My quandary: pink or blue? UK or US Passport to take with me. Each carries its own risks. With the pink one, condescension towards a febrile, disorganised, arrogant, petulant little Island that got in over its waders and is now swimming in a sea of home-made muck. Talk about eat your own cooking. With the blue one, there is guilt by association with a barmy septuagenarian sporting an apricot rinse who personifies stupid (and constantly goes out of his way to expand the definition), cant keep his Twitter shut and can’t run a government (but he can run a huge tax loss carry forward). On this occasion, pink it is. It’ll be easier to cast an apologetic smile and shoulder shrug about British disfunctionality than squirm at American crassness. Trump makes OJ Simpson look innocent and Bush Junior a genius. Nothing personal.
Doris drove me to St Pancras. Took a couple of photos that I’ll no doubt regret. Kissed me. Smiled and shrugged her shoulders. You’re on your own, fella.
The Eurostar left on time at 0755, a lyrical French voice imploring us to use all available luggage space and keep seats free as it’s going to be busy – which it wasn’t. French chap seated beside me in our “duo”. Well-dressed and “scentless” – a good start, particularly in Summer because I have a very sensitive nose when it comes to body odor….and I am after all, going to the Mecca of body odor (France just beats Belgium by a nose, pun intended). He moved seats. Maybe read my mind.
I responded to a friend’s email, apologising for my recent hermit-like behaviour. I’m sharing it because it’s relevant: “I’m in this curious mental state of being increasingly relaxed but seeking a bit more structure, finding it liberating to be out but equally, missing the analytical work and knowing that I have to and want to go back to work but not knowing what the hell I want to do, or where. Screwed up, huh? If you hit a mid-life crisis, aren’t you supposed to buy a Maserati or a boat, get hair plugs or cheat on your wife? So, I do wonder what this is all about…and I’m becoming increasingly certain that walking alone in hot weather with a heavy pack on my back isn’t going to tell me, but it seemed like a good idea six weeks ago”. And that really says it all. We are where we are.
Taxi from Gare du Nord to Montparnasse was €25 including tip. My little treat to myself . Very polite lady driver in a very clean, hybrid something-or-other. Traffic not too bad. Clear skies. Hot. Parisienne women dressing as Parisienne women do. Yummmm. Espressos and ciggies under canopy in street cafés…. Shouldn’t these people be at work? Place de Madelaine and Eres, where Doris once bought a swimsuit. Oh how I love Paris!! Quite definitely my favorite city. Nowhere like it. Annoying! Sustained the first damage though – somewhere between taxi and train, I lost the basket to one of my walking poles. Bummer. Won’t be the last loss. Oh, the mood swings…
1252 and we’re off on time. Again.
Ready for the next phase.
The TGV is the dog’s bollocks. I’d forgotten how cool. Leaving Gare de Montparnasse for Biarritz en route via the new rail line that the taxpayers recently built for the Socialistas. Jeremy Corbyn, eat your heart out. These trains are delightful. New. Clean. Smell nice. Big display in French, English and Spanish – no German, oddly. Speedo too – currently 262km/h and winding up rapidement. Looks like we top-ticked at 300 km/h (186mph) as I scribble. I’m on the upper level with a seat to myself. These solo seats have a vanity mirror built in so one can do one’s makeup. A 5W USB port, a spot light in the arm and a dimmer wash light and a mains-power plug point in the desk. The tray-come-desktop comes down in two parts, there’s space for book/paper storage and there’s a foldaway cup holder. Lastly a pop-out coat hook and seats that recline as if they’re on gliders. You connect to the internet via tgvconnect.com and you get all the instructions in English, complete a with moving map and a “Diploma for 300km/h“. This is what taxes are for.
The New TGV
You’ve probably heard that Britain/Rosbif suffers from poor productivity but no one can figure out why for sure. The French/Hexagones are more productive yet their labor laws are more stringent and they work less. Arrogantly, I ask myself, how can Hexagone productivity be superior to Rosbif productivity? Maybe because of the Scots? More on that bottomless pit another time. If investment in infrastructure and capital goods has anything to do with it (it won’t take a week by road to get your goods to an airport, by which time they’ve perished), the Hexagones had the right idea, and the Rosbif are doomed. It’s not clear how we get back in the game being so far behind, and worse, at a time when our government is in tatters and the cabinet feuding like spoiled children.
As I bemoan our barren future, I console myself by trying to buy some cheap wine in a plastic bottle, and I proffer Mr MasterCard. “TGV Bar” man looks at me.
“Carte étranger…?” he asks
“Oui.”
“Ne-marche-pas!” he says. Won’t even let me try.
So cash it is. No tip.
Luddite to say the least, and a vivid counterpoint to the pinnacle of TGV technology. It is oddly-comforting (to a Rosbif bridling at the corn-holing he’s about to receive from a smug, unelected EU apparatchik) to see Europe remain dysfunctional despite all the guff and chops-licking over “Botchit”. Thesis intact. Europe can never be a proper, functioning “union”. Something as basic as cross-border credit card payment restrictions in the 21st Century highlights the hurdles still out there. It’s a sign. As much as the Hexagones get some of it right, it’s more the stuff that stays within l’Hexagone, domestic bliss – the ‘infra’ in infrastructure. It’s not that mine was a Rosbif card that they where instructed to decline to be punitive; Spanish or Bosch cards would be just the same. “Étranger”. Which my iPad auto-correct unwittingly changes to “stranger”.
