“But walking causes absorption. Walking interminably, taking in through your pores the height of the mountains when you are confronting them at length, breathing in the shape of the hills for hours at a time during a slow descent. The body becomes steeped in the earth it treads. And thus, gradually, it stops being in the landscape:
it becomes the landscape. ”
― Frédéric Gros,
This one really resonates with me.
This might sound weird, I don't know.
Perhaps it only happens on a longer Camino, maybe after 2-3 weeks, but I've often felt one of the most rewarding aspects of a Camino is the way we can become lost in, or 'at one' with the landscape.
I feel myself become more 'grounded' and almost part of the landscape itself. When walking alone, even on remote stretches, I never feel lonely. I feel surrounded by life. The birds, the animals, the trees. Yes, particularly the trees.
Some must have stood there for centuries, like guardians of the way, watching Pilgrims pass by. Some I think deserve names, like dear Tomas a couple of days out from Santiago. He resembles an 'Ent'.
That connection to the Landscape, to it's energy if you like, was very strong one day.
Pat and I were walking between Villa Franca del Bierzo and Vega de Valcarce. So I think it would have been a couple of kms before La Portela perhaps?
I was slightly ahead of Pat, and I had stopped to take some photos as we passed along a small country road in quite a wooded area in that valley.
I had stopped and was just looking at a tree.
Pat may have felt my mood as she stopped beside me.
"Oh No"!, she said.
"That's so sad".....
At the side of the tree, was a pile of recently felled logs.
Judging by the diameter of the logs, these were not old trees.
And next to the pile of 'young logs' an ancient tree was standing.
Almost stooped over the pile, as if in pain.
Pat wept......
There were many such piles along that road, and then a saw mill.
And stacks of planks.
I called that section, the 'Valley of the Fallen'.
Maybe the longer we spend in nature, we come to understand it more, and become part of it?
Do you find yourself talking to the trees, the birds, the animals?