the previous afternoon’s struggles, things can only get better. They start well enough, with a five-part breakfast that includes pastries, fruit, yoghurt, fried eggs and smoked salmon and avocado on toast. Walker’s fuel, I think to myself sagely as I resolutely clear every speck of food.
The morning has dawned bright again, and I feel a happy tingle as I consider the sheer good fortune of getting such pleasant weather in autumn. Slogging through constant rain while wrapped up head to toe in waterproofs, though ‘character-building’ I’m sure, would have made for quite a different experience. I strike out, expecting a similar level of confusion and agro, and perhaps a similar level of humdrum surroundings. But the path is clear and sure under my feet, the way clearly marked at every turn.
I have found my stride when a man passes me, ruddy cheeked and golden haired, with the look of a well-seasoned walker about him. He makes a remark in Spanish, which I, as the terrible gringo I am, don’t understand. ‘English?’ he asks – again, why is it SO obvious? – and we get chatting. He’s a Welsh folk singer who decided to take some time off work and walk the entirety of the Camino del Norte, combining his passion for hiking, love of excellent food and desire to improve his Spanish. His initial comment had been in relation to my impressively small bag, and I have to shamefacedly confess that my real one – the one with all my clothes, laptop and toiletries – is being transferred by cab as we speak, like I’m some kind of soft-handed noblewoman. My new acquaintance, Gwilym, is doing things properly – carrying his own hefty rucksack the whole way and staying in hostels each night, booked the same day. When that fails, he has a tent with him to camp. We’ve soon swapped life stories and bitched about my favourite gripe, the insanity of the lack of train infrastructure in Wales – ‘the road down to the Valleys is gridlocked every morning and evening’ – as well as exchanged important cultural recommendations (apparently I must look up videos of people singing to cows on YouTube because they love it). After a highly enjoyable ninety minutes we say our goodbyes, as I suspect his absolute belter of a pace might just kill me if I continue it any longer.
This is one of the great joys of the Camino, or in fact any famous pilgrimage trail. You meet travellers along the road; you share stories and tips; you skip the small talk and get straight to the interesting stuff as your feet beat the well-trodden path that so many before you have walked. And then you wave them off, with no expectation that you will ever see them again. You hold each new interaction lightly, enjoying it while it lasts before letting it go without awkwardness. In many ways it’s the greatest of levellers; you all have to walk the same distance, no matter who you are. I’m reminded of Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, in which a group of pilgrims share their (often bawdy) stories to pass the time as they go. They represent people from all classes and walks of life, but there on the road they compete as equals to tell the most compelling tale.
The origins of the concept of pilgrimage are hard to determine. It’s a feature of many world religions, but in the Christian tradition, at least, the idea of travelling to places considered particularly holy first gained momentum in the fourth century. The twelfth century is considered to have really been the golden age of Christian pilgrimage, but it’s remained a devotional practice throughout the centuries, while being embraced more widely in modern times by those without a particular faith.
The English term ‘pilgrim’ stems from the Latin word peregrinus, meaning a foreigner, stranger, someone on a journey or a temporary resident. Before we came to know it as the spiritual journey on foot it conjures up today, in the earliest roots of Christianity the term applied to all believers – because all Christians identified as being temporary residents on this earth who were journeying through life, while their true home was in heaven. There’s something powerfully poetic in this idea for me: that we’re all ephemeral residents on this planet; that we can claim no real ownership over any of it. All the more important, then, that we see ourselves as caretakers, treading lightly as we travel through a world that will pass from us to the generations to come.
While our reasons for pilgrimage may be different, my encounter with Gwilym has imbued the first part of the day’s hike with extra oomph and I realise his long legs – and compelling conversation – have propelled me over a third of the way, all through rolling green countryside, in far less time than anticipated. I feel buoyed up for the next section – which is more beautiful still, snaking across a wide sandy beach before heading onto a coastal path that wraps around the rockface with views down to the peaceful, shimmering blue waters of the Bay of Biscay below.
My feet are starting to feel just a little less enthused now, although they get an extra skip to them every time a passer-by wishes me ‘Buen Camino!’, a frequent occurrence. This is another wonderful gift of the pilgrimage – if you’re walking in the right direction, carrying a rucksack and wearing a pair of hiking boots, locals know exactly what you’re up to. And it’s traditional to wish you well on your journey: a small but hugely motivating kindness when you’ve spent four hours on your feet.
