Fini

Holy BLeeeeep! Not only are we done now...this morning at 7:45, the taxi will take us to the airport in Santiago! Sorry for not posting in the last two days!

We arrived in Santiago proper on Friday as anticipated. We knew from maps and blogs and elevation maps that there were several good climbs the last day....with one directly as we came into the city. Well they did not disapoint, at all! The last climb was the best, worst, funniest, as there was a hospital a little more than halfway up! Hmmmm think someone was trying to give as a hint that as the road went around the bend...it was still going up! A friend from the road, Veronica, traveling with her husband and two friends, actually lost her lunch on the climb! But she made it all under her own steam in the end! She put it down to a bad Cafe con Leche.

The city itself is a tad difficult to describe too. It sits atop a series of ridges and hills. Very little is flat.

We stumbled into a very sweet young lady, another of our many many Camino Angels. Rather than just describe how to get to the Cathedral, she actually walked us to the old city and turned us towards the Cathedral, when there was no chance to make a mistake, and then she left us with a smile!

Once you find the Cathedral, you, as a pilgrim still have a few things to do...you journey isn´t quite over yet. First you need to get a last sello/stamp on your Camino Passport, then you need to find the Office of Pilgrims, and get certified/stamped again! They keep all sorts of statistics on who and from where and how old etc etc. After all that you are given at long last a Compostella, declaring that you have in fact completed the Pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostella, via which ever route! Your name is done very nicely in Latin to boot!

Standing in line, you are actually standing on a staircase in a lovely medievil building, that wraps around the tower, twice. You are standing with people from all over the world, who have traveled any one of at least 10 different roads to Santiago! We reconnected with many of the folks we met along the way, standing in line there.

Compostellas in hand we hurried to find a taxi and make our way to warm rooms, dry beds with sheets and all that stuff. Adrianne thought she wanted to go shopping for something new to wear, something clean and not hand washed in cold water in a laundry sink! But in the end even she simply showered and went to bed!

Yesterday, Saturday we all got up early and hurried back into downtown Santiago to try and pick up a few trinkets and such and just get a feel for the town proper. There is a Pilgrim Mass at noon each day, where they read out the different countries from which we´ve all traveled. The seating can get a bit dicey so you want to make sure that you are there early.

There were still two more Pilgrim tasks to be accomplished. One is to visit the tomb, containing the bones of Sant Iago himself, which is under the altar, and then to "greet" St. James himself. Behind the altar (hopefuly I will be able to show this later when I download pictures) there is a LARGE, actually slightly larger than life, figure of St. James/Iago, directly behind and above the altar. There is then a small, very narrow passage behind there that you climb (again with the climbing) and then you approach this gold and literally jewel ecrusted figure and you hug him from behind! There is a gentleman of the cathedral there to make sure that the jewels stay right where they shoudl!

We did all of this and much much more yesterday and wandered back to our TC Santiago hotel at around 9 or so...with the sun having just gone behind the horizon. It was a perfect day to end our trip...today we go home and digest everything we´ve seen and one, to say nothing of eaten...after all....that is something the four of us do very, very well. (esp. those whose initials are R. and A.!)

Can´t wait to see you all !

Do it again.....oh God yes!