EXTRACT:Peter Murtagh and his 18-year-old daughter Natasha not only walked 900 kilometres together along El Camino in northern Spain last summer, but recorded their experiences and individual insights in a handsome book. How cool is that? It was a journey of discovery, reflection, emotion, exhaustion, exhilaration and lasting memories. In this abridged extract, we join them well along the ancient pilgrim route, in the village of Estella, where they unexpectedly take part in a fiesta procession, brazen out a bull run, and make acquaintances they will never forget
The Camino makes you simpler, because the lighter the backpack, the less strain there is to your back, and the more you will experience how little you need to be alive
- From a leaflet in the 13th-century church of St Stephen at Zabaldica written a few years ago by a Jesuit, Jose Antonio Garcia Monje
ZUBIRI TO PAMPLONA
21km in 6 hours
Peter: We arrive in Estella, hot, sticky, tired but glad to have started so early and to have reached our destination before the sun gets punishingly hot. Outside the town's municipal albergue [refuge], a three-storey former pilgrim hospital on a pretty, cobble-stoned street, two other walkers are waiting. It's 11.30am and the alberguewon't open until 12.30pm. But there's no question of walking further – we've done enough for today and the wait will be worth the rest it delivers.
And then, unexpectedly, the door to the albergue opens. Out comes a small, elderly man who walks with a slight stoop. He might be 60; he might be 70. He has close-cut grey hair, a lined, weathered face and a kindly smile. He’s a wiry sort of fellow, full of beans and delighted to see some pilgrims. His name is Pablito.
He’s wearing a white shirt and trousers, a red scarf tied Boy Scout-style around his neck and shoulders, and a red cloth belt, worn like a crios, tied at the side and hanging down the outside of his left leg. On his feet are a pair of white canvas espadrilles with extravagant red laces tied like a bow. Behind him is a younger man, similarly dressed, and another older man emerges from the albergue, also dressed in this manner.
Natasha: I was too tired to move, budge or show any signs of a reaction. I sat hunched on the bench, squinting my eyes at these mad people. Dad thinks this is great. In his usual, peculiar manner, he gets down on one knee in front of the three men, shouts, "Oi!" to attract their attention and starts taking photos of them.
Peter: What happened next is the sort of thing that central casting could not advance as a story line because no one would believe it. But it is true and it is what makes travel in general – and the Camino in particular – truly wonderful.
Natasha: Dad is in fits of laughter. Then the unimaginable happens; he starts to put his boots back on. I don't understand and I look at him, puzzled, then I look at my poor little feet, naked and in my nice open flip flops. "Come on! Put your boots on!" dad exclaims excitedly.
“You must be joking. No way,” I say.
“They want us to join the parade! Come on!” he urges. I can see I’m not going to win this one. So I slowly start to get up, with a face of disgust. I couldn’t want to do anything less. But it was just as well I did, because what we saw, and took part in, was unbelievable.
Peter: It is fiesta time in Estella. The fiesta is in honour of the town's patron saint, St Andrés. There's all the usual stuff going on for a week: the daily running of bulls, bull fights, street music and bunting, things especially for children, exhibitions and it seems everyone has had a bit too much food and drink.
Today, however, it’s time for the annual procession, which includes parading a relic of St Andrés through the town, along with sundry other participants – devotees of other aspects of faith (adherents to Mary, for instance), traditional Navarrese dancers, bands of musicians (both traditional in a general sort of way, and some that are very particularly Basque). The relic is held in a gold and glass case and is carried shoulder high on a special platform, held aloft very carefully by four volunteers. \
All we have to do is carry traditional pilgrim staves, which Pablito has made and adorned with scallop shells and a gourd, just like the ones medieval pilgrims used as water carriers.
But then out comes the banner: a tabard-style, silk cloth banner hanging from the top of a pole and cross piece, and with white silk cords and tassels hanging down the side.
José hands me the banner. “Can you carry?” he says. Well, what the hell! In for a peso, as they say.
