My sister got the ‘Simon and Garfunkel’s Greatest Hits’ album when I was around 12. It was the first time I’d heard music that was about something. Music that was, if you like, more than just tunes.
I fell in love with New York vicariously. In my dreams I’d go to New York and it would look like the red sandstone tenements of Glasgow (the only big city I knew) with some steel and glass towers in it. Later on I watched the 70’s New York movies like Serpico and Dog Day Afternoon. All fantastically sleazy and beautiful at the same time.
Paul Simon’s songs, like The Boxer and America were a fundamental part of my teenage years. They can still reduce me to tears in seconds.
Steve : Some people go to great lengths to avoid the heat of the day. I got up around 3:30am to do my old-man-goes-to-the-loo-in-the-middle-of-the-night trip and someone else was up, packing their bag for the day.
We got up with everyone else and we’re on the road at 5-something am. Today is a short and boring day. 19 km to Carrion, almost all of it along the road.
19 km along the roadside
We had a first rate breakfast at Poblacion de Campos in a rather upmarket albergue as it opened at 6:30am. We must look for more such albergues!
In the garden of the 1st breakfast albergue
A second breakfast at a fun hippy albergue followed in Villarmentero de Campos.
Then, heads down, suncream on, headphones in, off we go along the roadside.
We arrive in Carrion around 11am. We have beaten the worst of the heat!
Our albergue, a convent just inside the town, called Santa Clara, is very nice.
We have a room with three beds and lots of room. Excellent.
Following the rinse, lather, repeat washing cycle H and I go out for lunch whilst J falls asleep. We find a proper restaurant with white shirted waitresses and air conditioning. We have a veggie version of the peregrino lunch special and are well satisfied. At the next table are half a dozen men who we think are the guitarists for a concert that is happening in the evening. They have the correct fingernails and – dead giveaway – one of them has a guitar. the leader of the group, an American, also has a very small kitten in the top pocket of his white shirt. Every now and then we hear a miaow and a tiny leg pops out to bat at something.
It’s now very very hot. I bought another pair of socks from a specialist hiking store. The lady tells me they are a good Camino choice. I hope she is right.
Back to the albergue for a sleep, difficult in the heat.
In the evening we go to the guitar concert in a converted church.
Awaiting a guitarist…
The American man in the white shirt in the restaurant is, indeed, the leader of the guitar school that is housed in this church. I ask after the cat and he tells me that it died.
I relay this to Jen who says that sick feral cats are very common in Spain. It looks like our American friend was trying to save one small kitten and had, sadly, failed in his efforts.
The guitar concert was excellent.
Back to the albergue where H made some banana and Huel pancakes and finally got to use the Huel he’d carried across half of Spain.
A final wander around outside the albergue, where H decides to do some slack-wire…
And then to bed.
Sunset over Carrion
Tomorrow is a long 30km+ day with the first 17 being the longest stretch on the Camino without water. Right!
Steve : I’vemade it through all 27 episodes of ‘Cabin Pressure’. Moved on to a few Kermode and Mayo film reviews shows that I had saved (hello to Jason Isaacs). Today was an excellent Radio 4 play from a few years back (I have hundreds of GB of BBC radio programmes saved over the years) called ‘Double Jeopardy’, a fictional retelling of the relationship between Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler as they worked on the film script for ‘Double Indemnity’.
Muriel: Little did I know, when I last did a degree, that my newly honed writing skills would be put to use for patient advocacy rather than for educational research purposes! I’m absolutely sure that’s not what the ESRC had in mind when they generously funded my further education but life doesn’t always turn out the way we planned it. Letter writing is not possible for Ali as one of the cardinal symptoms of severe ME is cognitive dysfunction. Ali refers to is as brain fog. I describe it as not being able to hold onto one thought long enough to connect it to the next thought. Either way, it’s a severe loss when one needs to fill in lengthy forms or write letters or answer neverending easily misinterpreded questions with potentially severe financial consequences. What was that question again?!
So today my job has been to try to ask for the assistance of Ali’s MP (Member of Parliament in Westminster) and MSP (Member of the Scottish Parliament). Pay attention now as we lucky Scots have representation in not one but two parliaments! I am not in the habit of contacting MPs/MSPs as I usually assume they have much better things to do than worry about our troubles but in this case I’ve made an exception and contacted not just one, but both of them.
For those of you who are not local, the UK has a welfare or social care system. This means that those who, usually for reasons not of their own making, are unable to support themselves are entitled to a degree of support from the state for the duration of their ills. Depending on your particular circumstances, this support is accessed by many and varied form fillings and evidence gathering exercises, face-to-face assessments and hopefully successful outcomes granted for a short period of time then reassessed (more forms, more face-to-face assessments – you get the picture?) to make sure that the benefits are adjusted to be somewhat adequate to an individual’s needs or withdrawn if no longer appropriate. Apart from the 40 page forms to be filled in (for people with disabilities?!) what could possibly go wrong?