It is a humbling thing, walking. If the concept of ‘slow travel’ comes up a lot in the flight-free movement, this is surely the slowest form of travel there is, trusting in your own feet to transport you somewhere. You must resist the temptation to try to speed things up; you must let go of your frustrations that this new gait is totally at odds with the usual busy franticness of life. It requires, above all things, patience. The Dutch cyclist imparted one good piece of advice, both for life and for pilgrimaging: ‘Go at your own pace.’ You have to find the natural rhythm that your body wants to follow; fight it and you’re done for.
For me, walking is, in and of itself, an act of supreme faith. Logically I know that if I put one foot after another, I will reach my destination. The outcome is assured – it’s only a matter of time. But it’s one thing knowing and quite another believing. The progress is so slow, it reminds me of watching the hour hand of a clock; you know it must be moving, because eventually it will be pointing at a whole other number, but you can’t ever really see it happening. So it is with walking. The time feels endless and elastic, drawn out like a wad of bubblegum. Distance becomes a different beast entirely. As I continue at my steady, rocking pace, my mind flits back to my previous train ride from Santander. It is known as the slow train, because it chugs along gently through the countryside, often on a single track, taking three hours to reach Bilbao. That same journey back will take me five days on foot. It’s a sobering thought.
But if there is something of the impossible in the notion that walking will get you somewhere far away, there is equally something miraculous in it. I reach the commune of Ontón and see that only a couple more hours’ hiking stand between me and the day’s destination. With the sun beaming down, a snack bar demolished and a pair of new socks on my feet, that seems no distance at all.
We’ve left the quaint seaside territory behind on this next leg, though. Official signs try to take you off on a detour, but all the guidance I’ve read, including Follow the Camino’s notes, tells me this is a mug’s game that adds 8km on to the journey. Instead, you’re told to follow the N-634 for pretty much the rest of the way. It turns out to be a coastal road with no pavement – not built for pedestrians at all, in fact – with cars whizzing by at high speed every so often while you jump in a roadside ditch. It could not feel more at odds with the idea of the ancient pilgrims’ way – treading the same path that my Christian forefathers did and so forth – and I make the juxtaposition even weirder by popping on my headphones to listen to an Ignatian spirituality meditation, which I struggle to hear over the blare of engines and car horns.
I find myself crying a lot these days at the beauty of the world, and so it is on the distinctly unlovely N-634. I cried in Santander as I walked along the seafront; I teared up on the train as we rumbled through archways of trees; I shed a tear meandering along the river in Bilbao; I welled up when I started to see signs for the Camino; and I wept on the coastal path from Pobeña earlier in the day, as I looked down at the rippling turquoise shallows. Now, I cry while walking alongside an ugly highway when my meditation prompts me to consider that God has already forgiven me for the things I’ve done wrong in my life (including, hopefully, all those flights). Perhaps it’s that the writing of this book has brought the climate emergency sharply into focus, but I feel near constantly overwhelmed by gratitude that I am lucky enough to be seeing different bits of this mesmerising world of ours – and by my sadness that it has taken us so damn long to value the things in it whose worth is beyond measure.
One big advantage of this section of the walk is the lack of people. Part of the appeal of a pilgrimage was the idea of getting a little solo time, especially after a year of lockdowns and being trapped in a basement flat with housemates. Well, at the side of the N-634 I finally get my wish. Apart from the occasional truck and the brief accompanying anxiety that I might get mown down, I am utterly alone. As always in such situations – which are rare enough to be one of life’s greatest delights – I sing at the top of my lungs.
During the final stretch, a long pedestrian street that morphs into a wide promenade along the seafront, I allow myself the treat of listening to music. I strut into the seaside resort town of Castro Urdiales in time to the beat with the zest, if not the body, of a woman who has not been walking for six and a half hours, beaming stupidly at everyone I see. My mode of transport is my own two legs, and I could not be happier.
Day three dawns bright and gorgeous. Shouldering my backpack and pausing to marvel at the sun rising in blazing orange over the harbour, I set off on my longest day of walking so far. The destination is Laredo, a town further along the coast. The forecast said the temperature would hit 28°C today – nice, sure, but a little spicy for a day-long hike. The first hour passes in a happy blur, with the sun filtering through leaves on a trail through forested glades. And then comes the most flat-out fabulous part of the entire thing: a rough, rock-strewn track suddenly opens out onto a blistering vista of the sea, so blue it almost hurts to look at. I can’t help but laugh out loud at how ridiculously, staggeringly beautiful it is.
