Dinner at the palace

As I click on Will to Walk to access your blog, I notice that there are about about 1,170,000,000 results (1.7 billion) for this category. They may not all be in relation to you William, but you are at the top of the list!!

Anyhow, here is my rendition of the last seven days of your epic journey, Coralie and William. While I tried to summarise it in my own words initially, I found it better to shorten what you said, Will, because you have said it so beautifully. Your words have for me captured so much of the feeling and essence of your experience, to the extent that words and photos can do this. As you know, I have put it in present tense, to try and capture the moments as they occur.

Blessings.

Narayan

Day 36:
Leave town under the moon and street lights with that little creek flowing with us down past the horse paddocks.
Begin a long ascent up a rocky pathway with spectacular distant mountains views.
Continuing up possibly the steepest hill of the whole journey we reach the very quaint busy village of Triacastella.
We catch up with a Dutchwoman from our first day, a Kiwi, and an Aussie walking for the eighth year who had heard about his guy walking for Parkinsons, so the awareness is slowly moving into conversations which is great and a tour guide is looking at my blog and talking about it.

Day 37:
We see Sandy off home to the Alsace – it was great to have a good friend along; he was fit, funny and full of adventure.
Have breakfast with two lovely American women who are seasoned hikers but are also walking for spiritual reasons.
We swap photo shots along the way when one of them tells me of five friends with Parkinsons whom we chat a little about. She will give them my blog address and they may be in touch and we might catch up again with them in Santiago.
Leaving town in the light is hard to get used to, and having clouds is a new experience .
Passing animals in sets of two has us thinking of ‘the Ark’, but looking at the sky we know this is not possible today so we put it down to coincidence.
We enter what is an ancient forest. The trees are full of gnarled faces which slows us right down as we look into their ancient eyes.
As we emerge from this state of wonder an American joins us saying (among many things) that he is a Neanderthal with technology, how apt that he has just been in this ancient forest. His passion is stone carving, the hardest thing being not to cut off too much stone.
We settle in to our farmhouse as the rain pours down, the weather of unpredictable Galicia …

Day 38:
Unusually we have breakfast before leaving, so no need to hope for a bar along the way. I have the flu so he does not charge me for my half eaten dinner, gives me medication, and a special tea mix for sleeping.
Walking from our first farm stay we continue on through tree covered walkways looking out on to a patchwork of farming land sloping down from village dairies, with a handful of sheep and Alsation farm dogs.
We walk on again through ‘Hobbit like’ old forests until we come to a statue where people had been placing pictures and notes etc. when I feel a hand rubbing my back which has my Parkinsons’ sign on.
In broken English this teary French woman says: (as she kept rubbing my back and crying) “It is difficult, and for you too Madam…” as she looked at Corrie, “..my ‘usband ‘as it”.
The three of us hug and cry as others place more adornments or just keep going, then we talk a little before exchanging “hasta luegos” knowing we will meet again.
(William, your sonnet on this is very moving – it has touched the hearts of many, including us).
Walking on our famous Camino white gravel path, a woman, having heard of this Parkinson fellow, starts talking with me and ‘rubbing my back’. After saying some lovely words to me, she informs me that she was a physiotherapist working with Parkinsons’ people. A couple of Australians join us along with the Seattle man and the French woman, more tears, then photos and goodbyes.
We come around a bend to see our first Spanish lake floating below the steep hill town of Portmarin.

Day 39:
We move out past the beautiful misty lake. Owing to the possibility of rain I do not wear my Parkinsons jacket and feel very different. There are no ‘good for you’ statements; no ‘Parkinsons, what a great cause’ comments; no personal disclosures; no murmurings once they think you are out of earshot; no more ‘is she the wife’? The sign is an invitation that is taken up regularly usually by the many people who have relatives.
The country side is always pleasant to look at, pockets of pines or poplars dot the flatland, pine forests line the hillsides, while oaks and birch some young, some old follow the footpath.
No village for ten 10kms so breakfast tastes better than normal. The last 15kms are filled with farming and grazing based villages which like most are closing down, while accommodation and food for pilgrims keeps the ‘open for business’ sign up.
Light rain teases us as we walk the last 1km to our new home and very large bedroom.
An after dinner chat with a couple from Brisbane ends our day and leaves us with a warm and fuzzy feeling as we watched a couple in their sixties in an eight month old relationship holding hands and talking about their love for each other.
I think the Galician rain gods will come tomorrow.

Day 40
The Galician rain gods do arrive so we wait until they are less angry and left in a sprinkle but they soon once again lose their temper on two occasions.
We walk strongly hoping to avoid too much rain – it is unpredictable, and to save what’s left of my toes I have ditched my weather proof shoes.
Many medieval villages, night-watched by the ubiquitous village guard dog. These dogs sound very ominous but are usually tied up or behind fencing so not a threat.
Not such a social day today except for two occasions. Firstly when Corrie attempts a pied piper act without the pipe; and just four kilometers out from our next Albergue we run into our Canadian friends who walk us to the front door of our room in a field, in the village of Ribadiso where we find our new neighbours are the two Aussies we met last night.

Day 41:
Rain greets us as my non Gortex shoes apologise to me.
I like walking in the rain but usually at my choosing and not much of the day; everything is so fresh, flowers look newer, leaves look greener and scents seem more acute.
While the rain does not stop, most of the morning is spent in rainforest type vegetation and gum and pine forests which are thick with anti rain material moving in and out of non tree areas.
There are lots more walkers now as many join to walk the last 100kms. This doesn’t really affect our walking but it has a different feel to it and it means more can read my jacket.
Whether rain or not, it has to be on for our last 20kms – tomorrow – when the media will be out in droves to greet me (joke), but there will be a lot of clicking of cameras.
Nearing the town of O Pedrouzo we see our two lovely American women friends. It is great to catch up and swap some ‘falling over stories’ before seeing our two Canadian friends who have been traveling at about our pace the whole journey. I said to him earlier he could have a copy of the rare deer photo I took, but he said, “thanks but I’ll get my own”, well, he got it.

Day 42:
The lights come out from their cosy shelter. First we see the familiar twinkle of the stars, then a slither of moon and soon after, the fire in the sky, walking mostly through long, misty rainforest pathways, forming a glorious umbrella that we do not need.
This means I am advertising again and two Spanish girls take the cue: “Why are you walking with Parkinsons on your back”? “To raise some funds and get people talking about it” I said, “Like me” she says, takes a photo then the girl from Madrid continues to sing.
We had heard about this lad walking in thongs and bare feet and because of his enquiring mind, we meet him as well. “Has someone in the family got Parkinsons”?
We chat for a while about it, he takes a photo and then he leaves us an hour later still no wiser about what to do with the rest of his life.
Then I am asked by a group if they can take a photo of me, but after putting an expression on my Parkinson gaze they took a photo of my back.
We then do our final lap through the once familiar tall thin streets of Santiago’s old city to the Cathedral where controversially lie the bones of St James. For most this is neither here nor there but for the devout, the symbolism is clear and rich.
We then catch up with two other Aussies, mum and daughter from Japan, our friends from New Zealand and a young New Yorker whom we walked with some days ago and who is very thankful for Sandy’s help in locating her bag!!
We’ll celebrate by letting the sun rise before us, walking around Santiago, repairing my feet while Corrie will do exactly what she wants.

Halleluja!! Mission accomplished!
One million steps for William and Coralie.
One giant step for sheer persistence, courage and awareness-raising of Parkinsons.