"into the great wide open..."
-Tom Petty
I have to admit, the meseta is nothing like I thought it would be, but everything like I read. Big skies, wide open spaces, long distances between population centres, and completely devoid of anything interesting. I haven't even taken many pictures over the last couple of days because I thought that a dozen pictures or so of flatness was enough to bore anyone. Although the people who live in the towns and villages along the way are really nice and very friendly, the meseta itself is essentially a long, straight, boring slog. I need a city. I need one soon. Fortunately, one is coming up soon - León is only two or three days away. If I can get there by Sunday, I will have covered close to 180km in 7 days. I passed the halfway point of my camino today, in terms of kilometers. In terms of days, I suspect I passed that a week or so ago. Given the pace I´ve been on for the last few days, I can't see myself arriving in Santiago any later than the 19th or 20th (barring any disaster befalling me).
If it weren't for some of the people that I met over the past week, the meseta surely would have driven me mad by now. There's the two Francescas (one from Italy and one from Hamburg), Matias (also from Hamburg and a friend of the second Francesca), Gert (must have a pint of phlem in your throat to pronunce that properly) from the Netherlands. Super nice people who I´ve kept pace with this past week or so. Then there's Theresa from Vancouver and Philip from London...didn't spend much time with them, but what a time it was. Philip is an IT consultant, and an ardent atheist. Theresa is a retired nun and a theology major. Me: somewhere in between but with enough philosophy classes under my belt to really stir shit up in that crowd. We all got a lot excited (and a little drunk) as the converstion meandred from the nature of belief, the essense of faith, and ultimately to cognitive dissonance. May sound like dry stuff, but I ate it up like popcorn. I think we all quite enjoyed ourselves; we were all still on speaking terms in the morning, so that's a positive sign.
On a completely different note, I've been going through my previous blog entries, and I realize that I've been a little harsh on other pilgrims in general. Thing is, now that the race-walkers are far, far in front of me (by my calculations, they're somewhere over the mid-atlantic about now), I've met some teriffic people along the way. It's funny how different cultures handle foreign (for them) languages. On that front, the Germans come out way, way on top...most of the ones I´ve met here speak English very well, and do a very passable French. Brits try very, very hard, so points for that. Americans try slightly less hard, but are smart enough to hang around the Germans. The French, I'm sorry to say rank dead last. Every time you speak to them in any language, they respond in French. Blows my mind. Still trying to rank South Africans...most speak at least a couple of languages, and one guy, Stephan...I´d swear he speaks every language. I think I caught him having a long discourse with a sparrow yesterday, but I can't be sure.
Anyways, this is turning into a novel. Should be in León in the next couple of days, and in Astorga soon after. Then come the mountains. Big ones. Oh, well...not like they just popped up from nowhere - I knew they were there when I started this whole trip. So, until León...take care.
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