Journeys

The most interesting of the diverse group of writers at the Ottawa Independent Writers’ ‘Retreat’ in June was Guy Thatcher. He is in his late 70s. He is a former officer in the Canadian Forces (Tank Corps, helicopter pilot). He is a widely traveled man who has walked the entire Camino de Santiago. He first walked the Spanish segment from Pamplona to Santiago, a westerly route inland from the south shore of the Bay of Biscay. He returned three years later and walked the French portion, the Chemin de Saint-Jacques, from Le Puy in the Massif Central, South-West to Roncevalles across the Pyrenees, to Pamplona. Walking the Camino, even the Spanish portion, is no walk in the park. It is about 700 Km from Pamplona to Santiago, and a more demanding and stressful 875 Km from Le Puy to Pamplona. Guy Thatcher was in his early 70s when he walked the Spanish part of the Camino and entering the second half of his 70s when he did his second walk. He has written two lovely books, Journey of Days, and Journey of Days Continues, about his walks, about the people he met and places he passed though; but mainly about the people.

I highly recommend these two books.  Anyone who reads this blog and is interested should visit http://www.guythatcher.com, where more information can be found about Guy Thatcher, as well as ordering information.

He struck a particularly unpleasant year of atrocious weather for the first half of the second walk. His description of this is daunting. I’ve been a walker all my life, have walked large distances exploring bits of country and a good many cities in Europe and the UK, and to a lesser extent in USA and other parts of the world. Insofar as I know my way around cities in Britain, Europe, America and Asia and a few famously beautiful rural regions, it’s because I explored them on foot (on a bike in New York). In a limited way I’ve explored Shanghai, Beirut and Bangkok, constrained by absence of street signs in an alphabet I could read.  But all my walks were puny compared to Guy Thatcher’s.  An advantage he had over me should I have attempted to walk the Camino is a good grasp of desirable languages, French, German, and enough Spanish to get by. Years ago I could have coped in German and Italian, perhaps could have understood when spoken to in French but could not have replied to anyone in French. I’d have sunk without trace on the Chemin de Saint-Jacques and probably even more rapidly on the Camino de Santiago.

Guy Thatcher’s two lovely books about his walks on the Camino are at their best when he writes with empathy and insight about the people he met along the way, his fellow walkers (pilgrims) and some of the unusual people who maintain the lodgings for pilgrims that are located at strategic intervals along the way.  He has great capacity for developing these insights and writes movingly and with compassion about some of them. He has obtained their permission to publish these often intimate details, and deserves high praise for the skillful, sympathetic  way he has written about people, some of whom had experienced great travail and personal sadness.

About halfway through his second walk Guy Thatcher, not a particularly religious man, finally figured out why he was walking the Camino. It was to understand better both himself and the human condition, and large philosophical questions about why we are here and what is the meaning and purpose of life. I’m trying to delve into these questions in my memoirs, although the excerpts that I’ve posted so far on this blog have rarely addressed these questions. I’ve posted what I recall of my childhood, school life, medical education, some of my travels, and the life-changing day I picked up the hitch hiker who became my beloved wife. I’ve written but not yet posted some thoughts about the meaning of life, my life anyway, and the lessons I’ve learnt as my own life has moved towards its end.

I hope Guy Thatcher will do this next: write a memoir about his life, the lessons he’s learnt, and what he has come to understand about the meaning of life. I would find his thoughts on these questions helpful as I try to clarify my own ideas about these large questions.