There is a point on this section of the walk where you can choose to do the official route, which adds a further 12km onto your journey (taking the total up to a not insignificant 37km) or do the much more popular shortcut. Most people opt for the latter, and it’s what the notes from the holiday company recommend. But guess what that shortcut involves? Kilometres upon kilometres back on our old friend the N-634, ugly as sin and with no pedestrian provisions. You walk the entire way to Laredo along the side of a road dodging vehicles zipping by at 70kph. By the time I reach the juncture, I am feeling good – my legs sturdy, my feet firm, my heart stout. And the idea of taking the short road seems, well, a bit of a cop-out. I didn’t come to the Camino to take the easy way, especially if that way happens to be deeply unattractive. Before I’ve fully thought it through, my feet have selected for me, following the official shell sign and waltzing up through a tree-lined path. And thus continues one of my longest-ever days of walking – and my descent into the mild madness of the solo pilgrim.
I have rarely felt more alone than I do in this endless stretch of path through the northern Spanish countryside. I do not see another human for the next four or so hours – not another walker, not a rural farmer. I do see cows though. Making my way up a steep gravel path, which I attack with gusto using a technique I like to call the ‘invisible rope’ (you ‘pull’ yourself up hand over hand as if there’s a rope in front of you, surprisingly effective), I spot a field of them near the top. Remembering the wise words of my new friend Gwilym, I try singing to them – a rousing rendition of ‘Que Será Será’ that I think Doris Day would be proud of. I don’t know what I was expecting – a cacophony of approving moos? – but they look their signature brand of extremely nonplussed. (Although one does look up at me briefly, and I like to think we’ve made a fleeting yet powerful musical connection.)
From that point on, things get weirder. If this kind of long-distance walking puts you in touch with your inmost being, mine is exceptionally vocal. Not only do I continue to sing, I talk aloud to myself in a range of accents; giggle into the wind at nothing; engage in loud yogic breathing; float my arms up and down like a dancer warming up for a show while giving myself stirring pep talks. I utter the phrase ‘You got this, girl!’ out loud more than once – words I have never said in my entire life.
The hours pass in distinctly unregimented fashion, sometimes gone in the flap of a butterfly’s wings, sometimes slow and thick as molasses, when I have no choice but to wade through step by arduously gruelling step. My mood changes so quickly I feel on the edge of mania, one second thinking, ‘I hate this I hate this I hate this’, and the next laughing with purest euphoria at the achingly sumptuous view of rolling hills beneath me. I thought it would be a time for having deep, meaningful conversations with God; instead, I find that, at my lowest points, all that keeps me going is mumbling the words of the Our Father over and over under my breath like some crazed, religious zealot.
I see an official sign that says ‘Laredo, 11km’ and in a state of wildest delirium think to myself, ‘Just another two hours! Excellent!’ (the word ‘just’ working exceptionally hard here). But what a final stint. The official path once again turns seawards, winding its way along coastal clifftops. I look up and see four birds, too far away to make out what breed they are, gliding in majestic circles on an updraught just above a rocky outcrop. I laugh out loud again, and shout to the wind, ‘Are you f***ing kidding?’ – because it’s just silly, really, how perfect it all is – and of course this is the point at which I see my first humans of the day. They politely pretend not to have heard my outburst as I crumple down beside them on a grass verge, looking out across to Laredo with its sweeping beach, now visible off to the west. They’re two Dutch guys, also walking the Camino, and we trade stories of our travels so far. They took the long road today too – but it was worth it, we all agree – and one of them will be doing the entire pilgrimage trail, all the way to the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela. His friend is just joining him for a few days and heading home when they reach Santander.
‘I’m still waiting for my body to get used to walking every day,’ says the first, Jeroen. ‘It’s been nine days and it hasn’t happened yet …’ I tell him to think about how good it will feel when he finally gets to the cathedral in Galicia, and he smiles and shakes his head. ‘The final destination isn’t important,’ he says firmly. ‘I can’t wish away the time – the point is to enjoy every day as much as I can. If I stop enjoying it, I stop walking. It’s not about the end goal.’
Well, blimey. It’s like running into the Dalai Lama in the middle of the wilderness.
