April Showers Bring May Flowers

It is appropriate that we ended April with pouring rain. We received 24 mm of rain on Thursday tongue in cheek, I saw someone twitter “Toronto is looking a lot like New Orleans after the flooding”. We have had a few rainy days this week and the grass where I walk Bella is covered in inches of water. OK, bring on the flowers!

May Day
Is it May already? I received my annual announcement from Susan this morning, who every year reminds all us friends what the good weather starting in May means to everybody. Actually, her note brings back memories, but I think I have gotten past the May “2-4” camping weekends which were the harbinger of spring for me. Right of passage for our teens here is to go camping with friends that weekend, get drunk and *hmmm* need I say more? I will let others do this sort of stuff outside in the spring – I think I prefer to wait for summer to bake on a hot beach or have weekend long outdoor escapades. In the meantime, long walks, roller blading and nice outdoor patios are on my agenda!

We finished poetry month, but I can’t help but do one last blog on the topic. I was able to find a few minutes to catch up on my blog reading on Thursday night and as I was attempting to get through the ever growing list of bloggists I am following, I had to add two others I found mentioned within my “regulars”. This is a round about journey to the poetry topic, but bear with me, I will get there.

Visiting a Castle in Spain
First, let me put in a plug for My Castle in Spain. I am having a wonderful time with “virtual travel” by visiting various foreign websites. Since I have a great interest in doing the Camino in Spain in the next few years and am reading another blog On the Camino, which is a day by day account of one person’s Camino journey 2 years ago, I read the My Castle in Spain blog with great interest. She does a splendid job of describing the local culture, customs and everyday life which surrounds her. I enjoy her blog immensely. Hers contains many great local pictures, well framed and explained! It is like being on a guided tour which is handed out in 10 minute lumps every day or so in each blog. It was her blog which connected me to the Oia blog and caused a large sigh of jealousy to escape my lips.

Azure Seas and Blue and White Houses on the Hill
Oia is a village on the sea side of Santorini Island. The blog is called A Notebook about Life in Oia. It is a blog well worth exploring. I have some fond memories of things Greek and have listened to some first hand accounts of the beauty of Santorini.

Sadly, I never got to go there with my Greek, although his parents own a beach house on the Mediterranean a boat ride away. However I was bitten by the bug to go there some day and experience this beauty first hand. This blog brought back some wonderful memories of things Greek and is a very interesting site to visit because it documents the work these expats who are renovating a cave house in the side of the mountains. An interesting blog with beautiful postcard perfect scenery pictures.

I will go back to follow the progress and hopefully see the finished product of all their labours – along with the breathtaking photos of the azure blue waters, white and blue stucco homes and hillsides of green. I am sure their “cave” (not to mention Santorini island) would an idyllic place to live.

A Brief Stop with a Cuban In London
The second new blog I found was A Cuban in London. Whilst browsing through his site, I read the most wonderful poem, titled “kidnap poem”. It evoked some warm and fuzzy memories because of words used. Lilacs are my favourite flower and soon it will be lilac time. Words like “the beach” and “the sea” always cause a moan of desire to escape my lips. In its own way it is a very sensual poem. The linguistic imagery is so playful and laid back that the sensuality sneaks up on you. I was also very much grabbed by the content of the site itself. The visuals are stunning and attention grabbing and I saw several blog titles and some longer text content with interesting titles that will draw me back again when I have more time.

I have to thank the Cuban in London bloggist for finding such a wonderful poem. I am going to have to read more poems by this American poet.

Kidnap Poem by Nikki Giovanni

kidnap poem

ever been kidnapped by a poet
if i were a poet
i'd kidnap you
put you in my phrases and meter
you to jones beach
or maybe coney island
or maybe just to my house
lyric you in lilacs
dash you in the rain
blend into the beach
to complement my sea
play the lyre for you
ode you with my love
song anything to win you
wrap you in the red black green
show you off to mama
yeah if i were a poet
i'd kidnap you



According to Wiki:

Yolande Cornelia "Nikki" Giovanni (born June 7, 1943) is a Grammy-nominated American poet, activist and author. Giovanni is currently a Distinguished Professor of English at Virginia Tech.[1]

looking at wiki it seems her most recent published work is - Bicycles: Love Poems (2009) (William Morrow) I wonder if this poem is in that book? I will have to find it.

Looking Forward to the Weekend!
I am composing my blog on Friday, although in interests of keeping to one blog per day, I am writing this in advance of my trip up north tonight and putting it out on auto-publish. I am going to sneak off from work early and go up to visit with my friends at GopherBrokeFarm and spend the night and then carry on to my Georgian Bay Shangri-La tomorrow. My folks are camping out there (figuratively) for the summer, until their new place is built and I have some work projects to discuss with my Dad! Got to love a Dad who likes work projects!

Not sure if I will be back late Saturday night or Sunday morning, but will get my next blog out on Sunday for sure!

[Posted with iBlogger from my way kool iPhone]

A Pilgrim's Walk Along the El Camino in Spain

I had a wonderful evening last night.    My friend Yvonne (one of the ladies I went on a cruise with) kindly offered to set up a night so I could meet another friend of hers, Brigitte, who had completed the Pilgrim’s Walk – the El Camino Trail - through Spain in 2002.   Barb, my Collingwood friend, was able to come down to the Big Smoke and join us.  Barb and I are talking about – no, let me rephrase that – planning to do the Camino sometime in the next 3 years.