Enter the Conservative government and their penchant for ‘making the bankers happy’ at the expense of the ordinary folk (from Steve, Ry Cooder – No Banker Left Behind). What follows? Mayhem! Much like the PACE trial we looked at yesterday, it is perfectly possible to enter the PIP (Personal Independence Payment) system at a particular award level (all carefully assessed, evidenced, etc) and be re-assessed 2 years later in much worse health but find that you have – according to the PIP reassessments – miraculously regained sufficient health/functioning to no longer qualify for the PIP benefit (or to be recovered in the case of the PACE trial). Your PIP financial support is abruptly ended. There then follows a comic farce in which various stages of reconsideration and appeal progress from one stage to the next over a very long period of time adding additional stress to your already difficult circumstances. All the while, with new and interesting stages of ‘recovery’ interpreted liberally by the PIP assessors in order to continue to deny your claim – until eventually your case ends up before a court of law. For a large number of PIP claimants this appears to be the first time they are able to put their case to people who are not trained in the PIP assessors’ new found art of denial of disability.
So what does this have to do with MPs/MSPs? You might think that medical evidence, evidence from people who know you or care for you, specialists, psychologists, etc would form a picture to satisfy a disability benefit claim? But no, in the hands of a PIP assessor these are mere fodder for misinterpretation and gleaning of ‘turns of phrase’ to be twisted into evidence on which to base a denial of one’s claim. So, in the end, one has to turn to one’s MP/MSP to ask for their support: people who don’t know you/have never met you and have a country to run. And, if the disability support forums are anything to go by, this appears to be an often successful means of getting the PIP assessors to stop their lying and manipulative ways. I would have thought that MPs/MSPs would have better things to do than sort out wide scale mismanagement of benefits systems, but I guess, thank heavens, they don’t! Whether their PIP claimant support loads are now reaching such heights that they are inclined to put extreme effort into bringing about wholescale repair of a broken PIP system remains to be seen. And whether their hoped-for interventions will make any difference to this debilitating process, for Ali, also remains to be seen!
And don’t forget that when this round of ‘trying to survive the system’ comes to whatever end it comes to it will be just in time to fill in the forms for the ESA renewals! Never a moment to recover one’s health! Anyone would think that increased stress was a well-known cure for whatever ails you?
And lest you think that any of this leaves me with any degree of satisfaction in an advocacy job done satisfactorily so far, think again. One of the risks of being a parent to a child or young person with severe ME is that you can be accused of Munchousen Syndrome by Proxy because the words the various agencies see/hear are yours rather than the child/young person’s since they are too ill to engage with such a long and complicated (and nasty pit filled) process! Here’s a link if you’ve not ever run the risk of being so accused – https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/001555.htm . Being your child’s advocate is not for the faint hearted!
Muriel: Here’s a conveniently Plain English explanation of a new theory about ME (Dr Willy Erickson). I’ve not heard this one before. A link to the original journal article is also in this link below for those of you who understand in depth physiology, anatomy and biochemistry?!
Steve : Last night was very hot. The Castrojeriz albergue is one big room and it didn’t cool down until well after midnight. Not too much snorting and I reckon I’ve got the pilgrim way of being able to sleep through anything pretty much sussed.
Bags loaded and out by 5:30am.
Castrojeriz albergue at 5:30am
Moon over rio Odrilla
Castrojeriz lies in a valley between two high plains. The hope was that we’d reach the other plain on the west side of the valley by sunrise. We made it with a few minutes to spare.
To the summit for the sunriseSun through turbines
Take H’s advice…
We walked the high plain…
Atop Alto de Mostalares
…and then descended into Itero de la Vega.
Another cafe stop at 8:30.
The landscape was changing. The fields were larger and flatter and stretched to the horizon.
It was getting very hot. We crossed the Tierra de Campos, through Boadilla del Camino…
Storks on the roof of the church in Boadillo del Camino
…and walked into the scorching town of Fromista around 1pm.
Fromista is rail yards and canals and long low buildings holding who knows what. The albergue was just off the main square. We arrived, did the pilgrim thing of shower, clothes wash and sleep for an hour or so. We Scots cannot handle this heat.
The 25km had taken their toll. Our feet and legs were fine but the heat had exhausted us. We sat around. H and I fiddled about with tech and backed up the thousand or so pictures that I’d take so far. Dinner was in a cafe off a rather tired looking strip: tagliatelle with mushrooms times three. As we were sitting outside a considerable wind blew in from the east. We were grateful for the cooling effect but in the end we had to retreat into the cafe. We watched a rather good basketball game on the bar TV.