I tell them how little time it’s taken for me to go slightly crazy and start talking to myself, and Jeroen says that’s the whole point of walking the Camino. What, to go mad? ‘No, to really get to know yourself; and to learn to love yourself.’ I much prefer this interpretation to the one that says I’ve got only the slimmest of grasps on reality, and so I pop it into my mental folder of pilgrimage wisdom.
Our unexpected meeting is exactly the pick-me-up I needed to plunge on for the final hour, and I do so with a literal spring in my step, hopping from rock to rock. I march into Laredo, chest out, pride holding my back ramrod straight. I have walked for eight hours, and I am still upright and alive, and if that’s not a miracle, I don’t know what is.
Laredo is a beach town, dominated by a long stretch of mustard sand and lapped by waves of tantalising blue. My Dutch cyclist from Bilbao has turned up here too – what can I say? Once you’ve been harangued about your kissing technique by an acerbic drunk English woman, you never go back – and we agree to meet for a dip. I just have time to remove my hiking boots, which feel like they’ve been surgically attached to my feet, and massage my toes back to life (undoubtedly the greatest physical pleasure I have ever experienced) before heading out again. As I sink my bare feet into soft sand and saunter languidly along the place where the sea meets the beach, letting cool water lick my ankles, I feel contentment deep in my bones. I wish I could bottle this feeling; I wish, more than anything, that like Jeroen and Gwilym I was doing the whole pilgrimage.
I can already sense a slow change deep within me – each day brings more punishing humility, yes, but more respect for what my body and mind are capable of. Buried beneath all my nonsense lies something that I am only just starting to make out: a steel cable of stoicism that can withstand much more than I give myself credit for.
After three days spent in near-perfect solitude, it is genuinely enjoyable to talk to a person again. Tom and I greet each other like old friends before running into the sea, where the chill of the water acts as a healing balm on my sunburned calves and swollen hooves. I float, weightless and carefree, under the late-afternoon sun. That evening we sample the nightlife of Laredo, where the top-rated place for dancing on TripAdvisor turns out to be a pub solely occupied by men over the age of 60. Still, life is what you make of it, and so we order round after round of ‘dos cervezas!’, so many that we decide we could probably do some dancing anyway. The old men watch grimly, quite possibly wishing us dead. I feel a surge of national pride – a rare experience for me – when Tom remarks that I ‘can really hold my drink’. ‘Of course,’ I reply, ‘I’m English!’
The fact that the only patriotism I feel is in relation to hailing from a country of functioning alcoholics is something to mull over another time – for now, I am queen of the beers. Keep ’em coming.
This feels less of a strength the next day as I scramble to pack my bag for my final section of the walk. My original ferry crossing has been cancelled – something about ‘the sea’ and ‘the weather conditions’ – and so I’m having to leave a day early. I still have time to tackle today’s section, a breezy 14km that will see me wind up in the small town of Escalante, from where I can catch a bus to Santander. Aside from the mild hangover, there are two extra obstacles to contend with: as I will be going straight from there to the city, I will finally have to put on my big-girl pants and carry my own hefty bag; and, given the sporadic nature of rural buses and a later than ideal start, I have left myself less than three hours to complete the journey. I figure this is fine, provided I have absolutely zero stops and keep up a good pace. It will be tight, but possible.
Things begin incredibly badly, as I struggle to find my way out of Laredo and waste precious minutes comparing Google Maps, my written instructions and the gronze.com website. By the time I’m on the right road, I’ve frittered away a quarter of an hour – not a big deal in normal circumstances, but a real problem when working to a very fixed timeframe. Still, off I trot, the bag, though heavy, feeling curiously like it’s giving me a cuddle via straps that comfortingly girdle my waist.
It’s a rather delightful walk once you’re off the main road, with paths winding through charming pastoral farmland and the quaintest of Spanish villages, complete with rough-hewn stone buildings and pretty, ancient churches. Of course, I have left myself no time whatsoever to stop and appreciate any of this. The sun beats hot and heavy again, and it is with a flicker of annoyance that I momentarily pause to suncream up. I don’t have time for this!, I think while haphazardly slapping factor fifty onto strips of exposed flesh.