Only when we are in front of the church does the scale of what we are involved in become clear. There are some 30 groups taking part, about 500 people in all. .The streets are lined with thousands of people, all the men dressed in the traditional Basque red and white. \
Natasha: Drums banging and guitars strumming, crowds on their tippy toes to see the parade, and opening the closed shutters of the houses along the streets . . . I feel like I am hallucinating as I am swallowed into a sea of white and red, and filled with cheering and music. It is like the climax scene in a dramatic thriller, where the James Bond character is racing through a rowdy crowd, chasing the baddies.
The sun is belting down on the city, poking through down to the street at lower buildings. Tomorrow they’re running the bulls at 8am and again at nine. Two shots at that, then.
Peter: Next morning, Estella has a slight hangover. As pilgrims leave the albergue (to the strains of Bob Marley's Redemption Song) and strike out for Los Arcos in the half light, revellers roam the streets, dodging mechanical road sweepers and early morning bread delivery vans. Young men the worse for wear, held vertical by adoring young women, saunter uncertainly about the narrow streets, all the time threatening to fall over into a sleepy heap.
We re-acquaint ourselves with the layout of the town; the direction from which the bulls will come, the turns they will take, whether they are likely to hug the inside of the curve of the street, or the outside (upon which judgments might rest matters of life and death). We note the best vantage points along the route, all the way down to a corral for the bulls, which is near the albergue. We pick our spot and are joined by two lads from Northern Ireland, Gary and Andrew.
Natasha: It's only been a week, and the things that we have experienced along the way are almost indescribable. I don't know how I can write about the emotion and effects this had on me.
It’s 7am in Estella, and we’re downstairs having breakfast in our albergue. We are sitting around a long table shared with other pilgrims. Out of nowhere I hear a voice beside me say: “So where in Ireland are you from?” in the sweet sound of an Irish accent. We have finally met fellow Irish pilgrims, something I have been waiting for. I’m thrilled.
It’s Gary McCartan, a 21-year-old from Newcastle in Co Down. He has just finished his second year studying nursing at Queen’s University in Belfast. With him is Andrew Lee, a 20-year-old from south Belfast, also studying nursing.
Dad and I told Gary and Andrew that we were going to stay on for the 8 am running of the bulls, Dad adding that he was thinking of running. They seemed very interested and declared they would too.
Peter: The bulls are released from the bull ring, which is at the upper end of the town, and forced to run down a series of narrow streets to the corral. An hour later they are released to run back to the bull ring where, later in the afternoon, for each day of the fiesta, bull fights are held and they meet their fate.
Natasha: At exactly 8 am there are two loud bangs, explosions that signal that the bull run has begun. About one minute later, we hear the thundering hooves. Like a cloud of black, the angry beasts come haring round the bend. With excited eyes we watch as they get closer to us. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Andrew slips under the fence 15 metres ahead of the bulls, and starts to run. Gary and I watch as he careers round the bend of the street, a bull now 10 metres behind him, big handlebar horns and all.
“What just happened?” says Gary, looking to where Andrew had been at the fence. Ten minutes pass and Andrew has yet to reappear.
“Well, it was nice knowing him,” I think to myself, sure he is lying dead somewhere. With that, the brave madcap comes trotting towards us, clearly pleased with himself. He is ambushed by questions from his envious friend.
“Right, I’m doing the 9 am run then,” Gary says, eager to hold the adrenalin rush Andrew had.
“Okay, if you are doing it, I’m doing it,” I promise. And so we wait.
Peter: Me too! I stroll down the street to the corral to inspect the enemy. There are eight of them, one seriously big fellow, three or four medium-sized ones and three or four not much larger than calves. They are mainly black, although the big one has a large white patch on his back, and there is also a brown one. Several of them have bells around their necks, which somewhat diminish their ferocity. But they all have well developed horns.
The streets of the bull run are thronged with people once more; the wooden barriers have been slid out of their sockets and normal life has resumed, sort of. A brass band with drums has emerged out of nowhere and marches jauntily up and down playing breezy little tunes, kind of Herb Alpert meets Um-pah-pah. It is a little like a musical jeer at the bulls: “Ha! So you thought this street was yours, torro; well, just you listen to my jolly tune. I’m not afraid of you.” And the young girls are everywhere, ogling the young studs who ran with the bulls, one of them grabbing a small one by the tail and almost dragging him to the ground. And then the band disappears and the people melt away again and the wooden barriers are slid back into place.
