Pilgrim's Road

and as I came to it first I went in. My temperature had dropped even lower on the short descent and the hot radiator in the tiny foyer was as welcoming as all the delights of the Alhambra. While I was hugging it, feeling distinctly the worse for wear, a young woman appeared from the kitchen to see who had come in. Discovering that I was English she went to fetch her father. By this time I could recognise a Basque by the outsize circumference of his black beret, and this small white-haired man was wearing one which seemed wider than he was high.
    He tut-tutted at my damp bedraggled appearance, and without a word poured me a glass of dark red wine. In my depleted state it raced through my veins with the speed of light and had an even more intoxicating effect than the euphoria of the climb. I stopped shivering almost at once.
    An hour or so later, after I had eaten a large portion of red bean stew laced with peppers and sausage, and had finished the bottle of delicious Navarrese wine with my host, I decided that Aimery Picaud must have based his condemnation of the Basque race on a very limited field of observation. It seemed to me that their wine, their food and their company were decidedly civilised, not to say, merry.
    The monastery of Roncesvalles took on decidedly more interesting appearance after this protracted relaxing lunch. It is true that the present buildings are an odd mixture of styles and periods, and are not in the best of repair, and that the steeply pitched zinc roofs are totally out of keeping with its dignity, yet it has something — atmosphere certainly. Whether one approves of its architecture or not, its setting among mature beech woods is undoubtedly lovely and its history is impressive. An Augustinian foundation, it was established here by a bishop of Pamplona in the twelfth century in order to maintain one of the most important pilgrim hospices of the whole route. Poised on the threshold of Spain — St James’ own chosen land — linked through Charlemagne and Roland to the Christian Reconquest, and coming after one of the most arduous stretches of the route, Roncesvalles couldn’t help but assume a special role in the pilgrim’s itinerary. It is still one of the most emotionally charged positions of the Camino.
    In its heyday it was like a small city and the pilgrims who made it there could relax for three days in what for the time was heady luxury. There was a hospital for the sick as well as an apothecary’s services for those with minor ailments. There were separate dormitories for men and women, furnished with beds instead of simply having straw strewn on flagstones. Baths were available, and there were cobblers to repair the pilgrims’ footwear and blacksmiths to shoe the horses of the wealthier pilgrims. For their spiritual comfort a miraculous statue of the Virgin (made not by human hands and discovered through the intermediary of a stag with a star shining between his antlers) graced the church. A funerary chapel believed to contain the bodies of Charlemagne’s fallen heroes offered a further focus for devotion. This together with the pilgrims’ own chapel at the gate of the monastery are the oldest buildings of the present-day complex.
    I leaned Roberts against the wall of the long nineteenth-century building which houses the monks’ quarters, the treasury and various offices and went to find out if I could stay in the refugio. After a short wait the father on duty, Don Javier Navarro, another Basque, emerged clad in modern dress, complete with cartwheel beret, and I was taken to a small office to fill in a questionnaire. Apart from the usual questions of age, sex, nationality, religion, point of departure etcetera, there was ‘motive for journey?’. This gave me some difficulty, for five possible reasons were suggested — religious, spiritual, recreational, cultural and sporting. Don Javier urged me to tick as many of these motivations as I thought appropriate. When I thought about them I could see that almost all had some bearing on why I was cycling to Santiago, although had I not been presented with the list I might not have started thinking of the subtle differences between such words as spiritual and religious. The only one I didn’t tick was ‘sporting’, which I rejected because at the time I could only think of sport as an organised activity like football or the Tour de France, and that didn’t seem appropriate to a lone traveller. But later, mulling it over,