Keeping up a strong pace, I sense that I’m making good progress and wonder briefly if perhaps there might be time to grab a drink in Escalante. But when I double check projected timings on my phone, it is to discover that I should reach my destination in forty-five minutes. The bus comes in thirty-five minutes. There is no time to panic or cry out to the heavens; there is only time to accelerate. I charge onwards with a new energy that comes from somewhere deep within – quite possibly my inner well of skinflintedness, which has absolutely no intention of paying through the nose for a taxi – and am soon striding to the beat of a non-stop mantra of ‘the pace was quick but the pace got quicker’ in time to the squeaking of my rucksack’s shoulder straps.
It’s in something of a daze that I see I have fifteen minutes till the bus comes and twenty minutes left of walking. Walking clearly won’t cut it, in that case. It’s time to run. I start to jog, my legs squealing in protest at the sudden change in expectations. You want us to RUN now, do you? Wasn’t it enough that we were walking faster than a London commuter while carrying all your worldly possessions?
I gently but firmly tell them to shut the f*** up and concentrate on the task at hand. The final couple of kilometres zoom by at double the speed and I arrive at the bus stop, dripping with sweat and panting, with two minutes to spare. I experience a burst of purest elation along with the sudden realisation that using your body as a mode of transport is bizarrely thrilling. I had control over my speed; like the equivalent of putting your foot down in the car when you’re running late, I covered more ground when I had to. I don’t know why, but this idea seems revelatory, maybe because we so often think of walking – and indeed running – as something purely recreational, and seldom as a serious means of getting from place to place.
The bus arrives three minutes late – pah, I needn’t have jogged that last kilometre – and I sink into my seat in a state of blissed-out relief.
It’s a rough ride on the ferry back to Portsmouth from Santander. Sleep is almost impossible to come by, even after the past few days’ exertions and following a slap-up meal of tomato salad, grilled squid and crema Catalana in the Brittany Ferries restaurant. But come daylight, the relentless up and down provides a strangely soothing sensation akin to the stomach-flipping experience encountered on a rollercoaster. The dance of gunmetal waves is more fascinating to watch than placid seas; powerful blasts of white sea spray catch the sun and dazzle with blink-and-you-miss-them rainbows. (The unkindest part of me also finds something sadistically amusing in watching bemused fellow passengers try and fail to find their sea legs around the breakfast buffet.)
Along with the intense weather, a ‘technical fault’ with one of the engines delays our arrival to the UK further. We were due to dock at 7.15 p.m. on a Thursday; we wind up pulling into Portsmouth at 11.45 a.m. the following day. We foot passengers must wait longer still, scattered around the information desk until a shuttle bus deigns to pick us up. Again, I register how my days of walking have shifted something within. While other pedestrians carp and complain, approaching the harassed woman working the customer service beat every few minutes to demand an update, I placidly relax in my chair. Haranguing her won’t speed up the process, just like getting frustrated didn’t lessen the distance that needed to be traversed. It’s not only me that has to go at my own pace; the rest of the world works according to its own timetable too. You can choose to fight it or accept it. The slow traveller I am evolving into is ever so gently being drawn towards the latter.
I feel I have been away forever and for no time at all. The whole experience has been one of constant contradictions, in fact: humbling yet empowering; black moods followed by wildest bouts of ecstasy; drinking and dancing counterbalanced by fervently mumbled prayers reminiscent of a fifteenth-century monk; the ugliness of the industrial Bilbao suburbs balanced out by some of the most remarkable natural landscapes I’ve ever had the privilege of seeing. And the only way to witness all of these things, the only way to really experience them, was on foot.
I’m reminded of the famous line uttered by Bilbo Baggins in The Lord of the Rings: ‘It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door. You step into the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to.’
I couldn’t agree more.
Carbon comparison
280kg of CO2e for a return flight London Gatwick–Santander2
12.6kg of CO2e for a return train London Waterloo–Portsmouth;3
340.3kg of CO2e for a return ferry Portsmouth–Santander4
= 352.9kg of CO2e
Carbon emissions saved: -72.9kg of CO2e*
* As you may have noticed, this journey was my only flight-free trip that appears to have had a larger carbon footprint than the equivalent journey by air. It is hard to verify whether this is truly the case, as Brittany Ferries does not currently have data on the carbon footprint per individual passenger for each of its ships. Consequently, a very general emissions calculator has been used to calculate the CO2e for this journey based on the distance travelled, with no accounting for freight. The company is set to cut emissions over the next few years as it adds two ferries powered by Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to its fleet in 2022 and 2023 – significantly cutting air quality emissions such as soot and sulphur – and two hybrid LNG–electric vessels in 2025.