Pilgrim: Finding a New Way on the Camino de Santiago

A contemporary take on an ancient experience, Pilgrim is an entertaining and moving memoir of Kari's 900km walk to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. In classic pilgrim fashion, she meets and befriends an array of companions along the way, from all walks of life, united by a common sincerity of purpose. Battling through sun and snow, mud and mountains, blisters and bedbugs, her real destination turns out to be "deep peace".

Initially unsure of the difference between a long walk and a pilgrimage, Kari and her friend, are not sure what to expect as they embark on the Camino de Santiago. Sleeping in hostels and carrying all their belongings on their back takes some getting used to and they are sorely tested by the unrelenting physical challenge of the 'great trudge'. In the early days they are preoccupied by the external journey. But soon, like a modern-day Canterbury Tales, Kari and Ali find themselves swept along by a motley band of pilgrims whose stories touch the heart and awaken the soul. Pilgrim brings to life, in vivid detail, the kindness of strangers, the warmth of village hospitality and the sisterhood of the Sturdy Girls. With San Miguel adopted as their patron saint, the Camino becomes filled with beer, laughter and a return to the carefree joy of childhood. There is an unburdening, a sloughing off of the things that don't matter. Only what counts is left behind.

Pilgrim celebrates communitas, friendship and the resilience of the middle-aged women who keep going when those around them buckle, who bandage the broken, make them dinner and get them back on their feet. Encouraged by the ghosts of pilgrims who have walked the Way for a thousand years, and with no real choice in the matter, she finally slows down, and the pilgrimage becomes a journey to the interior. As she walks her defences are broken down and her heart opens.

On a transformational journey that takes her from the snowy mountains of the Pyrenees, through the dry winelands of Rioja, the mysticism of the Meseta, to the Green farmland of Galicia, a spiritual reawakening occurs. She revels in the utter joy of a frosty sunrise with shadows a hundred meters long, the frogs, and the cuckoo that follows them for miles. The body may be broken but nature has the cure.

Pilgrim is a coming-of-(middle)-age tale. The story is ultimately one of transformation, of rebirth and redemption. Written with warmth and honesty, Pilgrim shows what can happen when we jump off the path we are on and step onto a new one, where nothing looks the same.

The question is no longer what do I want to do with the rest of my life? The question is who do I want to be?