travel

It was July 2011.

I was working in a bank, sitting in the office all day and party all weekend long - I was sick of it.
I had to make a decision where to go for my 2-weeks September holiday, was I going Amsterdam and celebrate or make the same in Prague.

At one weekend mid of July 2011 my mate Peter and I planned a trip, to go to Spital am Pyhrn by train Saturday morning 5:30, up to the top of a mountain, stay one night at a hut and come back.
I was really happy with the plan - sounded like a different but great weekend.

As it had to come I got invited to a birthday party on that Friday evening, my best mate's new girlfriend – my thought was “I go there just up to 11 pm”.
I came home at about 2.30 am - hangovered and shit-faced in the morning, grabbed my backpack and into Peter's car. He looked at me, started smiling and said "Mate, u gonna have a hard day!"

A coffee and a sandwich on the train helped me feel a bit better.
We arrived at Spital a Pyhrn, looked for the signs "Großer Pyhrgas" and started walking. It was 7 am, it started to clear up, the forecast said sun.
As we started walking uphill, I started to regret every drink from last night.
We walked on gravel-roads, on paths across a paddock watching out to find a safe step between cow-pooh.

Half way up was a hut, a good possibility to sit down and rest. It was about 10 am.
Some bread, hard sausage, cheese, an electrolyte drink and a rollie later, we kept on walking.

Up the path, meadows, cows and rocks, single trees in between, we reached the level were vegetation got rare, after another hour through bushes even the grass got less. And suddenly we saw the cross at the top, it looked so close but took us another 30 minutes to get there.
Five hours later, 1.604m higher, sweat, pain in my legs – I had no training - thirst and sickness - we did it!

Up there, sitting and talking to my mate about my holiday, he told me about the "Camino de Santiago" in north Spain, his experience of one month walking.
At that moment I knew what had to do.

Instead of partying I walked the "Camino primitivo".
Walking, thinking, talking to other pilgrims (I still prefer the word traveller or walker), sleeping in a harbourage or next to the road, again walking 30 km a day.
The simple life out of a backpack, the contact with the people on the way, asking for food or water as a non-Spanish speaker (and they don't know English!), experiences with wild dogs, fruit trees next to the road with the sweetest figs I ever had.