Wednesday, July 19, 2017

After the Camino - Recovery

Here we are after two days recovery. We have met, yet a new set of friends. Two priests and a group of young men (15) who have used the Camino as a retreat to further discern their vocation. They arrived on Sunday, just prior to the Noon, Pilgrims' Mass.


Fathers Nicholas and Joel invited us to join them for Mass on Monday morning. It turns out that they were staying in the same hotel as we, so it made arranging meeting times and places easy. We were given the beautiful chapel of Our Lady of Sorrows for the Mass and our men sang and led the parts. Afterwards we joined for a group photo and headed out for some breakfast. Father Nicholas commented on God's providence in bringing us together as it made the conversation about seminary with his group just come up naturally. Our men chatted with theirs about the program over chocolate pastries and cafĂ© con leche. We parted company with the plan to meet again later for dinner. 

In the meantime, there was one thing on our mind...


The Barber Shop!




We first stopped by a silver shop as Camilo and Matthew were on a mission for Father Winslow, then with a few small purchases at other shops we headed to the Barber. I had mentioned looking forward to a straight razor shave a few days before arrival and it became our goal, after venerating The good Saint, to get all cleaned up.


The rest of the day was spent praying and relaxing, with a little bit of souvenir shopping...














...until we met our friends from Down Under for dinner. When we met, we realized that almost everyone had a similar idea about the Barber. I guess it's one of the little known Camino rituals. We had a very nice time and then said our goodbyes as our friends were heading to Fatima the next morning and then home.






Tuesday will also be our final morning in Santiago as we will be boarding a train to Lisbon that afternoon for an overnight ride. Our time together as 5 pilgrims is quickly coming to an end.