We have now walked 800km, or so, and have arrived in the fabled city of Santiago de Compostela! This camino is now complete. But perspectives have changed and we realise that, actually, we have just started. One part of our path is finished. But another is about to begin.

Looking back to when we did our practice walk in Richmond Park in December last year, it seems like a lifetime ago. Those people who did that practice walk don´t really seem to have been us. Although it was us. We actually did do that walk. But somehow not. Back then 12km seemed like a long way.

Those two people who got on a train to St. Jean Pied-du-Port and started walking the next morning on this camino were us too. But it seems as if during the camino across Spain we have changed. Subtly. Perhaps profoundly. Or perhaps our perspectives of space and time and our place in these measures has changed dramatically.

Looking back, it seems like yesterday when we started our walk over the mountains bordering France and Spain. Yet in reality, it as about four and a half weeks ago!

With all massive tasks, undertakings or challenges we all take on in our lives, it is easy to be overwhelmed by the size of it and stop even before we have started. But the 800km is far easier overcome when every day is broken down into distances to be walked, places to visit, things to see, food and drinks to be organised. And each day is broken down into sections. After this town, is this. After that farmhouse, is that. We will have some water there, some lunch then.....

But the process of breaking down the massive task is continued until you realise that each objective is built upon the most simple, easily achieved undertaking we can do. And that is merely taking one step after another. When there is no deadline, time is simply a measure of the passage of the sun across the sky or the passing of the rain from this valley to the next. And distance walked is merely achived by one step followed by another. So the footfalls of our feet have become the metronome of our achievements. So our perspectives changed again.

Whoever said, "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step", got it absolutely right. But we thought it best to maybe add this caveat: "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a good pair of shoes!" We should know. And the pain and the suffering that the boots have caused have also changed our perspectives!

At the beginning, 20km in a day was long and hard. But toward the end of this camino, 35km was easily, and enjoyably, achieveable. Getting started in the mornings was an up-at-7am-and-out-the-door-by-8am-at-the-latest affair. Whereas now, it-is-up-whenever-and-get-some-breakfast-and-hit-the-road-by-9ish-or-so affair. Lunch was far more leisurely and arrival at day´s end was a when-we-get-there affair. So the perspectives changed again. And it was the journey and not the destination that was important.

Everybody that walks the camino has a very individual experience. No two are alike. Even though you may share the same bubbles, your experiences are shaped by the changing of your perspectives. And you share the road, beers, wine, food, pain, suffering, laughs and crys with some amazingly diverse and interesting people. If the camino is the cake, then our fellow pilgrims are the icing!

Whether you believe that is is just a long walk through some fantastic landscapes with some incredible people. Or that you are guided by a higher power on a holy pilgrimage, you can not help but be choked with a little emotion upon reaching the Cathedral reputed to house the relics of the Apostle of St James. And it is not hard to be moved knowing that you have followed in the footsteps of 12 centuries of pilgrims and heard the same Pilgrims´Mass upon arrival. The graves and memorials of pilgrims´ passed have testified to the sacrifice made in an attempt to reach this fabled city.

With one part of our path complete, we have decided to carry on with another....you guys knew we had a touch of madness anyway! How perspectives change!

Tomorrow we will walk "just" another 100km toward Finisterre - "The ends of the Earth" and Muxia - the reputed place where St. James´ boat was driven ashore in the mists of legend. At the end of the Camino Finisterre, we shall have a beer (or three) and toast the sun as it sinks into the western horizon and reflect on what the future holds across the sea! just like the pilgrims of old!

Like all tasks that are achieved, it is only in retrospect that the lessons they contained are realised. And so too with these paths that we have just walked!

May there be a road! Buen camino!