A Day to be Free in Santiago de Compostela

This morning, we were all happy to sleep in a little bit, and even happier that we didn’t have to pack up and shift hotels again! The yoga team was able to have practice in the beautiful former horse stalls underneath the hotel we are staying in, which is a former monastery. The readings for the day were selected on encouraging people to be authentically themselves today - fully exploring exactly who they were and what they might like to do. As with all themes in yoga, who knows who picked up that lesson, but that was the only exposure for today’s word, which was authenticity.

Breakfast was offered during a long stretch of time this morning, so we all ate on our own schedules. At 9:30, we all met in front of the hotel for a two hour tour of the city, the cathedral museum, and the cathedral by a beautiful guide, Christine. Christine regaled us of tales and details about the history of the city and the cathedral and peppered her talk with plenty of suggestions for us to explore in the afternoon. She found us a nice spot to sit, on the inside steps of the church, for the noon pilgrim’s mass and let us know that today the botofumiero would in fact be flying. She left us to experience a lovely mass with many priests and some singing, all in Spanish. Before the mass, it was fun to hear the reading of the locations from which the pilgrims had entered the city in the prior 24 hours. So many countries! After communion, the 8 men in red robes untied the ropes supporting the giant silver and tin incense burner, filled it with incense, and then, using a perfectly correographed series of tugs and pulls, swung it high above the heads of the people gathered. Christine had situated us perfectly, so that the botofumiero flew right over us. It was quite breathtaking!

After mass, we all split up to experience the many gifts of the city on our own. We gathered again at the end of the day for an amazing dinner at Restaurante Langrina. Course after course of delicious food, with everyone’s dietary needs taken care of so lovingly. A great restaurant owned by a great family! We were lucky enough to be serenaded a couple of times by a local guitar/singing group, which was icing on the cake!

Copyright 2022 Nancy and Hugh Murray

Nancy C Murray is a practitioner of shamanic energy medicine, Reiki master joy professor and spiritual leader. She leads public and private yoga classes and healing sessions, transformational courses, and also retreats and spiritual journeys.