Camino Day 10: Najera to Santo Domingo de la Calza
“ All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking.”
Day 10: 24.8 kilometres - 40,816 Steps
I bring Dora the Explorer with me. She bounces along, light on her feet and always smiling. Perhaps she is the perfect pilgrim? Perhaps I am the Daily Crazy.
It is cold – minus 2 degrees C when we leave, warming up to 14 later. The fields we walk through are lush and green. I feel like Dorothy walking through OZ to the Emerald City.
The 20km walk is easy.
We arrive at our hotel – a Parador – a converted monastery/nunnery. It’s lovely, we each have a hot bath but Donna will not leave the luxury so I set out to visit the Cathedral alone.
It’s awesome! The Melbourne boys are there, they point out a small passage which goes up to the Cathedral defences, onto the roof. I go up the small spiral staircase. At the top you can open small viewing windows and peek down onto the main cathedral from above. I see the reverse of the stunning stain glass windows. It’s fascinating – the secret life of the cathedral.
Most bizarrely the cathedral contains a chicken coop with two live chickens and a rooster who live in the cathedral. Why you ask? There is a legend of the miracle of the Hen and the Rooster and it is truly fabulous. It goes like this:
Years ago, a German Pilgrim named Hugonell was walking the Camino to Santiago with his parents. On the way they stopped at an inn in Santo Domingo de la Calzada. The young inn-keepers daughter fell in love with Hugonell, but her affections were not reciprocated. In anger, she framed him for theft, placing a silver goblet in his bag. Hugonell was found guilty and promptly hung. His parents, although grief stricken continued on to Santiago and on the way back, returned to Santo Domingo to see their son’s grave. What they found was their son, still hanging on the gallows! Alive!! Hugonell told his parents that Santo Domingo had bought him back to life. He asked them to go to the Majors house, tell him of the miracle and ask him to cut him down. Which they promptly did, however, the mayor was about to have dinner and in his disbelief stated “the boy is no more alive than these roast chickens” at which point the roast chickens jumped up, sprouted feathers and beaks and crowed back to life.
To this day there is a saying around town: Santo Domingo of The Way, where roosters crow after being roasted. I kid you not.
I start to see chicken motifs everywhere.
POSTCARDS FROM Najera to Santo Domingo de la Calza
