Roncesvalles

The plan was to just pass Pamplona, to change buses here. Thanks to my stubbornness and reluctance to ask for help I ended up spending the night and most of the next day in the city.

There were two buses departing from Pamplona, many people travelled to Roncesvalles this evening. Arriving we were handled efficiently by experienced staff and directed towards food opportunities and sleeping quarters. The arrangement reminded me of the Roskilde festival, clean and efficient, and because of the high load of pilgrims a complete camp of temporary barracks had been constructed. I try not to, but still worry a little over finding a bed further down the trail because of the large numbers of Pilgrims here. I expect most of the Albergues down the road to be smaller facilities than in Roncesvalles.

The church really gives the look and feel of an ancient Temple. The appearance is gothic to me and I specially notice the organ whose pipes you see high up along one wall, these intrigues me. The sermon is in Spanish. Sometimes we stand up, sometimes for quite a long time. This is my first Catholic mass. The only part I understand is the listing of present nationalities which is truly impressive, communion also seems vaguely familiar. When we leave the church, it is dusk. A small bat veers past outside the gates. There are many bats in in the village. Had it not been for the floodlights outside our barracks, there would be an excellent view of the beautiful starry sky.

Dinner is my first acquaintance with the pilgrim menu in one of the village's two inns, which both serve the same menu. Fish and Chips is interpreted a bit differently here. By refraining from removing the skin from the fish, you apparently avoid the trouble of breading it.

It is a strange village with a monastery, a church, restaurants and a hotel and not much else, except hundreds of pilgrims then of course. And everyone will walk down through the valleys tomorrow. I do not remember that I met that many outside of Pamplona earlier today. Many of the pilgrims are from Spain but here are people from all over the world. Around the dinner table are Italy, Spain, Germany and South Korea represented in addition to myself.

I barely see the stars and bats behind the bright light while I'm wondering if my shed mates will insist on activating the air conditioner stationed just above my pillow.

When boarding the bus to Roncesvalles earlier today, I accidentally showed the driver my ATM receipt instead of the ticket. Which passed without comment.

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