 You might be wondering, what is the Camino Pilgrim’s Walk? 

El Camino de Santiago or St. James’ Way is a pilgrimage  route to the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia in north western Spain, where tradition states that the remains of the apostle Saint James, are buried.  In ancient days people made religious pilgrimages on many different routes throughout Great Britain and Europe.  While the custom of a Christian pilgrimage has been well documented, there is some evidence that the Camino has been travelled even in pagan times.  There has been some claims made that the route was a Celtic death journey, westwards towards the setting sun and terminating at the “End of the World” (Finistera) an the “Coast of Death” (Costa da Morte) and the “Sea of Darkness.”

 Today, there are tens of thousands of people from all parts of the globe who do the Camino walk each year for various reasons.  Of course there are a large group of Christian Pilgrims who do the walk as in penance or just plain devotion.  A good number of pilgrims are not there for religious reasons, some just want to experience a different sort of travel, others  are there for the challenge of a major hike and some do it as their own a spiritual quest, removing themselves from modern convenience and comforts to gain some perspective on life.

 There are many different originating points and they converge at various points along the route.  There are starting points throughout Britain and Europe, although most would consider to have done the entire walk one must begin at least no closer to the end point than the Pyrenees mountains at the Spanish/French border. 

 The trails are sometimes very difficult but the Pilgrim’s walks are well serviced and reasonably safe for travellers, with water, cheap food and lodging at frequent enough intervals.   There are hostels available at the end of every long day and they charge only about 3-7 Euros a day (about $5-16 CAD)  for a dorm style bed for the night.  Pilgrims are only allowed to stay one night at each location and so you need to press on to the next destination every morning with all you need on your back.  No lingering over coffee and cake and “what will we do today” discussions.

 According to Brigitte they have not extended the servicing of Pilgrim’s needs to toilets, so it is not for those who want to be pampered.  It is an all terrain hike which is very demanding and not without inconvenience.

 Pilgrims need to obtain a passport (of sorts) which identify them as a Pilgrim and provide the credential to access the “refugios” (hostels) and obtain a “Pilgrim’s Meal” at restaurants.  Brigitte said that the meals were good and cheap and included either a bottle of wine or a bottle of water.  After a few days most Pilgrims would opt for the water.  The passport is also a record of the places you stayed at and is necessary to obtain a Compostela, which is a certificate of completion of the pilgrimage.  According to Wiki, you need to walk at least 100 km to obtain the certificate.  Interestingly, the certificate is considered by the church as an "Act of Indulgence", which means that it can get you to heaven if you did something big on the "no, no" category.  

 The route Brigitte took brought her along 800 km  of trail and this required 30 days of hard walking.  She is Spanish and she did the walk because of her Spanish heritage.  She did it alone, but said she soon met up with people to walk with and had constant travelling companions.   Speaking both English and Spanish she had an advantage, but she said many people did not speak Spanish and just English would not cause us any difficulty.  It was obvious in talking to her how difficult and challenging the route is.  She almost gave up once.   However the other thing that came through clearly is that she was glad to have done it and counted it as a wonderful life experience.  She also said she met a tremendous number of wonderful people who were from all over.  Some of which she still keeps in touch with.

Maybe 2010 is the year I should do it.  When July 25^th falls on a Sunday it is said to be a Holy Compostellan Year.   July 25^th is said to be the day that Saint James, the patron saint of Spain died.   The next Holy Compostellan Year is in 2010.  Hmm, next year?  A bit soon – I have another adventure I want to do first and that will likely be in 2010 and I need 7 weeks off work to do that adventure.  Will tell you about that one in a future blog! 

To continue with the account of last night’s fun, we 3 women had a great couple of hours chatting with Brigitte over dinner.  We were at to Quotes Bar (at King and Front St)  where I had a reasonably passable steak.  Yvonne’s sister works at the bar and she joined us at 8:00 when she finished.  Once the conversation ran out we decided to carry the party over to the Crocodile Rock Bar. 

The Crocodile rock is very much a ladies bar, and on any one night there are at least 6 women to every man.  It is decidedly heterosexual, and I have heard it called a “cougar bar”.  No matter, women go there to have fun.   Often the dance floor is just women.   While we were there we saw at least  2 limos pull up and deposit a bunch of ladies who were doing a send off for a lady friend bride to be.   The music is great, drinks flow and I am sure there are more than a few ladies who get lucky.   The rest are happy just to get out and dance and have fun with their girl friends.  Such as the case with us 5. 

After a few drinks and a fair bit of dancing my friend Barb and I left – enough fun was had and we older ladies need our sleep!     The evening was  such fun from start to end and I now have a renewed enthusiasm for my  future adventure, my long walk through Spain.  

For More Info on the Camino:

 If you want to hear one account written by a couple of ladies who did the walk:

http://www.travelwithachallenge.com/Spain-Camino-de-Santiago.html

 

For all sorts of other information you can go to these sights:

http://www.pilgrimage-to-santiago.com/camino-wiki/index.php/Main_Page

http://www.santiago-compostela.net/

http://www.caminodesantiago.me.uk/

http://onthecamino.squarespace.com/what-to-bring/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Way_of_St._James