The Luminous Continent

Satellite photo of Antarctica

Inhaling pure oxygen after a long hard climb up a steep and icy slope in Antarctica, I look down at our ship as a sailboat drifts by and kayaks glide in the glacial waters below. 

Imagining myself alone on this frozen planet, I realize how American explorer Admiral Richard Byrd felt when he wrote: “This is the way the world will look to the last man when it dies.” 

Picturing the scene as my last view of a world about to be lost, I am struck by the silence. In this world of ice and snow, all is deceptively still, even as the vast ice sheet that is the Antarctic Peninsula I stand on keeps on moving. 

Walking the Camino

Posted by auberrie on September 5, 2013 at 6:40 PM

A first cousin and niece who live in Madrid planned this trip for me (a labor of love) and we are at the 100 km marker indicating distance to our goal: Santiago de Compostela.

To make it, we have to walk 15 km. (about 10 miles) daily.

The process involves applying for a "credencial" (an informal passport which you get stamped at hostels, bars, churches along the way to verify you walked through the route).

The minimum requirement to get a "Compostela" (official certificate of pilgrimage) is 100 km. walk through last section of the 500 km. Camino route (Sarria to Santiago). There are several ways to do the Camino, starting your walk from "home" (from Portugal or France, from parts of Spain through the coast or through the central area cutting through Pyrenees).

I chose to start from Edgewater, walking across the GW Bridge into the Cloisters in NY, using the museum's statue of Santiago de Compostela (with a pilgrim shell on his hat) as my "starting from home" reference.