The final day of the Camino! Not mountains nor treacherous hiking paths through the passes nor late nights nor flat tires prevent us from our goal; after another 100 km haul, we at last roll into Santiago de Compostela - site of the remains of Apostle St. James, the third holiest site in Catholicism, the meeting point for pilgrims walking routes through Europe...routes that start in Denmark, in France, in Belgium, in Holland, in Germany, wherever people are born with feet and the will to use them. Our journey has been long and tiring, a challenge to both body and spirit...
We awaken in Portomarín to the sight of trash strewn across the albergue, discarded bottles and food wrappers piled up on every table by the pilgrim-tourists who, having started their journey here, cannot comprehend the trials and tribulations that face those who follow the Camino from further back. But that rant is old hat now, already spent in yesterday's reflections: the Camino is a process of moving forwards without forgetting to look sideways. Our cycling day begins with the arduous yet by now quite manageable 350 m climb out of Portomarín to the site of an old hospital. We pass groups of pilgrims everywhere, their organized tours and souvenir trinkets clogging the roadside cafés. At the top, the path drops off through a valley - and this too is crowded; some lack the tact or presence of mind to cede even part of the road to those travelling faster, so that we must shout ahead and break the already-tenuous peace or risk playing a very injurious game of pilgrim bowling...
...and the path heads in behind fields and farms after a while along a rough track unsuitable for our poor road bikes, so we veer off to the highway - but not before, just at the fork where we must make this decision, an old stalwart waves us over with "I thought I heard English being spoken!" He hails from Britain and knows these parts well, having visited each year to walk part or all of the Camino Francés; he has also tried the Camino del Norte along the northern coast, only to find that the terrain is mountainous, the albergues are not reserved exclusively for pilgrims, and historical landmarks appear with much lower frequency. Nevertheless, he cannot be faulted for trying...
...and the highway is unremarkable. The mountains have by now given way to gently rolling hills, which we travel up and over for what seems like an eternity. Some 20 km out of Santiago, our exhaustion briefly catches up with us; we take a quick nap by a bus station just down a side road to keep out of the way of passing traffic, giving us the energy to continue on - but the last part proves especially daunting, as if to mock us for letting our guard down even briefly. There is a long hill up to the city limits, which we trudge up with our hallmark persistent stubbornness. The hill mastered, we find that the carretera turns into an autovía and is thus impassable to cyclists; we must take the side road past the airport, on which we meet the hiking path again. This close to our objective, we opt to finish the last bit on this hiking path - so we find ourselves very quickly on a succession of small roads and packed dirt paths, each leading us past every church imaginable and over every hill within sight of Santiago. In our confusion, we stray from the path momentarily before our error is corrected by a helpful local who shouts and gestures until we grasp her meaning sufficiently well to right ourselves...
...atop the final hill out of Santiago there is a statue to pilgrims adorned with the cross, eternal symbol of the march of Catholicism across the Iberian peninsula. We take a short pause before descending into the city proper, weaving our way over the cobblestone roads, determined to make it to the cathedral even at the cost of fighting oncoming traffic down one-way lanes - yes, we are determined, for this is not an achievement to be taken lightly! The cathedral of St. James easily dwarfs all other cathedrals along our path thus far, its exterior covered in ornate Gothic detail - but the interior is yet more magnificent, with its imposing organ and ostentatious Catholic decor. We peruse the cathedral, making sure to hug the remains of Apostle St. James - in fact, there is a statue which represents these remains, so that one is spared the full morbidity that such a gesture would imply - and then head over to the pilgrims' office with its multilingual welcome sign, where we present our stamp-filled pilgrims' passports to receive a certificate of completion. As godless atheists, Valkyrie and I receive the generic non-religious certificate; Venus receives the religious certificate, which is visibly more detailed...
...the necessary gestures of finality completed, we turn to the tasks of real importance: food and sleep. For the former, we ask around until we find a restaurant serving a pilgrims' menu that is generous, delicious (swordfish, cannelloni, and shark!), and cheap (10€ including wine, which although equal to prices earlier along the Camino is less than we expected to pay in such a heavily touristed city.) This is followed by the search for the latter, which brings us to this old monastery building situated atop a hill opposite the old city. In the atmosphere of quiet monastic introspection, we drift off quickly...