Yay! Another (small) victory. We’ve arrived at Bordeaux St Jean. LATE. The big, flashy, tax-payer-funded monitor reads “Dax 16:15 16:20”. So, only the Swiss run on time, and they’re not in the EU. Money can’t buy taste, as they say. Nor can it ensure punctuality.
The Camino really is quite chummy. I was approached by a chap at Bayonne station as I waited for the local to St Jean Pied de Port, my jumping off point. We had the same backpacks and were waiting from the same train
“English or Espagnol?”
“English” I replied, as we shook hands.
“Figured we might be doing the same thing…”
This was Maurice – a burned-out physician turned private equity executive from Sacramento. His motherboard was fried by trying to juggle a hideous travel schedule, two young kids and an understanding (physician) wife. He’d resigned but unexpectedly secured another job, so the Camino was squeezed in at short notice. He only had 3 weeks, so he was going to omit chunks. We registered at the pilgrim office, wandered around the town, had a pilgrim dinner, bid goodbye and I have no doubt I’ll see him somewhere along the trail. Delightful.
Tonight I sleep with strangers in a shared room that costs €30. Livin’ the high life. Tomorrow, I walk 27km from St Jean Pied de Port to Roncesvalles. Supposedly the hardest leg of the lot because of the changes in elevation – start at 200m above sea level, climbing to 1400m then ascending back down to 900m. Apparently there is no warm-up.
I should have known. The buzz saw in the bed beside me foretold of discomfort. I just didn’t realize the degree.
I’m utterly spent.
“Drained” does not even begin to describe the day.
A full rucksack and severe changes in elevation have a compound effect, not to mention that ALL of the uphill work is at the beginning and just when you thought you’d be ok on the flat with jelly legs that wont respond to command, ALL of the downhill work is at the end. They didn’t mention that in the guidebooks. My legs are in shock. Tomorrow will be interesting.
The day began at 7am in dank gloom, moved to warm fog, changed to windy, out came the sun, and as I peck away here, we’re about to get heavily rained on. The foggy phase was the uphill work and I was astonished at just how much I sweated. It wasn’t hot but it was clammy and it was strenuous. Everyone was panting vigorously. There was no age-descrimination.
Pays Basque turns into Navarre as you cross a non-descript “border”, that is poorly sign-posted and preceded by a cattle grid. It evokes memories of the French Resistance moving surreptitiously in WW2 and more recently ETA and the separatists moving without trace as they plied their own modern-day “resistance”. Freedom fighter or terrorist and all that gubbins…
The landscape is stark and foreboding. It has an angry, jagged quality to it – rather like the staccato service in the cafes and restaurants. Sharp mountains rise out of nowhere. Deep, deep valleys and crevasses are cleft between them. You don’t want to trip and fall down one of those things. Game over. Quite amazing. I’ll let the photos speak for themselves.
I arrived at Roncesvalles at 3pm. 8 hours with stops is about the middle of the guidance they supply in the books. At my age (42), I’m ok with that, and as my mate Paddy Dempsey reminded me, it’s not a race.
“Show me a good loser, and I’ll show you a loser”. Yogi Berra.
I checked into the Albergue (€12 ka-ching, thank you), showered, moisturized (yup), did my laundry by hand and decided I couldn’t wait until 7pm, which was the earliest sitting for the €10 pilgrim dinner. Paella Mariscos at Casa Sabina was calling.
No sign of Maurice.
Sleeping arrangements are in mixed dormitories sub-divided into four bunk-bed “rooms” without a door. Everyone has a locker big enough for the pack though whether the bunks are big enough for the body will be determined. When I arrived, a cheerful but quite smelly Spanish cyclist was in my bunk. I knew he was Spanish because he spoke Spanish to me before I could utter a syllable. I knew he was in my bunk because his smelly shit was strewn all over it. I knew he was illiterate because there was a very clear, simple diagram showing bunks and numbers, and he had a ticket with 218 on it which did not match my bunk (219) with his shit strewn all over. Little things. Not rocket science. I agreed to swap bunks for obvious sanitary reasons.
I warned earlier about a sensitive nose and no doubt this will be a recurrent theme because it really pisses me off. Personal hygiene is so straightforward to get right but so nasty when not attended to – clearly a subject not taught in many European schools. I’ve travelled around a bit, and while the British, Americans and Asians are not without the occasional fugue, I am struck by how often I come across this condition more severely no with greater frequency in Europe. I just sticks in my mind – as well as my olfactory channels. Easy ditty for school kids.:
a dab here
a dab there
means you are clean
and I enjoy fresh air
Addendum: Don’t order the Paella at Casa Sabine if you ever go. It was horrible, over-cooked crisp rice with two anemic shrivels of squid, one half of mussel and two shrimp that had grey, dried-out meat in them. I paid because I don’t have the language skills to adequately express my displeasure and eloquently tell them to fuck off. No tip, not that that’s punitive in Europe.
Tomorrow is a 22km leg from Roncesvalles to Zubiri, with two distinct downhill segments, the latter at the end, descending from 900m to 500m. Weather not looking so great. There’s a sign outside: 798km to Santiago de Compostela.
