Santiago de Compostela Sept 13 - 15

We lingered in Santiago for a couple of days after our arrival.  We were staying at the beautiful Hospederia San Martin Pinario, a XVIth century monastery.  Our rooms on the 4th floor were in the monk's lodgings.  Cosy and compact they were perfect at 40 euros a night.

We attended mass on Sunday and saw the huge incense burner, known as the botafumeiro, as priests hoisted it in the air on a pulley system,  and allowed it to swing through the cathedral, a spectacle in itself.

 Interior of Cathedral of Santiago

The year 2014 marked the 800th anniversary of the year St. Francis walked the camino from Assisi, in Italy to Santiago.  As a result a special compostela was being offered at the church of St Francis in Santiago.  This special certificate is only offered once every 100 years on the centenary.  A year ago Cheryl and I were in Assisi  and hiked to St. Francis's hermitage in the surrounding hills, so this had a special meaning for us.

   

One added feature of our walk on the Camino Portugues was having the Spanish cycling race, La Vuelta happening at the same time as our walk.  As some of us are cycling enthusiasts this was of particular interest. One day as we left Caldas de Reis on our way to Padron we veered off course to a small village to watch the race as it came through.  It took 9 seconds for the main body of the race to go by, like sudden tidal wave...

And then, two days after our arrival in Santiago we watched the finish of the race as it ended in front of the cathedral in Santiago this year.  I don't know what arriving pilgrims would have made of the spectacle in front of the cathedral on this day, with the crowds, the stages set up, the trucks, trailers, billboard size tv screens and the music.  I'm sure it was not the arrival they were expecting...

From our position 50 meters from the finish line we were able to watch the overall winner Alberto Contador as he arrived to claim victory...

The next day we left Santiago on Ryanair for Barcelona for a few days before flying home.

Pilgrim Notes: Santiago

Without writing a book about it (there is enough of those on the Camino already), the story of Santiago goes something like this: 

Santiago is the name the Spanish people gave to James, the elder, the apostle of Jesus Christ.  After the crucifixion of Jesus, James ventured westward to the Iberian peninsula to preach the gospel.  There is no mention of this in the bible, but the story appears in later texts of the eighth and ninth centuries.  On his return to Jerusalem, he was beheaded by the orders of Herod in A.D. 44.

His remains were then collected  and returned to the northwest corner of Spain, where he had preached.  How they arrived there is a bit of a mystery.  One account says that they were place into a stone boat that had neither sails nor oars nor crew and somehow arrived near the land at Padron; another account says that the remains were shipped back, but off the coast of Spain the ship floundered in heavy seas and went down.  Sometime afterwards James' body was washed ashore covered in scallop shells.  His body was taken inland to a mount that is present day Santiago de Compestela and buried.

Santiago's tomb was all but forgotten for 800 years until a religious hermit reported seeing flashing lights on the hilltop.  After a favourable investigation by the local bishop a church was built on the site and Santiago began his rise as a martyr for Spain, 800 years after the fact.  The timing was fortuitous, Spain was in the throes of driving out the Islamic Moors who had occupied Spain since A.D. 711.  In A.D. 845 Santiago appeared in a dream to King Ramiro I and told him that Jesus Christ had given him Spain to watch over and protect and that he would accompany Ramiro into battle astride a white horse and carrying a shining sword.  So was born Santiago Matamoros (Santiago the Moorslayer). 
This was to mark only one several appearances of Santiago during the Reconquest of the Iberian peninsula.

In A.D. 1122 Holy Year Status was granted to the shrine of Santiago by the Pope, allowing pilgrims to receive an indugence and absolution of all their sins.  This greatly increased the number of pilgrims journeying to Santiago.  As well, the Codex Calixtinus appeared around this time.  also known as Liber Sancti Jacobi, or the Book of Saint James, it added greatly to the life of Saint James, as well as being the first guidebook on the camino.

The Moors were finally driven out of their last stronghold in 1492 and by then Santiago and the pilgrimage were firmly established