0.0 km to day! Ok that's not really true as I walked around the city but no more Camino kilometers.
I spelt in till almost 11am. Oh it felt so good. But the mattress on my bed was like two inches thick and I could feel the wires underneath. I looked around the room this morning and realized not all the mattresses were the same. So I move my self to a recently vacated bed with a six inch thick mattress.
I got a hotdog for €1 for lunch. Then walked around looking for the office of the place I shipped my stuff ahead to. I came across people whom appeared to be waiting for a parade holding what seemed like long paper sticks.
Eventually I found the place but it was not open. A note on the door sent me around the corner to a bakery who had a key to retrieve my box. It cost €20 but it was worth it to know that my stuff was safe and secure no matter how long my camino took. (The post office says they will only hold packages for 30days).
I took my stuff and sat in the cathedral plaza for a while hoping to see someone I knew. No one I knew arrived, but it is nice to just watch the excitement of others.
I took a siesta back at the albergue. My knees hurt the most right now. I think I pushed them too hard making sure I got to Santiago on Thursday so I could see everyone one last time.
Later I headed back into town to to see the inside of the Cathedral. I took a quick look around and then realized people were claiming seats an hour before the 7:30 mass started.
The mass was in Spanish and I understood a little of it. The amusing part was that the sections where people normally kneel, all the pilgrims remained standing. Everyone's legs hurt! Hahaha
I had read online that this mass every Friday, a local company paid the fee to swing the Botafumeiro, a massive incense burner that was used in long ago times to mask the stench of the hundreds of smelly pilgrims attending mass. It was also believed that incense smoke had a prophylactic effect in the time of plagues and epidemics. The tradition of swinging the Botafumeiro can be traced back to the 11th century. The Botafumeiro is carried and swung by eight men in red robes, called tiraboleiros. The men pull on a massive rope to send Botafumeiro swinging over the congregation near to the ceiling.
While waiting for mass I had noticed a long line to the left of where I was sitting. After mass I asked the guard what the line was for. It was to visit the tomb of St. James. I quickly joined the queue a minute before the guard closed the line turning away very disappointed pilgrims, two if which were an older French couple I had seen a lot during the middle section of my camino. I think they were a little disappointed and not able to come back the next day but the language difference between us has always been difficult.
The tomb of St. James is controversial in my opinion. I went to visit it because of the pilgrim tradition not because I really believe it contains the bones of the Apostle James. St. James was beheaded in Jerusalem and his remains were reportedly brought back to this region of Spain. A tomb was built but abandoned several hundred years later due to the persecution of Christians in the region. Over 500 years later, in 814, a hermit living alone in the woods discovered the tomb in the middle of a field. The hermit said he had been led to the site by falling stars. The Church declared the remains to be those of St.James. The king ordered a chapel to be built on the site. As the legend goes kKing Alfonso II became the first pilgrim to journey to the chapel. The construction of the current cathedral began in 1075. Interestingly the tomb of St. James is still in the original marble vault that was found in the middle of the field as the cathedral was really built on top of it and the city sprang up around it. While the cathedral was completed less than 50 years later it was expanded and and changed over the decades. The most famous facade, the one facing the square where the pilgrims end their journey and subsequently the most photographed, dates from the 18th Century.
Anyway, back to the remains of St. James. The church has refused to have the bones analyzed by modern technology, not even for Carbon14 dating. This has created many sceptic and the believers can only take with faith the word of the church.
After seeing the tomb, the line continues to, as a translated sign says, "embrace the apostle". Over the alter is a gilded statue of St.James. A flight of stairs lead you up behind the alter. The steps are nearly purple and are worn stone with indentations from the millions of feet that have tread there over the last 900 years. You hug the statue from behind, wrapping your arms around his shoulders.
The line leads you out through a back door of the cathedral to the street. I took the long way back to the albergue past the doner kabab stand and a small grocery store picking up food and juice for dinner.
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