Hamish: we are now roughly one third of the way through our trip having walked a mighty 271.9km! We only this morning walked into our third and final district before entering Galicia (don’t ask me the name as I have forgotten and the wifi is being unkind).
(Edit: the district in question is in fact ‘Palencia’ after having finally connected to the Albergue wifi.)
We have roughly 426k to go and we are all slowly getting better at early starts and early evenings. I admit that I am by far the slowest to learn about early starts… This morning was the second that we managed to get out and walking before the sun rose and the first that we had a rather spectacular view as the sun crested the horizon! (A sight I admit I haven’t seen for a long while).
The tiny Spanish towns are a sight to behold and every one leaves me wanting to buy up a derelict house and move in immediately! I fear I may be romanticising them somewhat. Nonethetheles, I would not be surprised if this were to happen…
Yesterday, as we wandered around the beautiful town of Castrojeriz, we came across a Silencio, something quite surreal and very beautiful. It was an empty house, filled with some beautiful photos and decorated with such care and attention. Each room was laid out precisely and the garden was well tended sporting a tranquil pond with running water, a single congregation, unlit church which had been excavated into the mountain and some unshaded seats in the garden proper for those who draw strength from direct sunlight. This silencio was based around the simple rule “don’t say anything”. After many days of constant company and many many ‘hola‘ and ‘buen camino‘, it was such a peaceful change to hear no voices and sit, tranquil and cool, listening to the sound of running water.
All in all the first third of the trip has been a great success! We have been rained on, nearly lost our bag a couple of times, walked in the blistering heat and eaten more tortilla than I ever thought possible. We are still standing, and somehow smiling however, so we shall carry on and see what the next 420km brings us!
Steve : Way back in Pamplona we were in an albergue when an unusual snoring-related event happened.
The albergue had some 20 beds, so we expected at least 4 snorers. I think we had three and they were giving it the full treatment.
But, but… glory of glories. The three of them were (a) snoring all at the same pitch and (b) had snorts of the same duration. So rather than the quasi-random snorting you get with the solo snorer this trio were synchronising nicely. One would start and just as his snort came to an end another would pitch in. When he had finished the third started, ending just in time for the first to kick in again.
Result? We had a constant background roar. Think of an old air-conditioning unit in a dodgy American motel. I can sleep through that! Easy-peasy!
So, snorers of the world. A plea. If you must snore in shared dormitories than please plan your trips such that groups of you, of similar pitch, always travel together and snore in symphony. A grateful audience would surely agree….
Steve : We were up the big hill beyond Hornillos this morning for the sunrise, so, of course, Sheryl Crow started up in my brain’s music player.
Jen and I have been discussing ideal playlists on a pilgrimage theme – however you’d care to define that.
Top of our list is the great Paul Simon song, “America”:
Cathy, I’m lost, I said though I knew she was sleeping And I’m empty and aching and I don’t know why Counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike They’ve all come to look for America
There will be more…
Ironically, given we’re on a pilgrimage where you’re supposed to be paying attention, on some long days, like today, when the sun is hot, you need distractions from the relentlessness of the trail. For the last few days I’ve walked the meseta listening to ‘Cabin Pressure‘, from BBC Radio 4, on my Sansa MP3 player. If you’ve never heard it, I urge you to give it a go. Extremely funny. Unfortunately I finished it last night in bed, whilst trying to block out the snore-fest.
So, today’s trek across the wide open spaces was accompanied by a BBC ‘Book at Bedtime’ recording of Robert Harris’s novel ‘The Ghost‘, from, I think, 2007 or so. This novel, and the Roman Polanski film version, are favourites of mine when travelling. I’m not entirely sure why, but they seem to transport me better than most. I remember listening to the BBC recording about ten times whilst my brother and I took shifts driving a minibus full of kids to a camp in Finland.
So, in the 34 degree heat of the Spanish midday I strolled into Fromista with the book ending about half a km from the albergue.
While much of the rest of the world has now moved toward disregarding this study for the methodologically poor quality which pervades it, here (in the UK) there seems to be a profound unwillingness on the part of both some sections of the research community and government/welfare communities to acknowledge that it was a deeply flawed study which should be retracted. An apology to all those hurt by CBT/GET ‘treatment’ would also be useful. A determined effort to remove these kinds of warped assumptions about poorly understood conditions, like ME/CFS, from the welfare system would also be helpful. Further, a complete revision of the advice given to GPs would be in order.
The ME community has been spoken of by the PACE researchers as an angry group of patients. No wonder, when they’ve been the subject of such research/medical/welfare malpractices!
Huge thanks go to the many ME patients and research activists who put huge efforts into getting the data for this trial opened to scrutiny and then re-analysed and exposed for what it is.
