drum roll please...

WE MADE IT TO SANTIAGO!!

This morning was the longest 12.8 miles of my life. We left our government 120+ person albeurge this morning after a wonderful evening of wine, homemade shrimp pasta and many friends. Our understanding of the last day was that we would walk over a hill and be able to see part of the cathedral in the distance, our final destination. Not the case, but every little hill we climbed we were SURE santiago would be the next thing we saw. Made the morning really drag out :) We finally saw Santiago in the distance and it definitely was not what I thought.. was a loud, busy bustling city. We had to walk a couple of miles through the ¨new town¨of Santiago before we saw the cathedral peeking out behind the old building, 20 minutes later. We walked down a flight of stairs, said hola to all the pilgrims that are filtering into the city from the many different pilgrim routes they´ve all come in from, and under an archway. There was a man playing a bagpipe under the arch and it made the moment even more surreal. Suddenly, with no warning, we were in the middle of a plaza and the cathedral was part of what we just passed under. To our left stood a glorious cathedral that I swear reaches the sky. Took my breathe away a little bit. Catie, Michael and I got the infamous picture taken in front of it and then all of us just sat and stared at it, in awe that we finally reached what we have walked 200 miles (and 375 for Michael and Catie) to find. As we sat, the noon bells of the church rang out to begin today´s pilgrim mass service.

After getting our credentials saying we completed, we found a nice hotel to stay in for the next two days. This afternoon we explored Santiago and ran into so many wonderful friends that we have met along the way. Enjoyed a sangria while watching a tractor parade- I would love to explain this more but we´re really not sure what was going on... there were easily over 100 tractors going around and around a large park, honking and waving at the many onlookers. Weird. We treated ourselves to a fancy seafood dinner (our plan is to try the octopus that the area of Galicia is known for tomorrow) and are going to meet friends at a music festival and for a celebration drink later.

It was a wonderful day and the three of us are so thankful and mesmorized that we are actually in Santiago. Tomorrow we will go the pilgrims mass at noon where they will read our names as the pilgrims that made it safely yesterday and partake in all of the traditions. I don´t know that I´ve explained it before but St. James cathedral is where St. James, one of the apostles and is believed to either be the brother or cousin of Jesus, is buried. It´s a pretty amazing story. We are looking forward to the next few days of relaxation and celebration but it will sure be strange tomorrow to not put on our hiking boots.

Thanks for all of your thoughts and prayers to get the 3 of us here safely the past few weeks. I´ll keep you updated as our journey across Europe continues- we´ll be in Greece in 4 days!!

Buen Camino