Natasha: 8.50am and we are getting ourselves ready, turning to Andrew, who sits high up on the fence, for wise words on how to make it out alive. The locals and regular runners must have been laughing at the deal we were making out of something that was clearly like a run to the milk shop for them. Dad hops down off the fence and agrees to join in, too.
The bulls would be coming from the opposite direction this time, from down the town, up towards us and to the bull ring. We stand watching, waiting, feeling nervous and wondering at the madness of it all. Bang bang! It is 9am and they have been released. We wait.
Then we see them. I look at Dad and Gary, who are closer to the bulls, to see when they start running. When the bulls are about 80 metres away, we start to run. They are synchronised in their running, and catch up with us very fast. I am getting nervous as I can hear them getting closer and closer.
Peter: As they round the bend and start towards us, I try to take a picture, close the camera and then start running. Jazus! Where are all those little ones? These guys are HUGE . . . Two blokes in front of me turn and start their run. If they're off, I'd better leg it.
And so I run and run and run like blazes, not looking back, just trying to make sure I don’t fall. “If you fall, Tash,” I said to her before the run began, “roll to the side as fast as you can; don’t let them trample you.” I’m fairly sure that’s what her mother would advise as well.
So far, so good; done about 50 metres now. Pumping, pumping, not looking back. And then there’s these two blokes, one on either side of the narrow street, holding a big, yellow, plastic, tarpaulin banner close to the ground as though they are about to lift it suddenly for us all to jump over. Do not do that, lads; do not do that! They read my mind and keep their banner on the ground and the whole herd – runners and bulls – trample over it. Then the bulls veer right into a large square and on up towards the ring; I carry on straight into a shopping arcade, scattering customers, slip on to my backside and lie there giddy with excitement.
Yes! Got away with it! And then the thought: Where’s Tash? A nanosecond of panic until she emerges, safe and in one piece and a massive grin on her face...
ESTELLA TO LOS ARCOS
21km in five hours
Peter: The Camino from Estella returns to countryside quickly. There are mountains in the distance: one, Monjardín, we will approach and then skirt around its shoulder, but it's a climb nonetheless from a start of about 450 metres to about 650 metres. But the exhilarations of the bull run will carry us a long way.
Unexpectedly, we run into Pablito, who had invited us to join the procession the day before. He leads us to his tiny house and takes Natasha into the garden, to a stack of cut staves, each about two metres long. He chooses one; not the first one to hand; he makes a careful selection. He bids Natasha to stand straight and takes the staff, measuring it against her height.
He marks a spot about 8cm taller than her, rests it on a table and cuts it to size. He files the cut smooth. Then he shows Natasha how to hold it, where on the length of the pole to grasp it; one place for walking on the flat, another for climbing, and where to position the staff relative to one’s stride.
I watch all this and am overcome. I turn away and look out over the landscape, cut wheat fields, some in stubble, some now ploughed and resting until next season’s harrowing and sowing, vineyards and their harvest yet to come, groves of olive and walnut trees. Behind me, there is a gentle old man, lovingly passing on to a young girl with whom he cannot communicate in any conventional sense, something precious to him, which he hopes will be precious to her. The gift made, we embrace and go our way, meeting up again with Gary and Andrew.
I walk on ahead; I want to be alone; my eyes are filled with tears. This is what you cannot buy, what you cannot plan for. Long after I am dead, Natasha will remember Pablito and those precious moments when an old man in his garden made her a walking stick, gave it to her and taught her how to use it, for no reason other than she should share in a ritual, the Camino de Santiago, to which he has devoted his declining years.
Dundrum Shopping Centre, Ugg boots, MTV and The Hillsand all that other crap will never, ever top that.
Buen Camino! A Father-Daughter Journey from Croagh Patrick to Santiago de Compostela
by Natasha and Peter Murtagh is published by Gill Macmillan, €16.99
