Once we arrived in Santiago, we felt the bustle of a bigger city but knew we had an incredible experience coming to us. We got into town and it seemed like forever until we got to the plaza where the cathedral is. It was an amazing feeling to stand where thousands of pilgrims before us stood as they came to the completion of their journey. People were sitting, laying down, taking pictures and just hanging out in the plaza. Some people couldn't hold back their emotions and were crying. We did some of our own pictures and then group photos with our camino family. After that, we walked together to get our final stamp and our compostela. The feeling of being in Santiago was surreal because of the great fun we have had all along the way. We were excited to complete this stage of our journey, but equally sad to be already done!!!
My compostela said Joanne Hibberd. I thought there was a mistake, but I learned that really was my name in latin. Carson's name didn't change at all. We took our compostela and went to check in at our last albergue for this portion of our adventure and then headed to the pilgrims mass at noon. Though our feet were less than satisfied to stand still for an hour and a half, it was intensely beautiful to be inside the cathedral and see the large number of people taking part in the misa. My favorite piece was hearing pilgrims read parts of the daily prayer in their own languages and seeing the intense ball of incense fly through the cathedral. After we went to say a prayer for the end of our journey in the lower part of the church where Santiago remains.
We did some walking around Santiago and were celebrating with some Galician celtic music in the other big plaza. We hung out with our camino family and reunited with other friends from along the way!
The 24th of July is the big celebration in Santiago for the feast day. The actual saints day is a day spent with family. We planned to watch the fogos (in Galician), aka fireworks. They also planned a laser show on the cathedral, which we planned to sit in the square and watch. All of the festivities began around 11-12pm, much later than what we do back home for the 4th of July. We waited in line for a bit, but it turned out they weren't letting in any more people to the square because it was very full, or so we thought, so we went up to the park that over looked the cathedral. We found out after just a little bit that there had been a terrible train accident just a few miles away at the RENFE station, and that there would not be fireworks. We later realized that around 80 people passed away. Over 100 were injured and the train was going more than twice as fast as it should have been for the corner it was rounding. Santiago was not the same. This accident was one of the worst in European history, and definitely made the festival of Saint James, San Santiago a solemn day. The city declared a 3 day period of mourning, so we spent our time finding the camino friends we had met along the way. We had an excellent seafood meal with our french friends Jean Luke and Michel, and their wives. We did a little celtic Spanish dancing at the first concert of the festival, before they were cancelled. We did some shopping for ourselves and our families. We reflected on the incredible experience of the camino and realized the camino never is over. We found ourselves pampered in our first hotel experience (thank you Sheri Gedlinske!!!) with real towels and sheets. We do enjoy most albergues with camino friends, but we have met several friends along the way who snore a bit much. We had forgotten too how great it is to use real towels and sheets!!!
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