The Final Day ... The Final Steps ... The Camino's End
Thursday, June 20th, 2023
28 days ago, Deb and I arrived in Barcelona by high-speed train from Madrid.
So far we have climbed mountains, crossed deserts, visited magnificent cathedrals in Barcelona, Zaragoza and Santiago de Campostela, and rested and replenished over meals of local soups, paella, seafood and other area specialties.
The ocean port of Muxia is both our destination for today and our final destination for our 2023 Camino hiking. Muxia lies only 8 miles away.
We are in the absolutely tiny hamlet of Frixe, which literally measures at 800 feet by 400 feet. Deb and I are sitting in the dining area of the Casa Rural Ceferinos, which is similar to a Bed & Breakfast. We got up at 8:00 am for breakfast. but looking out the floor-to-ceiling windows of the dining area, watching the heavy rains splash off the road, we realize how absolutely, completely, stunningly little desire we have to hike in the rain.
We have two choices: get soaked or wait it out. The weather forecast says that it will pour until about 11:30 am which means a close call on the noon check-out, but also three hours late in starting.
And it is so boring waiting. I spend part of the time thinking about how I face challenges. When I start the day in good fashion, and it turns bad, I tend to press on because I'm already committed to the day.
But it's a different feeling when I'm sitting over breakfast, mulling over some unpleasantries - like heavy downpours of rain - and thinking to myself, “Do I even feel like getting out of bed?”
Noon comes around and the rains break. Deb and I suit up in our rain gear to handle the last of the drops. After 28 days and 270 miles, off we go on our final 42,000 feet, our final 210 minutes - give or take - of hiking.
Our final day takes us on dirt trails through eucalyptus forests, up and down sets of hills, on farm roads past fields of grain, and backroads past livestock.
Later in the afternoon, we come to the sandy beaches of the Atlantic Ocean and the Costa da Morte, in English - the Coast of Death, given this name because of the large number of shipwrecks along its rocky shore.
Galicia is a totally unique region of Spain. With its strong Celtic roots, you would not be wrong to think, except for the language, that you are in Ireland. The Galician “gaita,” a distinctive instrument quite similar to the bagpipes from Ireland, is often heard during local music festivals.
I know enough about Galicia and Muxia to know that it only converted to Christianity in the 12th century, so this countryside was a sacred Celtic place long before and long after St James preached here.
As the legend goes, the Virgin Mary herself met St. James here in Muxia and encouraged him in his preaching throughout Galicia.
It is also believed the body of St James, after his beheading by the Romans, was carried in a boat back to Muxía. Said boat sunk along the Costa da Morte, and by a miracle, the body was only later discovered and taken to Santiago.
Muxia is both a working fisherman town and a tourist destination. Deb and I have supper in the seaside strip of restaurants. We look out over the harbor where the boats lie moored to either the piers or floating buoys … unless they are on the ocean, catching the daily catch.
The town of Muxia is not the end of Deb’s and my camino. We must walk just under another mile, out onto the point of the peninsula.
Finally at the end of the peninsula, we can go no further. The church, jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean, is dedicated to "Nosa Senora da Barca", “Our Lady of Ships”.
This place was originally a pre-Christian Celtic shrine and sacred spot. Christians built a hermitage on this location, and later the present church in the 17th century.
In the evening I stop in the church to visit the pilgrim support center to get my pilgrim credential stamped, the final one of this hike. I spend some time looking at what the support center has. How you view these items depends on your reason for walking here. They are religious artifacts for the true believers, or memories for those on a spiritual journey, or souvenirs for the tourists. I select a few items as memories.
The final steps are to walk out on the point. Hopping from person-sized rock to rock, I imagined myself with those sailors on those ships of wood, sinking in the shoals because we navigated carelessly. In my imagination run wild, I am with those forlorn sailors in their final prayers, regretting sailing the Coast of Death.
Ultimately, I feel no right to compare myself with them, having been a sailor on ships of steel.
I was sure that I recognized the flat rocky ledge where the movie “The Way” starring Martin Sheen, was filmed. The story centers on a man who loses his son in an accident on the Camino de Santiago, and so Martin Sheen walks the 500 miles to honor his son. It’s easy to remember the first time I saw that movie.
By the time the final reel slipped out of the projector, I knew that I would walk that camino someday. And here I stand on the Costa da Morte, by the Church of Our Lady of Ships.
The sun sets over the Atlantic. Deb and I get up to return to our room. Another camino done … finished … complete.
Tomorrow we take the train to Madrid, the plane to America and finally home.
